TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 26026 SUBJECT: GRB 191016A: Swift-XRT afterglow detection DATE: 19/10/18 00:12:22 GMT FROM: Boris Sbarufatti at PSU K.L. Page (U. Leicester), A.P. Beardmore (U. Leicester), M. Perri (ASDC), V. D'Elia (ASDC), A. D'Ai (INAF-IASFPA), B. Sbarufatti (PSU), D.N. Burrows (PSU), J. D. Gropp (PSU) and P.A. Evans (U. Leicester) report on behalf of the Swift-XRT team: Swift-XRT has performed follow-up observations of the Swift/BAT-detected burst GRB 191016A (WeiKang Zheng et al. GCN Circ. 26012), collecting 4.2 ks of Photon Counting (PC) mode data between T0+45.0 ks and T0+56.9 ks. An uncatalogued X-ray source is detected consistent with being within 296 arcsec of the Swift/BAT position and is above the RASS limit, and is therefore likely the GRB afterglow. Using 3470 s of PC mode data and 3 UVOT images, we find an enhanced XRT position (using the XRT-UVOT alignment and matching UVOT field sources to the USNO-B1 catalogue): RA, Dec = 30.26933, +24.50988 which is equivalent to: RA (J2000): 02h 01m 04.64s Dec(J2000): +24d 30' 35.6" with an uncertainty of 1.9 arcsec (radius, 90% confidence). This position is 93 arcsec from the Swift/BAT position. The light curve can be modelled with a power-law decay with a decay index of alpha=1.8 (+1.5, -0.5). A spectrum formed from the PC mode data can be fitted with an absorbed power-law with a photon spectral index of 1.9 (+0.5, -0.4). The best-fitting absorption column is 1.4 (+1.7, -0.4) x 10^21 cm^-2, consistent with the Galactic value of 1.0 x 10^21 cm^-2 (Willingale et al. 2013). The counts to observed (unabsorbed) 0.3-10 keV flux conversion factor deduced from this spectrum is 3.4 x 10^-11 (4.3 x 10^-11) erg cm^-2 count^-1. A summary of the PC-mode spectrum is thus: Total column: 1.4 (+1.7, -0.4) x 10^21 cm^-2 Galactic foreground: 1.0 x 10^21 cm^-2 Excess significance: <1.6 sigma Photon index: 1.9 (+0.5, -0.4) The results of the XRT-team automatic analysis are available at http://www.swift.ac.uk/xrt_products/00929744. The results of the full analysis of the XRT observations are available at https://www.swift.ac.uk/ToO_GRBs/00929744. This circular is an official product of the Swift-XRT team.