GCN Circular 30846
Subject
GRB 210919A: Swift detection of a short burst
Date
2021-09-19T00:54:18Z (3 years ago)
From
Scott Barthelmy at NASA/GSFC <scott@milkyway.gsfc.nasa.gov>
A. Tohuvavohu (U Toronto), S. D. Barthelmy (GSFC),
A. Y. Lien (U Tampa) and B. Sbarufatti (PSU) report on behalf of the
Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory Team:
At 00:28:33 UT, the Swift Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) triggered and
located a short GRB 210919A (trigger=1073893). Swift slewed immediately
to the burst. The BAT on-board calculated location is
RA, Dec 80.230, +1.274 which is
RA(J2000) = 05h 20m 55s
Dec(J2000) = +01d 16' 27"
with an uncertainty of 3 arcmin (radius, 90% containment, including
systematic uncertainty). The BAT light curve showed a single-peaked
structure with a duration of about 0.3 sec. The peak count rate
was ~3500 counts/sec (15-350 keV), at ~0 sec after the trigger.
The XRT began observing the field at 00:30:10.5 UT, 97.0 seconds after
the BAT trigger. Using promptly downlinked data we find an uncatalogued
X-ray source located at RA, Dec 80.25441, 1.31189 which is equivalent
to:
RA(J2000) = 05h 21m 01.06s
Dec(J2000) = +01d 18' 42.8"
with an uncertainty of 6.9 arcseconds (radius, 90% containment). This
location is 162 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
https://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 1.56
x 10^21 cm^-2 (Willingale et al. 2013).
UVOT took a finding chart exposure of 150 seconds with the White filter
starting 99 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 0.142.
Burst Advocate for this burst is A. Tohuvavohu (tohuvavohu AT astro.utoronto.ca).
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/)