Electronic Telegram No. 3286
Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams
INTERNATIONAL ASTRONOMICAL UNION
CBAT Director:  Daniel W. E. Green; Hoffman Lab 209; Harvard University;
 20 Oxford St.; Cambridge, MA  02138; U.S.A.
e-mail:  cbatiau@eps.harvard.edu (alternate cbat@iau.org)
URL http://www.cbat.eps.harvard.edu/index.html
Prepared using the Tamkin Foundation Computer Network


SUPERNOVA 2012ga IN NGC 6976 = PSN J20522510-0546156
     G. Pignata, M. Cifuentes, Y. Apostolovski, and M. Vidal, Universidad
Andres Bello; J. Maza, M. Hamuy, R. Antezana, L. Gonzalez, R. Cartier, F.
Forster, S. Silva, F. Carrasco, P. Sanchez, C. Hervias, and R. Ramirez,
Universidad de Chile; F. Aros, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile; B.
Conuel, Wesleyan University; G. Folatelli, IPMU, University of Tokyo; and D.
Reichart, K. Ivarsen, J. Haislip, A. Crain, D. Foster, M. Nysewander, and A.
LaCluyze, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, on behalf of the CHASE
project (which is part of the Millennium Center for Supernova Science
collaboration), report the discovery of an apparent supernova (mag
approximately 17.8) on an unfiltered image taken on Apr. 22.40 UT with the
0.41-m 'PROMPT 3' telescope located at Cerro Tololo.  The new object is
located at R.A. = 20h52m25s.10 +/- 0".2, Decl. = -5o46'15".6 +/- 0".2
(equinox 2000.0), which is about 13".9 west and 4".8 north of the center of
the galaxy NGC 6976.  Nothing is visible at this position on a stack of
fifteen 40-s archival images taken between 2011 Apr. 14.36 and 2012 Apr.
1.39 (limiting mag 20.5).  The variable was designated PSN J20522510-0546156
when it was posted at the Central Bureau's TOCP webpage and is here
designated SN 2012ga based on the spectroscopic confirmation reported below.
Additional CCD magnitudes for 2012ga:  Apr. 15.35, [18.0 (CHASE); 23.38, 17.5
(CHASE); 28.431, 18.9 (J. Brimacombe, Cairns, Australia; obtained remotely
using a 51-cm RCOS telescope + STL11K camera + luminance filter at the New
Mexico Skies Observatory near Mayhill, NM, U.S.A.; position end figures 25s.12,
16".1; image posted at http://www.flickr.com/photos/43846774@N02/7122722421/).

     C. Inserra, S. J. Smartt, M. Fraser, D. Young, and K. Smith, Queen's
University, Belfast; F. Cellier-Holzem and P. El-Hage, Laboratoire de Physique
Nucleaire et de Hautes Energies, Paris; Y.-C. Pan, University of Oxford; M.
Sullivan, University of Southampton; I. Arcavi, A. Gal-Yam, and O. Yaron,
Wiezmann Institute of Science; S. Benetti, A. Pastorello, and S. Valenti,
Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica, Padova; and S. Taubenberger, A. Sternberg,
and S. Benitez-Herrera, Max-Planck-Institute fuer Astrophysik, Garching, on
behalf of the PESSTO collaboration (see Valenti et al., posted at website URL
http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=4037), report that optical
spectroscopy (range 360-910 nm), obtained on Apr. 29 with the New Technology
Telescope (+ EFOSC2), show that PSN J20522510-0546156 = SN 2012ga is a
type-II supernova at redshift z = 0.020; the spectrum is similar to those of
a few type-II supernovae at two weeks past explosion.  PESSTO classification
spectra can be obtained from website URL http://www.pessto.org/;
classification is made via SNID (Blondin and Tonry 2007, Ap.J. 666, 1024)
and GELATO (Harutyunyan et al. 2008, A.Ap. 488, 383).


NOTE: These 'Central Bureau Electronic Telegrams' are sometimes
      superseded by text appearing later in the printed IAU Circulars.

                         (C) Copyright 2012 CBAT
2012 November 1                  (CBET 3286)              Daniel W. E. Green