NOVA SCUTI 1960 AND NOVA SERPENTIS 1960

Abstract

Nova Scuti 1960 was also discovered by Savel'eva ;2 her announcement was received by us one month after H.A.C. 1525 had been issued (see also Sky and Tel, 21, 212 and 260, 1961). The appearance of the spectrum on our discovery plate (Plate I) is well described by Savel'eva, which is hardly surprising since the Soviet plate of Nova Scuti was taken only fourteen days after the Case plate. Savel'eva's estimated maximum brightness of seventh magnitude for Nova Scuti is reasonable, since the star was near thirteenth magnitude when the [O in] features were much stronger than the hydrogen lines, which, according to McLaughlin, typically begins to happen about 5τ/2 magnitudes below maximum light.3·4 The extreme faintness of the star on the Palomar Sky Atlas blue print (Plate II), where it is near the print limit, together with its estimated maximum brightness of not less than seventh magnitude, appears to make the amplitude of the outburst at least 14 magnitudes. A direct photograph of Nova Scuti was taken on April 27, 1961. This plate covers the cluster NGC 6611, and Walker's magnitudes in the cluster field5 were used to estimate the nova magnitude. The resulting Β magnitude of 13.8 indicates that the object is fading quite slowly, since it was hardly a magnitude brighter nine months earlier. An additional plate has shown that the magnitude was essentially the same on May 20 as on April 27, which lessens the likelihood that the object is