TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 21448 SUBJECT: LIGO/Virgo G296853: HAWC follow-up DATE: 17/08/10 19:10:13 GMT FROM: Israel Martinez-Castellanos at UMD/HAWC I. Martinez-Castellanos (University of Maryland, College Park) and A.J. Smith (University of Maryland, College Park) on behalf of the HAWC Collaboration: HAWC performed a follow-up of LIGO trigger G296853. At the time of the trigger only a small portion (6%) of the probability distribution overlapped with HAWC field of view (FOV), and it was located at a large zenith angle where the sensitivity is poorest. The real-time search was preformed and identified no candidate counterparts. Additionally we searched for longer duration emission integrating the next transit of the LIGO contour through HAWC's FOV. The most probable location transited 1-3hrs after the trigger (~41deg from zenith at culmination). In total, 52% of the LIGO probability contour was observed. There were no significant detections (5-sigma). HAWC is a TeV gamma ray water Cherenkov array located in the state of Puebla, Mexico. It is sensitive to the energy range ~0.5-100TeV, and monitors 2/3 of the sky every day with an instantaneous field-of-view of ~2 sr.