Catalina Sky Survey Candidate GRB

Above: Sequence of images showing a stellar-like "optical transient" event in Lynx found by Eric Christensen on 11 December 2004 at the Catalina Sky Survey. An animation is also available. Right: Object seen at the same location in 12 February 2002 images from NEAT/Palomar, found by Andrew Lowe in the SkyMorph archive. Image data courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.

During the progress of the Catalina Sky Survey (CSS) on the morning of 11 December 2004, Eric Christensen noticed the appearance, brightening, and fading of an unmoving point source, a "stellar object." Archive sleuth Andrew Lowe has since then found something at the same location in archival imagery from NEAT's Mt. Palomar telescope from the morning of 12 February 2002.

Eric Christensen tells A/CC that "An optical counterpart of a gamma ray burst (orphan or simply undetected in the gamma ray wavelength), or a previously unknown flare star seem to be the leading candidates" for what it was that he caught.

Update: On 16 December 2004, it was reported in GRB Coordinates Network Circular 2851 that "the transient was most likely an unusually strong stellar flare associated with [a probable M dwarf with a prominent H-alpha emission line], and not a GRB or any other exotic type of an event."

For more about all of this, see A/CC's news thread.