GCN Circular 78

The Nordic Optical Telescope GRB team (A. O. Jaunsen, J. Hjorth, M. I. Andersen,
K. Kjernsmo, H. Pedersen, E. Palazzi) reports the detection at the 2.5-m NOT of 
an unresolved (in seeing of 1.5"-2"), variable object located within the 
BeppoSAX error box of GRB 980519 (GCN #75). 

The coordinates (+- 0.5") are

RA(2000)  =  23 22 21.46
Dec(2000) = +77 15 43.0

The object had an I magnitude of about 19.5 on May 19.87 UTC but is not
detected in the DSS while objects of similar magnitude are. The OT had 
faded by about 0.6 mag in V and I on May 20.0 UTC. 

These observations suggest that the OT is the optical counterpart of GRB 980519.

Preliminary Cousins I photometry (+-0.1 mag, not corrected for extinction) of 
4 nearby reference stars yields

     RA(2000)       Dec(2000)         I
A    23 22 17.74    +77 15 51.2      19.04
B    23 22 27.29    +77 15 43.5      19.49
C    23 22 28.50    +77 15 25.4      18.52
D    23 22 47.14    +77 16 23.5      15.69

On this system the OT had I=20.08 on May 20.00 UTC

Finding charts, images and updates will be posted at 
http://www.uio.no/~ajaunsen/grb980519

This note can be cited.