August 5, 2012: N. J. Brown (Two Rocks, W. Australia) reported a possible nova in Carina to the IAU CBAT with an observation of magnitude 9.5 photographic made on 2012 July 24.68 UT. The object has been placed on the IAU CBAT TOCP page (http://www.cbat.eps.harvard.edu/unconf/tocp.html) and assigned the name PNV J09410000-5759540.
Following postings by Seiichiro Kiyota (vsnet-alert 14800) and Josch Hambsch (vsnet-alert 14809), Rob Kaufman (Bright, Victoria, Australia) confirmed the presence of a reddened object at unfiltered magnitude 10.3 in a 2-min DSLR exposure on 2012 Jul 28.792 UT (TOCP follow-up page).
Sebastian Otero derives an upper limit on the precursor magnitude at "<17.5 V; the closest star to the reported position is USNO-B1.0 0320-0171500, 2" away at 09 41 01.76 -57 59 53.8 (J2000.0)." (VSX entry)
Spectroscopy is needed urgently to determine the nature of this object. Additional visual and photometric observations are also requested.
Additional observations reported to the AAVSO International Database include:
2012 Jul 27.8986 UT, 10.2 (Andrew Pearce, Nedlands, WA, Australia);
27.9602, 10.055 V +/-0.031 (Josch Hambsch, Mol, Belgium);
27.9604, 10.080 V +/-0.064 (Hambsch);
27.9607, 10.136 V +/-0.061 (Hambsch);
28.9132, 10.5 (Pearce);
Aug 1.9620, 10.711 V +/-0.009 (Hambsch);
1.9622, 10.683 V +/-0.010 (Hambsch);
1.9624, 10.652 V +/-0.010 (Hambsch);
2.9007, 11.1 (Alexandre Amorim, Florianopolis, Brazil);
3.9620, 10.815 V +/-0.011 (Hambsch);
3.9622, 10.886 V +/-0.011 (Hambsch);
3.9624, 10.862 V +/-0.011 (Hambsch);
Coordinates: RA 09 41 01.87 Dec. -57 59 55.7 (2000.0)
Charts for PNV J09410000-5759540 may be created using the AAVSO Variable Star Plotter (VSX) at http://www.aavso.org/vsx
Please report observations to the AAVSO International Database as PNV J09410000-5759540.
This AAVSO Special Notice was compiled by Elizabeth O. Waagen.
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