TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 33356 SUBJECT: GRB 230217A: Gemini-South Optical Observation DATE: 23/02/20 18:26:01 GMT FROM: Brendan O'Connor at UMD B. O'Connor (UMD, GWU) and E. Troja (UTV, ASU), report on behalf of a larger collaboration: We carried out optical observations with the 8.1m Gemini-South Telescope in Cerro Pachon, Chile targeting the location of the short GRB 230217A (Moss et al. GCN 33339). We observed the position of X-ray Source 3 reported by Capalbi et al. (GCN 33348) at 09:24:47 UT on 2023-02-20, corresponding to ~2.5 d after the GRB trigger (Moss et al. GCN 33339, Svinkin et al. GCN 33349, Veres et al. GCN 33353). The target was observed during twilight for 300 s in i-band. Within the source localization, we do not find any obvious counterpart when compared to the PS1 catalog to depth i>22.8 AB mag (not corrected for Galactic extinction along the line of sight). However, objects fainter than the PS1 limits are resolved in our observation and will require image subtraction to establish fading. Further observations are planned. We thank the staff of the Gemini Observatory for assistance in rapidly obtaining these observations.