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GCN Circular 11674

Subject
GRB 110208A: Swift detection of a burst
Date
2011-02-08T21:21:21Z (13 years ago)
From
Scott Barthelmy at NASA/GSFC <scott@milkyway.gsfc.nasa.gov>
V. D'Elia (ASDC), S. D. Barthelmy (GSFC),
W. H. Baumgartner (GSFC/UMBC), D. N. Burrows (PSU),
S. Campana (INAF-OAB), N. Gehrels (NASA/GSFC), J. M. Gelbord (PSU),
S. T. Holland (CRESST/USRA/GSFC), J. A. Kennea (PSU),
N. P. M. Kuin (UCL-MSSL), C. B. Markwardt (NASA/GSFC),
F. E. Marshall (NASA/GSFC), D. M. Palmer (LANL),
T. Sakamoto (NASA/UMBC), M. H. Siegel (PSU),
E. Sonbas (GSFC/USRA/Adiyaman Univ.), G. Stratta (ASDC),
C. A. Swenson (PSU) and E. Troja (NASA/GSFC/ORAU) report on behalf of
the Swift Team:

At 21:10:46 UT, the Swift Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) triggered and
located GRB 110208A (trigger=445038).  Swift slewed immediately to the burst. 
The BAT on-board calculated location is 
RA, Dec 22.484, -20.628 which is 
   RA(J2000)  =  01h 29m 56s
   Dec(J2000) = -20d 37' 41"
with an uncertainty of 3 arcmin (radius, 90% containment, including 
systematic uncertainty).  The BAT light curve shows one peak
with a duration of about 15 sec.  The peak count rate
was ~1200 counts/sec (15-350 keV), at 0 sec after the trigger. 

The XRT began observing the field at 21:12:06.5 UT, 80.1 seconds after
the BAT trigger. Using promptly downlinked data we find an uncatalogued
X-ray source located at RA, Dec 22.46404, -20.59248 which is equivalent
to:
   RA(J2000)  = 01h 29m 51.37s
   Dec(J2000) = -20d 35' 32.9"
with an uncertainty of 3.9 arcseconds (radius, 90% containment). This
location is 145 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.  We cannot determine whether the source is
fading at the present time. 

A power-law fit to a spectrum formed from promptly downlinked event
data gives a column density consistent with the Galactic value of 2.31
x 10^20 cm^-2 (Kalberla et al. 2005). 

UVOT took a finding chart exposure of 150 seconds with the White filter
starting 84 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 none of
the XRT error circle. 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 0.02. 

Burst Advocate for this burst is V. D'Elia (delia AT asdc.asi.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.)
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