GRB 251214B
GCN Circular 43141
Subject
GRB 251214B: Mondy optical upper limit
Date
2025-12-16T13:49:15Z (5 hours ago)
From
Alina Volnova at IKI RAS <alinusss@gmail.com>
Via
Web form
A. A. Volnova (IKI), E. Klunko (ISTP), A. S. Pozanenko (IKI), N. S. Pankov (HSE, IKI) report on behalf of IKI-GRB-FuN:
We observed the field of the long GRB 251214B detected by Fermi (Fermi team, GCN 43088), Swift (Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN 43089; Evans et al., GCN 43098; Kuin and Eyles-Ferris, GCN 43105; Burrows et al., GCN 43112; Laha et al., GCN 43129), and GECAM-B (Luo et al., GCN 43113) with the AZT-33IK 1.5m telescope of the Sayan Solar Observatory (Mondy) taking several 120-second expositions in R-band starting on Dec.15 UT 11:36:28. In the stacked image we do not detect the optical counterpart reported previously (Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN 43089; Kang et al., GCN 43093; Gress et al., GCN 43095; Fu et al., GCN 43097; Gupta et al., GCN 43100; Watson et al., GCN 43103; Kuin and Eyles-Ferris, GCN 43105; Pérez-Fournon et al., GCN 43123; Volnova et al., GCN 43124; de Ugarte Postigo et al., GCN 43131; Pankov et al., GCN 43132; Lin et al., GCN 43134). Preliminary photometry and observational details are the following:
Date UT start t-T0 Exp. Filter Obj. Err. UL Site/Telescope
(mid,days) (n*s) (3sigma)
2025-12-15 11:36:28 1.12792 30*120 R n/d n/d 22.6 Mondy/AZT-33IK
The photometry is based on several nearby stars from the USNO-B1 catalogue (R2 magnitudes) and is not corrected for the Galactic extinction.
GCN Circular 43134
Subject
GRB 251214B: 1.6m Mephisto observations with newly installed mosaic cameras
Date
2025-12-16T04:17:28Z (15 hours ago)
From
Brajesh Kumar at SWIFAR, YNU <brajesh@ynu.edu.cn>
Via
Web form
Weikang Lin, Guowang Du, Ziwei Li, Brajesh Kumar, Jiayu Qi, Donglin Gao, Yu Pan, Yuan Fang, Xinlei Chen, Xingzhu Zou, Xufeng Zhu, Tao Wang, Jinghua Zhang, Xinzhong Er, Yuanpei Yang, Xiangkun Liu, Xiaowei Liu (SWIFAR, YNU) report on behalf of the Mephisto Team:
We performed simultaneous multi-band photometric observations of GRB 251214B (Fermi GBM Team, GCN Circ. 43088; Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN Circ. 43089) with the newly installed three mosaic cameras on the 1.6m Multi-channel Photometric Survey Telescope (Mephisto) of Yunnan University located at the Lijiang Observatory. The observations were initiated at 11:31:54UTC2025-12-14 (~2.5 hours after the Swift/BAT trigger). Multiple frames were obtained in uvgriz - bands. The optical counterpart is detected in the stacked images of g, r bands and single frames of i, z bands, but there is no detection in the u and v band stacked images. The preliminary photometric magnitudes and 3-sigma upper limits are listed below. These magnitudes are not corrected for the Galactic extinction in the direction of the burst.
UT Start |Band | Exposure(s)| mag/LimMag (AB)
---------------------|-----|------------|----------------
2025-12-14T11:49:07 | u | 300.0*2 | >22.68
2025-12-14T11:31:54 | v | 300.0*2 | >22.47
2025-12-14T11:49:09 | g | 300.0*2 | 21.08 (+/-0.12)
2025-12-14T11:31:56 | r | 300.0*2 | 20.64 (+/-0.08)
2025-12-14T11:49:09 | i | 300.0 | 19.50 (+/-0.07)
2025-12-14T11:31:56 | z | 300.0 | 18.60 (+/-0.14)
The optical detection of the burst is consistent with Eyles-Ferris et al. 2025 (GCN 43089); Kang et al. 2025 (GCN 43093); Gress et al. 2025 (GCN 43095); Fu et al. 2025 (GCN 43097); Gupta et al. 2025 (GCN 43100); Watson et al. (GCN 43103); Kuin et al. (GCN 43105); Pérez-Fournon (GCN 43123); Volnova et al. (GCN 43124); Postigo et al. (GCN 43131).
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Mephisto (Multi-channel Photometric Survey Telescope) is a 1.6-m wide-field multi-channel telescope, the first of its type in the world, capable of imaging the same field of view in three optical bands simultaneously. It provides real-time, high-quality colors of stellar objects. The Mephisto mosaic cameras were installed in October 2025. The first light was achieved in all three channels on 10 October 2025, and these are currently in the commissioning phase. Here, we note that the current data processing pipeline is still at a preliminary stage, with flux calibration precision in each band at the level of about 5% or even higher.
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GCN Circular 43132
Subject
GRB 251214B: UAFO optical upper limit
Date
2025-12-15T18:11:38Z (a day ago)
From
Alina Volnova at IKI RAS <alinusss@gmail.com>
Via
Web form
N. S. Pankov (HSE, IKI), A. Kochergin (UAFO IAA), A. A. Volnova (IKI), A. S. Pozanenko (IKI) report on behalf of IKI-GRB-FuN:
We observed the field of the long GRB 251214B detected by Fermi (Fermi team, GCN 43088), Swift (Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN 43089; Evans et al., GCN 43098; Kuin and Eyles-Ferris, GCN 43105; Burrows et al., GCN 43112; Laha et al., GCN 43129), and GECAM-B (Luo et al., GCN 43113) with the RC-500 (0.5m) telescope of Ussuriysk Astrophysical Observatory (UAFO) taking several frames in R-band. The observations started on Dec. 14 at 10:44 UT, i.e., ~ 1.5 hours after the Swift/BAT trigger. In the stacked image we do not detect the optical counterpart reported previously (Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN 43089; Kang et al., GCN 43093; Gress et al., GCN 43095; Fu et al., GCN 43097; Gupta et al., GCN 43100; Watson et al., GCN 43103; Kuin and Eyles-Ferris, GCN 43105; Pérez-Fournon et al., GCN 43123; Volnova et al., GCN 43124; de Ugarte Postigo et al., GCN 43131). Photometry and observational details are the following:
Date UT start t-T0 Exp. Filter Obj. Err. UL Site/Telescope
(mid,days) (n*s) (3sigma)
2025-12-14 10:44:26 0.09073 57*60 R n/d n/d 19.4 UAFO/RC500
The photometry is based on several nearby stars from the USNO-B1 catalogue (R2 magnitudes) and is not corrected for the Galactic extinction.
GCN Circular 43131
Subject
GRB 251214B: VLT/X-shooter observations
Date
2025-12-15T17:56:34Z (a day ago)
From
Antonio de Ugarte Postigo at LAM, CNRS <adeugartepostigo@gmail.com>
Via
email
A. de Ugarte Postigo (LAM), D. B. Malesani (DAWN/NBI and Radboud), M. Garnichey (LUX-Paris Obs.), J. An (NAOC), G. Corcoran (UCD), L. Izzo (INAF/OACn & DARK/NBI), A. Martin-Carrillo (UCD), A. Saccardi (CEA/Irfu), A. L. Thakur (INAF/IAPS), A. Torralba (ISTA) and Y. Ma (Princeton U.) report on behalf of the Stargate collaboration:
We observed the optical counterpart of GRB 251214B detected by Fermi (Fermi GBM team, GCN 43088), Swift (Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN 43089) and GECAM-B (Luo et al., GCN 43113) with X-shooter mounted on the UT3 (Melipal) of ESO’s Very Large Telescope (Paranal Observatory, Chile). Observations were conducted in twilight and at large airmass.
The acquisition images, which started at 00:46:54 UT of 15 Dec 2025 (15.74 hr after the burst onset) show the counterpart with the following photometry (AB magnitudes), as compared to field stars from the SDSS catalogue:
g = 23.15 +/- 0.06
r = 22.19 +/- 0.04
z = 20.76 +/- 0.05
A 2x600 s spectrum followed, covering the spectral range between 3000 and 21000 AA.
The spectrum shows a red continuum, consistent with the photometry, only detectable above 6000 AA, and more prominent at infrared wavelengths. We do not detect clear emission features from the underlying host galaxy (mentioned by Gress et al., GCN 43095 and Watson et al., GCN 43103), which prevents us from measuring its redshift. We note that the Legacy Survey reveals that the source underlying the afterglow is composed of two blobs, a fainter one right under the GRB and a brighter one towards the North East, at a distance of 1". The slight difference between our photometry and the one of COLIBRÍ (Watson et al., GCN 43103) could be due to the different contribution of these underlying sources within the photometric aperture.
We acknowledge expert support from the ESO observing staff in Paranal, in particular Claudia Paladini, Célia Desgrange, Cecila Bustos, and Ana Jimenez-Gallardo.
GCN Circular 43129
Subject
GRB 251214B: Swift-BAT refined analysis
Date
2025-12-15T16:41:36Z (a day ago)
From
Rahul Gupta at NASA GSFC <rahul.gupta@nasa.gov>
Via
Web form
S. Laha (GSFC/UMBC), S. D. Barthelmy (GSFC),
R. A. J. Eyles-Ferris (U Leicester), R. Gupta (GSFC),
H. A. Krimm (NSF), A. Y. Lien (U Tampa),
C. B. Markwardt (GSFC), M. J. Moss (GSFC),
D. M. Palmer (LANL), T. Parsotan (GSFC),
D. Sadaula (GSFC/UMBC), T. Sakamoto (AGU)
(i.e. the Swift-BAT team):
Using the data set from T-239 to T+963 sec from the recent telemetry downlink,
we report further analysis of BAT GRB 251214B (trigger #1423875)
(Eyles-Ferris, et al., GCN Circ. 43089). The BAT ground-calculated position is
RA, Dec = 330.222, -9.155 deg which is
RA(J2000) = 22h 00m 53.4s
Dec(J2000) = -09d 09' 17.3"
with an uncertainty of 1.2 arcmin, (radius, sys+stat, 90% containment).
The partial coding was 99%.
The mask-weighted BAT light curve shows a double-peaked structure with a duration of about 10 sec
T90 (15-350 keV) is 9.38 +- 0.73 sec (estimated error including systematics).
The time-averaged spectrum from T-0.19 to T+9.97 sec is best fit by a simple
power-law model. The power law index of the time-averaged spectrum is
1.79 +- 0.12. The fluence in the 15-150 keV band is 5.0 +- 0.4 x 10^-07 erg/cm2.
The 1-sec peak photon flux measured from T-0.13 sec in the 15-150 keV band
is 2.0 +- 0.2 ph/cm2/sec. All the quoted errors are at the 90% confidence
level.
The results of the batgrbproduct analysis are available at
https://swift.gsfc.nasa.gov/results/batgrbcat/BAT_refined_circular/1423875
GCN Circular 43124
Subject
GRB 251214B: AbAO optical observations
Date
2025-12-15T14:54:17Z (a day ago)
From
Alina Volnova at IKI RAS <alinusss@gmail.com>
Via
Web form
A. A. Volnova (IKI), R. Ya. Inasaridze (AbAO), A. S. Pozanenko (IKI), N. S. Pankov (HSE, IKI) report on behalf of IKI-GRB-FuN:
We observed the field of the long GRB 251214B detected by Fermi (Fermi team, GCN 43088), Swift (Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN 43089; Evans et al., GCN 43098; Kuin and Eyles-Ferris, GCN 43105; Burrows et al., GCN 43112), and GECAM-B (Luo et al., GCN 43113) with the AS-32 0.7m telescope of Abastumani Observatory (AbAO) taking several frames in R-band. The observations started on Dec. 14 at 15:00 UT, i.e., ~ 6 hours after the Swift/BAT trigger. In the stacked image we detect the optical afterglow reported previously (Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN 43089; Kang et al., GCN 43093; Gress et al., GCN 43095; Fu et al., GCN 43097; Gupta et al., GCN 43100; Watson et al., GCN 43103; Kuin and Eyles-Ferris, GCN 43105; Pérez-Fournon et al., GCN 43123). Preliminary photometry and observational details are the following:
Date UT start t-T0 Exp. Filter Obj. Err. UL Site/Telescope
(mid,days) (n*s) (3sigma)
2025-12-14 15:00:25 0.27325 51*60 R 20.6 0.2 20.7 AbAO/AS-32
The photometry is based on several nearby stars from the USNO-B1 catalogue (R2 magnitudes) and is not corrected for the Galactic extinction.
GCN Circular 43123
Subject
GRB 251214B: LCO detection of the optical counterpart
Date
2025-12-15T14:21:49Z (a day ago)
From
Ismael Perez-Fournon at Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias <ipf@iac.es>
Via
Web form
I. Pérez-Fournon (IAC and ULL), F. Poidevin (IAC and ULL), D. Cano-Morales, A.E. Hernández-Díaz, I. Correa-Plasencia, E. Lekaroz-Urriza, M. Quintana-Ansaldo (all ULL), and A. López-Oramas (IAC and ULL)
Following the detection of the long GRB 251214B, detected by Fermi GBM (Fermi GBM team, GCN #43088), Swift BAT, XRT, and UVOT (Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN #43089; Evans et al., GCN #43098; Kuin and Eyles-Ferris, GCN #43105; and Burrows et al., GCN #43112), and GECAM-B (Luo et al., GCN #43113), we observed the field with one of the two Las Cumbres Observatory (LCO) 1-m telescopes equipped with Sinistro cameras located at the LCO node at Siding Spring Observatory near Coonabarabran, New South Wales, Australia. The observation, a single exposure of 60 sec in the SDSS r' filter, started on 2025-12-14 at 10:26:57 UT, about 1.41 hours after the Fermi, Swift, and GECAM-B triggers. The optical counterpart first detected by Swift UVOT (Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN #43089) is clearly detected in our image with a preliminary magnitude of r' = 19.18 +/- 0.10, calibrated against PanSTARRS-1 DR2 stars and not corrected for Galactic extinction. Our result is consistent with other optical and UV detections (Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN 43089; Kang et al., GCN #43093; Gress et al., GCN #43095; Fu et al., GCN #43097; Gupta et al., GCN #43100; Watson et al., GCN #43103; and Kuin and Eyles-Ferris, GCN #43105).
Our preliminary photometry is not corrected for the light of the likely host galaxy discussed by Gress et al. (GCN #43095), and Watson et al. (GCN #43103) at a photometric redshift of z = 0.709 +/- 0.078 (Duncan, 2022).
This work makes use of observations from the Las Cumbres Observatory global telescope network (LCO program IAC2025B-008, SGLF and Superluminous Supernovae surveys).
This work made use of the Astro-COLIBRI platform (P. Reichherzer et al. 2021, ApJS, 256, 5).
GCN Circular 43120
Subject
GRB 251214B: Fermi GBM Observation
Date
2025-12-15T13:26:50Z (a day ago)
From
Marianna Dafčíková at Masaryk University <500025@mail.muni.cz>
Via
Web form
M. Dafcikova (MUNI) and C. Meegan (UAH) report on behalf of
the Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor Team:
"At 09:02:18.03 UT on 14 December 2025, the Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (GBM)
triggered and located GRB 251214B (trigger 787395743/251214377),
which was also detected by Swift BAT (R. A. J. Eyles-Ferris et al. 2025, GCN 43089)
and GECAM-B (X. H. Luo et al. 2025, GCN 43113).
The Fermi GBM on-ground location is consistent with the Swift BAT position.
The angle from the Fermi LAT boresight is 97 degrees.
The GBM light curve consists of a double-peaked emission with a duration (T90)
of about 15 s (50-300 keV). The time-averaged spectrum
from T0-0.6 to T0+9.9 s is best fit by
a power law function with an exponential high-energy cutoff.
The power law index is -1.81 +/- 0.05 and the cutoff energy,
parameterized as Epeak, is 1280 +/- 80 keV.
The event fluence (10-1000 keV) in this time interval is
(1.3 +/- 0.1)E-06 erg/cm^2. The 1-sec peak photon flux measured
starting from T0-0.58 s in the 10-1000 keV band is 3.3 +/- 0.3 ph/s/cm^2.
The spectral analysis results presented above are preliminary;
final results will be published in the GBM GRB Catalog:
https://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/W3Browse/fermi/fermigbrst.html
For Fermi GBM data and info, please visit the official Fermi GBM Support Page:
https://fermi.gsfc.nasa.gov/ssc/data/access/gbm/"
GCN Circular 43113
Subject
GRB 251214B: GECAM-B observation of a long burst
Date
2025-12-15T09:50:28Z (a day ago)
From
Xinghao Luo at SVOM/GRN <2952704891@qq.com>
Via
Web form
Xing-Hao Luo, Chen-Wei Wang, Shao-Lin Xiong (IHEP) report on behalf of GECAM team:
GECAM-B was triggered in-flight by GRB 251214B, at 2025-12-14T09:02:19.10 UTC (denoted as T0), which is also detected by Fermi/GBM (Fermi GBM team, GCN #43088).
According to the GECAM-B light curves in about 70-6000 keV, this burst mainly consists of multiple pulses with a duration (T90) of 17.7 +1.8/-1.2 s.
The GECAM-B light curve can be found here:
https://www.bursthub.cn//admin/static/gecambgrb251214B.png
Gravitational wave high-energy Electromagnetic Counterpart All-sky Monitor (GECAM) mission originally consists of two micro-satellites (GECAM-A and GECAM-B) launched in Dec. 2020. As the third member of GECAM constellation, GECAM-C was launched onboard SATech-01 experimental satellite in July 2022. GECAM mission is funded by the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).
GCN Circular 43112
Subject
GRB 251214B: Swift-XRT refined Analysis
Date
2025-12-15T09:28:13Z (a day ago)
From
Phil Evans at U of Leicester <pae9@star.le.ac.uk>
Via
email
D.N. Burrows (PSU), J.P. Osborne (U. Leicester), K.L. Page (U.
Leicester), R. Brivio (INAF-OAB), A. D'Ai (INAF-IASFPA), S. Campana
(INAF-OAB), S. Lanava (PSU), S. Dichiara (PSU) and P.A. Evans report on
behalf of the Swift-XRT team:
We have analysed 5.9 ks of XRT data for GRB 251214B, from 46 s to 28.7
ks after the trigger. The data comprise 8 s in Windowed Timing (WT)
mode (taken while Swift was slewing), with the remainder in Photon
Counting (PC) mode.
The light curve can be modelled with an initial power-law decay with an
index of alpha=0.72 (+0.14, -0.17), followed by a break at T+418 s to
an alpha of 1.33 (+0.10, -0.08).
A spectrum formed from the PC mode data can be fitted with an absorbed
power-law with a photon spectral index of 1.82 (+0.19, -0.18). The
best-fitting absorption column is 1.6 (+0.7, -0.6) x 10^21 cm^-2, in
excess of the Galactic value of 4.0 x 10^20 cm^-2 (Willingale et al.
2013). The counts to observed (unabsorbed) 0.3-10 keV flux conversion
factor deduced from this spectrum is 3.9 x 10^-11 (4.9 x 10^-11) erg
cm^-2 count^-1.
A summary of the PC-mode spectrum is thus:
Total column: 1.6 (+0.7, -0.6) x 10^21 cm^-2
Galactic foreground: 4.0 x 10^20 cm^-2
Excess significance: 3.5 sigma
Photon index: 1.82 (+0.19, -0.18)
If the light curve continues to decay with a power-law decay index of
1.33, the count rate at T+24 hours will be 1.6 x 10^-3 count s^-1,
corresponding to an observed (unabsorbed) 0.3-10 keV flux of 6.3 x
10^-14 (7.8 x 10^-14) erg cm^-2 s^-1.
The results of the XRT-team automatic analysis are available at
https://www.swift.ac.uk/xrt_products/01423875.
This circular is an official product of the Swift-XRT team.
GCN Circular 43105
Subject
GRB 251214B: Swift/UVOT Detection
Date
2025-12-15T05:01:50Z (2 days ago)
From
Paul Kuin at MSSL <npkuin@gmail.com>
Via
email
N.P.M. Kuin (MSSL/UCL) and R. Eyles-Ferris (U. Leicester) report on behalf
of the Swift/UVOT team:
The Swift/UVOT began settled observations of the field of GRB 251214B 64 s
after the BAT trigger (Eyles-Ferris et al., GCN Circ. 43089