//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20179 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A: Swift detection of a burst with an optical counterpart DATE: 16/11/17 01:46:55 GMT FROM: Scott Barthelmy at NASA/GSFC J. R. Cummings (NASA/UMBC), S. D. Barthelmy (GSFC), D. N. Burrows (PSU), V. D'Elia (ASDC), J. A. Kennea (PSU), H. A. Krimm (CRESST/NSF/USRA), F. E. Marshall (NASA/GSFC) and M. H. Siegel (PSU) report on behalf of the Swift Team: At 01:35:36 UT, the Swift Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) triggered and located GRB 161117A (trigger=722604). Swift slewed immediately to the burst. The BAT on-board calculated location is RA, Dec 322.070, -29.629 which is RA(J2000) = 21h 28m 17s Dec(J2000) = -29d 37' 43" with an uncertainty of 3 arcmin (radius, 90% containment, including systematic uncertainty). The BAT light curve shows several bright peaks with a total duration of about 160 sec. The peak count rate was ~8000 counts/sec (15-350 keV), at ~110 sec after the trigger. The XRT began observing the field at 01:36:37.5 UT, 60.8 seconds after the BAT trigger. XRT found a bright, uncatalogued X-ray source located at RA, Dec 322.0530, -29.6119 which is equivalent to: RA(J2000) = +21h 28m 12.72s Dec(J2000) = -29d 36' 42.8" with an uncertainty of 4.8 arcseconds (radius, 90% containment). This location is 81 arcseconds from the BAT onboard position, within the BAT error circle. No event data are yet available to determine the column density using X-ray spectroscopy. The initial flux in the 2.5 s image was 8.04e-09 erg cm^-2 s^-1 (0.2-10 keV). UVOT took a finding chart exposure of 150 seconds with the White filter starting 69 seconds after the BAT trigger. There is a candidate afterglow in the rapidly available 2.7'x2.7' sub-image at RA(J2000) = 21:28:12.53 = 322.05219 DEC(J2000) = -29:36:48.9 = -29.61358 with a 90%-confidence error radius of about 0.62 arc sec. This position is 6.6 arc sec. from the center of the XRT error circle. The estimated magnitude is 18.40 with a 1-sigma error of about 0.15. No correction has been made for the expected extinction corresponding to E(B-V) of 0.06. Burst Advocate for this burst is J. R. Cummings (jayc AT milkyway.gsfc.nasa.gov). Please contact the BA by email if you require additional information regarding Swift followup of this burst. In extremely urgent cases, after trying the Burst Advocate, you can contact the Swift PI by phone (see Swift TOO web site for information: http://www.swift.psu.edu/too.html.) //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20180 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A: VLT/X-shooter spectroscopy and redshift DATE: 16/11/17 08:32:11 GMT FROM: Daniele Malesani at Dark Cosmology Centre, Niels Bohr Inst Daniele Malesani (DARK/NBI and DTU Space), Thomas Kruehler (MPE), Kasper E. Heintz (Univ. Iceland and DARK/NBI), and Johan P. U. Fynbo (DARK/NBI) report on behalf of a larger collaboration: We observed the optical afterglow of GRB 161117A (Cummings et al., GCN 20179) with the ESO VLT Kueyen equipped with the X-shooter spectrograph. In the acquisition image, taken on 2016 Nov 17.097 UT (0.73 hr after the GRB), the optical afterglow is clearly detected with a magnitude R ~ 19 (assuming R = 18.10 for the USNO star at RA = 21:28:14.70, Dec = -29:37:08.8). The seeing was very poor, around 2.5", and the sky conditions were partially cloudy. Four spectra by 600 s each were collected covering the full X-shooter wavelength range 3000-25,000 AA. A faint trace is detected, down to at least 3800 Å. Superimposed on it, we are able to identify a number of absorption features which we interpret as due to Mg I, Mg II, and Fe II, all at a common redshift z = 1.549. We acknowledge excellent support from the ESO observing staff in Paranal, in particular Elizabeth Bartlett, Eleonora Sani, Steffen Mieske, and Jose Velasquez, and the visiting astronomers Gerard Gilmore, Amelia Bayo, and Aurora Aguayo. [GCN OPS NOTE(17nov16): Per author's request, the last paragraph was modified.] //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20181 SUBJECT: GRB161117A: REM optical and NIR afterglow detection DATE: 16/11/17 08:52:18 GMT FROM: Paolo D'Avanzo at INAF-OAB P. D'Avanzo, D. Fugazza, S. Covino, A. Melandri (INAF/OAB) report on behalf of the REM team: We observed the field of GRB 161117A (Cummings et al., GCN 20179) with the 60-cm robotic telescope REM located at the La Silla Observatory (Chile). The observations started at 01:37:05 UT, 89 seconds after the burst, and were carried out simultaneously in the g, r, i, z and H bands. A preliminary photometry indicates that the optical and NIR afterglow (Cummings et al., GCN 20179; Malesani et al. GCN 20180) is detected with a magnitude H = 16.4 +/- 0.3 at t-t0 = 233 s, and r = 18.3 +/- 0.3 at t-t0 = 808 s. Magnitudes are in the AB system and have been calibrated with respect to the 2MASS (H-band) and APASS (r-band) catalogues. //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20184 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A: Enhanced Swift-XRT position DATE: 16/11/17 11:45:40 GMT FROM: Phil Evans at U of Leicester M.R. Goad, J.P. Osborne, A.P. Beardmore and P.A. Evans (U. Leicester) report on behalf of the Swift-XRT team. Using 7318 s of XRT Photon Counting mode data and 11 UVOT images for GRB 161117A, we find an astrometrically corrected X-ray position (using the XRT-UVOT alignment and matching UVOT field sources to the USNO-B1 catalogue): RA, Dec = 322.05243, -29.61401 which is equivalent to: RA (J2000): 21h 28m 12.58s Dec (J2000): -29d 36' 50.4" with an uncertainty of 1.4 arcsec (radius, 90% confidence). This position may be improved as more data are received. The latest position can be viewed at http://www.swift.ac.uk/xrt_positions. Position enhancement is described by Goad et al. (2007, A&A, 476, 1401) and Evans et al. (2009, MNRAS, 397, 1177). This circular was automatically generated, and is an official product of the Swift-XRT team. //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20185 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A: Swift-XRT refined Analysis DATE: 16/11/17 12:10:20 GMT FROM: Phil Evans at U of Leicester K.L. Page (U. Leicester), P. D'Avanzo (INAF-OAB), V. D'Elia (ASDC), A. D'Ai (INAF-IASFPA), D.N. Burrows (PSU), T.G.R. Roegiers (PSU), L.M. McCauley (PSU), B. Mingo (U. Leicester), A.P. Beardmore (U. Leicester) and J.R. Cummings report on behalf of the Swift-XRT team: We have analysed 7.7 ks of XRT data for GRB 161117A (Cummings et al. GCN Circ. 20179), from 52 s to 19.0 ks after the BAT trigger. The data comprise 384 s in Windowed Timing (WT) mode (the first 7 s were taken while Swift was slewing) with the remainder in Photon Counting (PC) mode. The enhanced XRT position for this burst was given by Goad et al. (GCN Circ. 20184). The late-time light curve (from T0+5.1 ks) can be modelled with a power-law decay with a decay index of alpha=0.92 (+/-0.09). A spectrum formed from the WT mode data can be fitted with an absorbed power-law with a photon spectral index of 1.322 (+/-0.028). The best-fitting absorption column is 2.9 (+/-0.8) x 10^21 cm^-2, at a redshift of 1.549, in addition to the Galactic value of 4.4 x 10^20 cm^-2 (Willingale et al. 2013). The PC mode spectrum has a photon index of 1.94 (+/-0.08) and a best-fitting absorption column of 7.4 (+1.9, -1.8) x 10^21 cm^-2. The counts to observed (unabsorbed) 0.3-10 keV flux conversion factor deduced from this spectrum is 3.5 x 10^-11 (4.4 x 10^-11) erg cm^-2 count^-1. A summary of the PC-mode spectrum is thus: Galactic foreground: 4.4 x 10^20 cm^-2 Intrinsic column: 7.4 (+1.9, -1.8) x 10^21 cm^-2 at z=1.549 Photon index: 1.94 (+/-0.08) If the light curve continues to decay with a power-law decay index of 0.92, the count rate at T+24 hours will be 0.050 count s^-1, corresponding to an observed (unabsorbed) 0.3-10 keV flux of 1.7 x 10^-12 (2.2 x 10^-12) erg cm^-2 s^-1. The results of the XRT-team automatic analysis are available at http://www.swift.ac.uk/xrt_products/00722604. This circular is an official product of the Swift-XRT team. //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20188 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A: Swift-BAT refined analysis DATE: 16/11/17 18:35:49 GMT FROM: Hans Krimm at NSF/NASA-GSFC M. Stamatikos (OSU), S. D. Barthelmy (GSFC), J. R. Cummings (GSFC/UMBC), N. Gehrels (GSFC), H. A. Krimm (NSF/USRA), A. Y. Lien (GSFC/UMBC), C. B. Markwardt (GSFC), D. M. Palmer (LANL), T. Sakamoto (AGU), T. N. Ukwatta (LANL) (i.e. the Swift-BAT team): Using the data set from T-240 to T+962 sec from the recent telemetry downlink, we report further analysis of BAT GRB 161117A (trigger #722604) (Cummings, et al., GCN Circ. 20179). The BAT ground-calculated position is RA, Dec = 322.053, -29.612 deg which is RA(J2000) = 21h 28m 12.8s Dec(J2000) = -29d 36' 41.7" with an uncertainty of 1.0 arcmin, (radius, sys+stat, 90% containment). The partial coding was 100%. The mask-weighted light curve shows three main overlapping peaks, of increasing amplitude. The tops of the peaks are at T+3, T+35 and T+112 s, respectively. The burst faded to baseline by about 160 seconds. T90 (15-350 keV) is 125.7 +- 1.1 sec (estimated error including systematics). The time-averaged spectrum from T-6.00 to T+154.44 sec is best fit by a power law with an exponential cutoff. This fit gives a photon index 1.19 +- 0.12, and Epeak of 73.9 +- 4.3 keV (chi squared 33.82 for 56 d.o.f.). For this model the total fluence in the 15-150 keV band is 2.0 +- 0.0 x 10^-5 erg/cm2 and the 1-sec peak flux measured from T+111.35 sec in the 15-150 keV band is 6.8 +- 0.3 ph/cm2/sec. A fit to a simple power law gives a photon index of 1.82 +- 0.00 (chi squared 122.02 for 57 d.o.f.). All the quoted errors are at the 90% confidence level. The results of the batgrbproduct analysis are available at http://gcn.gsfc.nasa.gov/notices_s/722604/BA/ //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20190 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A: Swift/UVOT Detection DATE: 16/11/17 23:04:40 GMT FROM: Frank Marshall at GSFC F. E. Marshall (NASA/GSFC) and J. R. Cummings (NASA/UMBC) report on behalf of the Swift/UVOT team: The Swift/UVOT began settled observations of the field of GRB 161117A 69 s after the BAT trigger (Cummings et al., GCN Circ. 20179). A source consistent with the XRT position (Goad et al., GCN Circ. 20184) is detected in the initial UVOT exposures. The preliminary UVOT position is: RA (J2000) = 21:28:12.55 = 322.05230 (deg.) Dec (J2000) = -29:36:49.1 = -29.61365 (deg.) with an estimated uncertainty of 0.44 arc sec. (radius, 90% confidence). Preliminary detections and 3-sigma upper limits using the UVOT photometric system (Breeveld et al. 2011, AIP Conf. Proc. 1358, 373) for the early exposures are in the table below. The lack of detections in the m2 and w2 filters is consistent with the redshift of 1.549 reported by Malesani et al. (GCN Circ. 20180). Filter T_start(s) T_stop(s) Exp(s) Mag white 69 219 147 18.26 +/- 0.05 v 611 6146 255 18.77 +/- 0.19 b 536 5531 236 19.42 +/- 0.17 u 281 531 246 19.48 +/- 0.20 w1 660 6556 255 19.48 +/- 0.25 m2 1064 13173 712 >20.2 w2 586 11751 1141 >20.8 The magnitudes in the table are not corrected for the Galactic extinction due to the reddening of E(B-V) = 0.06 in the direction of the burst (Schlegel et al. 1998). //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20192 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A: Fermi GBM detection/observation DATE: 16/11/18 01:16:45 GMT FROM: Bagrat Mailyan at UAH B. Mailyan (UAH) and A. Goldstein (USRA) report on behalf of the Fermi GBM Team: "At 01:35:31.36 UT on 17 November 2016, the Fermi Gamma-Ray Burst Monitor triggered and located GRB 161117A (trigger 501039335/161117066), which was also detected by Swift (Cummings et al., GCN 20179). The GBM on-ground location is consistent with the Swift position. The angle from the Fermi LAT boresight is 94 degrees. The GBM light curve shows bright, multiple peaks with a duration (T90) of about 122 s (50-300 keV). The time-averaged spectrum from T0-4.7 s to T0+129.4 s is adequately fit by a Band function with Epeak = 68.04 +/- 2.66 keV, alpha = -0.43 +/- 0.07, and beta = -2.27 +/- 0.04. The event fluence (10-1000 keV) in this time interval is (3.93 +/- 0.079)E-05 erg/cm^2. The 1-sec peak photon flux measured starting from T0+116 s in the 10-1000keV band is 10.3 +/- 0.5 ph/s/cm^2. The spectral analysis results presented above are preliminary; final results will be published in the GBM GRB Catalog." //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20193 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A: GMG observation limit DATE: 16/11/18 05:31:04 GMT FROM: Jirong Mao at Yunnan Obs J. Mao, X. Yu, and J.-M. Bai (YNAO) report: We observed the field of GRB 161117A (Cummings et al., GCN 20179) with the 2.4-meter optical telescope at Gao-Mei-Gu (GMG) station of Yunnan Observatories. Observations began from 11:07:21 UT, Nov. 17th, 2016, about 9.5 hours after the trigger. We did not detect any source at the afterglow position down to a limit of R~20.6 mag. //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20194 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A: TAROT La Silla observatory optical observations DATE: 16/11/18 11:25:16 GMT FROM: Alain Klotz at IRAP-CNRS-OMP Klotz A., Turpin D., Atteia J.L. (CNRS-OMP-IRAP), Boer, M., Laugier, R. (CNRS-ARTEMIS), Gendre B. (UVI - Etelman Obs.) report: We imaged the field of GRB 161117A detected by SWIFT (trigger 722604) with the TAROT robotic telescope (D=25cm) located at the European Southern Observatory, La Silla observatory, Chile. The observations started 26s after the GRB trigger (14s after the notice). The elevation of the field decreased from 48 degrees above horizon and weather conditions were good. A difficulty is the presence of the bright star NOMAD1 0603-1050209 (ra=322.0444192 dec=-29.6163561) of magnitude R=11.060 located at 25 arcsec from the the GRB provided at by Marshall et al. (GCNC 20190). The first image is trailed with a duration of 60.0s (see the description in Klotz et al., 2006, A&A 451, L39). We do not detect any OT with a limiting magnitude of: t0+26s to t0+86s : Rlim = 16.8 Magnitudes were estimated with the nearby NOMAD1 stars and are not corrected for galactic dust extinction. //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20195 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A: MASTER-OAFA (Argentina) prompt OT observations DATE: 16/11/18 12:54:01 GMT FROM: Vladimir Lipunov at Moscow State U/Krylov Obs R.Podesta, C.Lopez, F. Podesta Observatorio Astronomico Felix Aguilar (OAFA) , National University of San Juan, Argentina H. Levato, C. Saffe Instituto de Ciencias Astronomicas,de la Tierra y del Espacio (ICATE), San Juan, Argentina V. Lipunov, E. Gorbovskoy, V.Kornilov, D.Kuvshinov, N.Tyurina, A.V.Krylov, I.Gorbunov, P.Balanutsa, A.Kuznetsov, V.V.Chazov Lomonosov Moscow State University, Sternberg Astronomical Institut of MSU K.Ivanov, S.Yazev, N.M.Budnev, O.Gres, O.Chuvalaev, V.A.Poleshchuk Irkutsk State University V.Yurkov, Yu.Sergienko, D.Varda, E.Sinyakov Blagoveschensk Educational State University, Blagoveschensk A. Tlatov, A.V. Parhomenko, D. Dormidontov, V.Senik Kislovodsk Solar Station of the Pulkovo Observatory D.Buckley, S. Potter, A.Kniazev, M.Kotze South African Astronomical Observatory R. Rebolo, M. Serra, N. Lodieu, G. Israelian, L. Suarez-Andres The Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias MASTER-OAFA robotic telescope (MASTER-Net: http://observ.pereplet.ru) located in OAFA was pointed to the GRB161117A 22 sec after notice time and 31 sec after trigger time at 2016-11-17 01:36:13 UT. On our first (10s exposure) set we found optical transient within SWIFT error box (Cummings et al., 20179) at the Swift UVOT position (Cummings et al., 20179; Daniele Malesani et al. GCN 20180;). The OT magnitude ~17.0 . The 5-sigma upper limit has been about 17.5 mag After several minutes OT disapear and apear against around 01 35 56 UT with unfiltered (red) magnirude ~ 18.0 (cf D'Avanzo et al., GCN 20181;). The observations started at zenit distance = 42 degrees, galaxy latitude b = -46 degree. The moon (91 % bright part) below the horizon (The altitude of the Moon is -1 degree ). The sun altitude is -25.6 degree. The object can be observed till 2016-11-17 05:44:35 UT. The message may be cited. //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20196 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A iTelescope observation DATE: 16/11/18 13:07:22 GMT FROM: Takanori Sakamoto at AGU Y. Kitaoka, T. Sakamoto, A. Yoshida (AGU) We observed the field of GRB 161117A detected by Swift (Cummings et al., GCN Circ. 20179) with the iTelescope.Net (http://www.itelescope.net) T11 (20" Plane wave ) telescope located at the AstroCamp Observatory (Mayhill, New Mexico, USA). 20 images of 60 sec exposures were taken in the R filter starting from November 17 02:02:56 (UT) about 27 minutes after the trigger and stopped on November 17 02:45:49 (UT). We do not detect the optical afterglow both in the individual images and the stacked image at the optical afterglow position (Marshall et al., GCN Circ. 20190). The estimated five sigma upper limit of the combined image (total exposure of 1200 sec) is ~16.9 using the USNO-B1 catalog. //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20197 SUBJECT: Konus-Wind observation of GRB 161117A DATE: 16/11/18 13:12:24 GMT FROM: Dmitry Svinkin at Ioffe Institute D. Svinkin, S. Golenetskii, R. Aptekar, D. Frederiks, P. Oleynik, M. Ulanov, A. Tsvetkova, A. Lysenko, A. Kozlova, and T. Cline on behalf of the Konus-Wind team, report: The long-duration GRB 161117A (Swift-BAT observation: Cummings et al., GCN Circ. 20179; Fermi-GBM detection: Mailyan & Goldstein, GCN Circ. 20192) triggered Konus-Wind at T0=5738.426 s UT (01:35:38.426). The burst light curve shows three bright emission peaks in the interval from ~T0-7 s to ~T0+130 s. The emission is seen up to ~1 MeV. The Konus-Wind light curve of this GRB is available at http://www.ioffe.ru/LEA/GRBs/GRB161117_T05738/ As observed by Konus-Wind, the burst had a fluence of 2.41(-0.14,+0.15)x10^-5 erg/cm2, and a 64-ms peak flux, measured from T0-0.342 s, of 1.94(-0.77,+0.78)x10^-6 erg/cm2/s (both in the 20 keV - 10 MeV energy range). The time-averaged spectrum of the burst (measured from T0 to T0+123.136 s) is best fit in the 20 keV - 1 MeV range by a power law with exponential cutoff model: dN/dE ~ (E^alpha)*exp(-E*(2+alpha)/Ep) with alpha = -0.86(-0.33,+0.36) and Ep = 69(-7,+6) keV (chi2 = 40/47 dof). Fitting by a GRB (Band) model yields the same alpha and Ep, and an upper limit on the high energy photon index: beta <-3.5 (chi2 =40/46 dof). The spectrum near the maximum count rate (measured from T0 to T0+8.448 s) is best fit in the 20 keV - 1 MeV range by a power law with exponential cutoff model: with alpha = -0.56(-0.42,+0.52) and Ep = 139(-20,+27) keV (chi2 = 49/47 dof). Fitting by a GRB (Band) model yields the same alpha and Ep, and an upper limit on the high energy photon index: beta < -2.6 (chi2 = 49/46 dof). Assuming the redshift z=1.549 (Malesani et al., GCN 20180) and a standard cosmology model with H_0 = 70 km/s/Mpc, Omega_M = 0.27, and Omega_Lambda = 0.73, we estimate the following rest-frame parameters: the isotropic energy release E_iso is ~1.3x10^53 erg, the peak luminosity L_iso is ~3.0x10^52 erg/s, and the rest-frame peak energy of the time-integrated spectrum, Ep,i, is ~176 keV. All the quoted errors are at the 90% confidence level. All the quoted values are preliminary. //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20202 SUBJECT: GRB 161117A: SMARTS optical/IR afterglow observations DATE: 16/11/22 01:11:47 GMT FROM: Bethany Cobb at GWU B. E. Cobb (GWU), reports: Using the ANDICAM instrument on the 1.3m telescope at CTIO, we obtained optical/IR imaging of the error region of GRB 161117A (GCN 20179, Cummings et al.) at two epochs (with mid-exposure times of 2016-11-17 02:38 UT & 2016-11-18 01:47 UT). For each epoch, several dithered images were obtained with total summed exposure times of 15 min in V and I and 12 min in J and K. The fading afterglow of GRB 161117A (e.g. GCN 20179, Cummings et al.; GCN 20180, Malesani et al.; GCN 20181, D'Avanzo et al.) was detected with the following preliminary magnitudes (or 3-sigma limits): mid-exposure time post-burst (hours) V mag I mag J mag K mag 1.03333 19.42+/-0.10 18.69+/-0.07 18.40+/-0.15 16.49+/-0.11 24.19361 >22.3 >21.1 >18.5 >16.7 (Optical photometry is calibrated against Landolt standard stars and IR photometry is calibrated against 2MASS stars in the field.)