GCN Circular 3927
Subject
GRB 050906: Bright galaxy in BAT error box
Event
Date
2005-09-06T11:42:14Z (20 years ago)
From
Andrew Levan at U.of Leicester <anl@star.le.ac.uk>
Andrew Levan, Nial Tanvir (University of Hertfordshire)
The BAT error box for the possible GRB 050906 (Swift trigger #=153866,
Krimm et al. GCN 3926) contains the bright (K~11), low redshift galaxy IC
328 (part of a small group) at z=0.03 (130 Mpc). Such galaxies are rare in
GRB error boxes. If GRB 050906 is a long duration GRB the presence of the
galaxy could be indicative of a GRB 980425/SN1998bw -like event. If the
burst is short then the distance to IC 328 is somewhat larger than the
distance at which the giant flare from SGR 1806-20 could have been
observed. Either possibility would be of considerable interest, so
although the reality of the burst has yet to be confirmed, afterglow
searches are to be encouraged.