TITLE:   GCN CIRCULAR
NUMBER:  27114
SUBJECT: GRB 200216B - possible IR counterpart from VLT
DATE:    20/02/17 11:37:45 GMT
FROM:    Andrew Levan at U.of Leicester  <a.levan@astro.ru.nl>

A. J. Levan (Radboud Univ), A. de Ugarte Postigo (HETH/IAA-CSIC, DARK/NBI), D. Xu (NAOC), D. A. Kann (HETH-IAA/CSIC), J. P. U. Fynbo (DAWN/NBI/DTU), K. E. Heinz (Univ. Iceland), N. R. Tanvir (Univ. Leicester), G. Pugliese (API, Univ. Amsterdam), D. H. Hartmann (Clemson University) report on behalf of the Stargate Consortium:

"We observed the localisation of GRB 200216B (D’Avanzo et al. GCN 27102) with the Very Large Telescope and the HAWK-I instrument in the JHK bands beginning on 17 Feb 2020 at 02:44 UT, approximately 13.2 hours after the burst. 

In our K-band images we identify a candidate IR counterpart within the refined XRT localisation (Goad et al. GCN 27106). The location of the source is 

RA(J2000) 10:41:44.28
DEC(J2000) 19:28:31.3

With an uncertainty of ~0.3”. 

The source has a magnitude of K(AB)~22. The source is not well detected in either the J or H-band observations, but the depths are such that these observations offer limited constraints on the colour of the source. Given the inferred high X-ray column a high redshift origin is unlikely. We cannot make any statements regarding variability at this stage. 

We thank the staff at the VLT, in particular Bin Yang and Trystyn Berg for their work in acquiring these data."