I got a few pictures of the nova as it was about to transit. Admittedly it's not much to look at. It measured about magnitude 9.05. But that makes it all the more astounding to me that the guy was able to find it with small binoculars and no computer. Apparently he has the sky memorized down to who knows what magnitude. Impressive. Unfortunately 9th magnitude is pretty bright for my setup so even with a red filter I was only able to go 2" (3" saturated the chip). But it's there. I could have gone longer to bring out the background but that would have had the nova saturating the chip and made accurate magnitude determination impossible. I could not find any amateur pre-discovery shots so I used the POSS. Here's the POSS image with one of mine next to it. Arrows indicate the nova before and after. If the weather holds I'm going to see about getting pictures every clear night for a while so I can see how it fades. http://users.wirelessbeehive.com/~paw/temp/nova01.jpg Looks like the progenitor star is listed in the Hubble Guide Star catalog as 5325:1837. Position (2000): RA 04 47 54 Dec -10 10 43 patrick On 29 Nov 2009, at 12:22, Patrick Wiggins wrote:
+++++ Nova in Eridanus This is an AstroAlert from Sky & Telescope. NOVEMBER 29, 2009 by Roger W. Sinnott An 8th-magnitude nova was discovered on November 25, 2009, by Koichi Itagaki of Yamagata, Japan. The new star lies in northeastern Eridanus, 6.9° west-southwest of Rigel. In an e-mail sent late on the evening of November 28th, Sky & Telescope Senior Editor Alan MacRobert writes, "Just spotted the nova in my 10x50 binocs on their wooden shoulder frame. Barely visible through the bright moonlight at about mag 8.4." The find was announced on CBET 2050, issued November 25th by the Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Itagaki was using an 0.21-meter (8.3-inch) patrol camera, but within 15 minutes he secured a confirming image with an 0.60-meter reflector. The nova lies at right ascension 4h 47.9m, declination –10° 11' (equinox 2000.0). +++++
It'll be about 7 degrees to the upper right of Rigel as Rigel is rising this evening about 8. Well placed for viewing as it transits about 1 tomorrow morning, about 40 degrees above the horizon as seen from SLC.
patrick