Skip to main content
Announcing GCN Classic Migration Survey, End of Legacy Circulars Email. See news and announcements

GCN Circular 7721

Subject
GRB 080515: Swift detection of a burst
Date
2008-05-15T06:19:28Z (17 years ago)
From
David Palmer at LANL <palmer@lanl.gov>
S. T. Holland (CRESST/USRA/GSFC), A. P. Beardmore (U Leicester),
P. A. Evans (U Leicester), E. A. Hoversten (PSU),
H. A. Krimm (CRESST/GSFC/USRA), C. B. Markwardt (CRESST/GSFC/UMD),
P. T. O'Brien (U Leicester), K. L. Page (U Leicester),
D. M. Palmer (LANL) and R. L. C. Starling (U Leicester) report on
behalf of the Swift Team:

At 06:01:13 UT, the Swift Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) triggered and
located GRB 080515 (trigger=311658).  Swift could not slew to the burst
due to Sun constraint.  The BAT on-board calculated location is 
RA, Dec 3.150, +32.599 which is 
   RA(J2000) = 00h 12m 36s
   Dec(J2000) = +32d 35' 57"
with an uncertainty of 3 arcmin (radius, 90% containment, including 
systematic uncertainty).  The BAT light curve from TDRSS was 
truncated by the beginning of a Malindi downlink and
is further complicated as we were coming out of the SAA at the time, but
shows activity from the trigger time to the end of available data
at T+8s, with a peak count rate of ~500 counts/s (15-350 keV). 

This burst is only 45.9 degrees from the Sun, so there will be no prompt 
XRT or UVOT data. The field will be outside the Swift Sun observing 
constraint tomorrow. 

Burst Advocate for this burst is S. T. Holland (sholland AT milkyway.gsfc.nasa.gov). 
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.)
Looking for U.S. government information and services? Visit USA.gov