TITLE: GCN GRB OBSERVATION REPORT NUMBER: 36 SUBJECT: GRB980329 optical observations DATE: 98/04/01 13:55:07 GMT FROM: Sylvio Klose at TLS_Tautenburg S. Klose, H. Meusinger & H. Lehmann (Thueringer Landessternwarte Tautenburg, Germany) report: The error box of GRB 980329 was imaged in V, R & I on March 29.8 - 30.0 UT, and in R and I on March 31.8 - 31.9 UT, using the Tautenburg Schmidt telescope equipped with the Schmidt focus CCD camera. Further R-band images were obtained on March 31.8 UT with the 2.2-m telescope at Calar Alto, Spain, equipped with CAFOS. A comparison of these images shows no object in the final 1-arcmin GRB error box for which the R-magnitude has declined by more than about 0.5 mag. Based on this finding it seems that the magnitude of the GRB afterglow was R > 20 about 15 hours after the burst (or the magnitude of the optical afterglow did not notably vary over this time span). R-band images (gif-files) taken on March 29.85 and 30.0 UT are available via anonymous ftp from ftp.tls-tautenburg.de in the directory /pub/klose. Further images will be make available, when deeper I-band images are obtained. Comments are welcome.