TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 9151 SUBJECT: GRB 090418 Lick Redshift DATE: 09/04/18 12:34:39 GMT FROM: Ryan Chornock at UC Berkeley R. Chornock, S. B. Cenko, C. V. Griffith, M. E. Kislak, I. K. W. Kleiser, and A. V. Filippenko (UC Berkeley) report: We obtained optical spectra of the afterglow of GRB 090418 (Chornock et al., GCN 9148; Mangano et al., GCN 9149; Yuan et al., GCN 9150) using the Kast spectrograph on the Lick 3-meter telescope. Our first 900s exposure, starting at 11:21:16 UT (only 816s after the burst trigger) reveals a smooth continuum extending to the blue limit of our spectra (3450 Angs). Superposed on the continuum are absorption lines of C IV, Mg II, Fe II, Al II, and Mg I at z=1.608, which we suggest is the redshift of this burst. Further analysis is ongoing.