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Looks like a false alarm – which is very disappointing. Thank you all for taking the time to check. Really appreciated.
Gary
I obtained an unfiltered CCD image from SLOOH Chile on May 3.006UT and measured it at 12.540CV +/- 0.004 using a nearby A2 star. There currently isn’t a sequence with the AAVSO chart, although I suspect that will appear before too long.
Gary
I had it at 12.5 visual on March 14.085 UT. It was a tad brighter in April 2020 at 12 4, and then 11.9 in April 2013 – the brightest ‘outburst’ for a number of years. I have a light curve here… https://garypoyner.wix.com/variablestars/markarian-421
Gary
I first met Ron at the Winchester weekend of 1978. I was in awe of his ‘astro-photography’, and can still remember those stunning photo’s of M42 which he used to display in the reception area of King Alfreds College. He turned up to a few VS meetings over the years, along with those held by the Deep Sky Section. It was always a pleasure to see him again and have a chat. His search for perfection in his telescopes was always a source of amusement to me (and others I have to say), and I would often ask him what telescope he had taken apart since we last met. Each year that he attened Winchester, he would invite me to break my journey home to Birmingham to visit him and see his observatory set-up. An offer I never did take up, and one which I truly regret now. My thoughts are with Pat at this sad time.
Gary
I can’t say I like the new site very much. For me it’s too ‘loud’ and crowded even on my large desktop monitor, but especially so on a laptop and phone. Much preferred the old layout.
I do appreciate all the hard work that’s gone into it though, but I’m not a fan of change for changes sake (I do realise that the web site needed to be upgraded behind the scenes though, so well done to all involved for that).
Recent forum posts definitely need to be put back on the home page please! That was always my first stop when I visited the old site, and as Nick says above, this is probably true for a lot of other visitors too.
Gary
This Nova (V606 Vul) is brightening once again. Looking at the VSS database, it can be seen that the Nova has been slowly rising from mid December (Mag 18.9V on Dec 6), through January where Nick James was able to follow it to mag 14.76CG by Jan 31. I’ve just measured an image taken by SLOOH this morning (Feb 23) at mag 14.6C.
If you can get to the field at this time of year, please report your observations to the VSS.
Gary
I remember chatting with Ian about his early days with PEP over lunch in some bar in some city years ago, and he did indeed have problems with his home built kit, but it’s been so long ago that we had this conversation that I can’t recall details. When CCD’s became available, Ian would have packed the PEP away (working or not) and gone with the new tech as soon as he was able, to that I’m sure.
David. I’ll be happy to take it off your hands to keep it within the VSS at least. I’ll drop you an email about it.
Gary
Eleven days into the outburst, this dwarf nova of the relatively rare type UGWZ is still fairly bright in the evening sky after fading by just over two magnitudes since discovery, and remains worthy of continued observation – visual, single image or time series.
My own light curve consiting of visual observations from Birmingham and CCD images from COAST and SLOOH is shown below.
Gary
Happy New Year!
Observing statistics for 2021 (2020 in parentheses)
Gary Poyner (Birmingham)
Not a bad first half of the year, but from August the majority of the time was taken with dodging cloud and observing in cloud breaks. Only 11 totally clear nights in the whole year (clear from dusk to dawn), and these were all in the first half of 2021. Dismal!
2021
Clear nights (less than 50% cloud) 19 (44)
Partially clear nights (50% or more cloud) 100 (95)
Totally cloudy nights 246.
Total observable nights 119 (139) with 82 (67) of these nights having Moonlight interference. I made observations on all 119 nights.Total hours at the telescope 227.7 (296.9) hrs
Best month April with 16 nights – 12 partially clear and 4 clear (May. 24)
Worst month December with 3 nights – 2 partially clear and one clear. (Feb. 6)Birmingham Met office gave incorrect information on cloud cover for 73 nights during 2021 (73)
Total visual VS observations for 2021 is 8,201 (10,717) a decrease of 2516 on 2020. CCD single measures using remote telescopes COAST, SLOOH and the AAVSO SRO-50 are 3,527 (1,909), an increase of 1618 on 2020.
Gary
After nine months of ups and downs, V1405 Cas has finally broken through the mag 10 barrier – last night (Dec 19) 10.47TG. That’s a 0.7 mag drop in 24h.
Gary
Not a hope of the cloud shifting here in Birmingham, but a SLOOH measure from last night has this new DN as…
Nov 30.833 UT 12.59C
Gary
Latest datapoint in AAVSO is 16.9V on Nov 11. That’s a 4.5 mag drop in just 5 days. Pretty quick. V1391 Cas took twice as long to drop by a similar magnitude ~ 10 days.
Gary
I echo all the sentiments here. An excellent meeting, top quality video, sound levels perfect and very well presented.
Well done to all involved.
Gary
I’ve not seen it either due to the weather, and am keen to do so. Once faded, there is a chance of a rebrightening(s). It doesn’t have to be a UGWZ to do this, as I have seen UGSU’s show a rebrightening (In 1996 I once observed a normal outburst in UV Per trigger a superoutburst followed by one rebrightening), but not more than one as UGWZ’s are prone to do.
Gary
VSNET-alert 26333 today announced that early superhumps with a period of 0.05404(4) d and amplitude of 0.055m had been detected (by Tonny Vanmunster), and that the object is a UGWZ type star. I must say that to me it seems a bit early to give this classification as definite, so probably wait for more data before we all go down the pub to celebrate. Taichi Kato isn’t often wrong in these matters though.
There is a chart and a very limited sequence (two stars so far) available for download from the AAVSO here, using the designation XM78HT or AT 2021ABOG.
Latest magnitude in the AAVSO DB is Vanmunsters showing 13.9-14.0C. (Oct 18.2 UT)
Gary
Here is my light curve of the outburst so far. Last night (Oct 11) it was fainter then 17.9CV. LL And dropped just over two magnitudes in two days.
I’ll certainly continue to monitor for any rebrightening(s).
Gary
Observations from last night and this morning (Oct 3-4) show very little change in the brightness of GK Per, so the outburst announcement which appeared on various VS mailing lists MAY have been a little premature. However an outburst is due sooner rather than later, so please keep your eyes on it.
Gary
Hi Robin,
I think it probably was LL And. I have a pre-print of a paper written by Taichi Kato in 1993 and printed in PASJ, which suggests that the 1979 Nova was indeed LL And (there were positional issues with the 1979 report). In it Kato-san writes (about the 1979 event)…
This supposed identification, which was later confirmed by the detection of a new outburst in 1993, of a relatively bright (19 mag) quiescent counterpart naturally suggested the dwarf nova-type classification. This information was quickly relayed to observers through the international alert networks (e.g. VSNET) and the object has been continuously monitored since then. The long-awaited next outburst finally occurred in 1993
I know I was observing it for a long time before the 1993 outburst, and was thrilled to see it for the first time then, confirming Tonny VanMunsters original detection. Indeed Tonny (in Belgium) and I were discussing the outburst on the telephone whilst looking at it through our telescopes! We did this several times in the 1990’s during rare outburst detections. Sadly those days are now gone – as has some of the fun of it.
Gary
LL And was first seen in outburst in December 1993, and the last confirmed outburst occured in December 2008. One other outburst was observed in June 2004 (although there have been three unconfirmed sightings visually since 2013)
LL And was fainter than 17.9CV on September 10 2021.
Nice find Jeremy.
Gary
I’ve just seen it visually at mag. 12.0 on Jly 16.948 UT, It’s a very red field, so poor comparison choices (high B-V).
Gary
EDIT July 18: With the release of the AAVSO sequence, the above magnitude of 12.0 should be revised to 12.3. Fortunately the AAVSO selected the same comparison star I used, but with a slightly fainter value.
Gary
