TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 20227 SUBJECT: GRB 161202A: Swift detection of a burst DATE: 16/12/02 23:29:05 GMT FROM: Scott Barthelmy at NASA/GSFC B. Sbarufatti (INAF-OAB/PSU), S. D. Barthelmy (GSFC), D. N. Burrows (PSU), S. B. Cenko (GSFC), J. R. Cummings (NASA/UMBC), N. Gehrels (NASA/GSFC), C. Gronwall (PSU), N. P. M. Kuin (UCL-MSSL), F. E. Marshall (NASA/GSFC) and M. H. Siegel (PSU) report on behalf of the Swift Team: At 23:12:52 UT, the Swift Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) triggered and located GRB 161202A (trigger=725036). Swift slewed immediately to the burst. The BAT on-board calculated location is RA, Dec 356.895, +19.640, which is RA(J2000) = 23h 47m 35s Dec(J2000) = +19d 38' 23" with an uncertainty of 3 arcmin (radius, 90% containment, including systematic uncertainty). The BAT light curve shows many peaks with a total duration of about 70 sec. The peak count rate was ~10,000 counts/sec (15-350 keV), at ~7 sec after the trigger. The XRT began observing the field at 23:14:06.7 UT, 74.1 seconds after the BAT trigger. Using promptly downlinked data we find a bright, fading, uncatalogued X-ray source with an enhanced position: RA, Dec 356.9031, 19.6477 which is equivalent to: RA(J2000) = 23h 47m 36.74s Dec(J2000) = +19d 38' 51.7" with an uncertainty of 2.4 arcseconds (radius, 90% containment). This location is 39 arcseconds from the BAT onboard position, within the BAT error circle. This position may be improved as more data are received; the latest position is available at http://www.swift.ac.uk/sper. A power-law fit to a spectrum formed from promptly downlinked event data gives a column density in excess of the Galactic value (6.00 x 10^20 cm^-2, Willingale et al. 2013), with an excess column of 9.9 (+6.04/-4.79) x 10^21 cm^-2 (90% confidence). The initial flux in the 2.5 s image was 2.18e-09 erg cm^-2 s^-1 (0.2-10 keV). UVOT took a finding chart exposure of 150 seconds with the White filter starting 82 seconds after the BAT trigger. No credible afterglow candidate has been found in the initial data products. The 2.7'x2.7' sub-image covers 100% of the XRT error circle. The typical 3-sigma upper limit has been about 19.6 mag. The 8'x8' region for the list of sources generated on-board covers 100% of the XRT error circle. The list of sources is typically complete to about 18 mag. No correction has been made for the expected extinction corresponding to E(B-V) of 0.09. Burst Advocate for this burst is B. Sbarufatti (boris.sbarufatti AT brera.inaf.it). 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.)