Swift/XRT confirms outburst of XTE J1701-462

ATel #15594; Amar Deo Chandra (IISER Kolkata)
on 7 Sep 2022; 04:25 UT
Credential Certification: Amar Deo Chandra (amar.deo.chandra@gmail.com)

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Following the report of a new outburst of XTE J1701-462 detected by the MAXI/GSC on 2022 September 06 (ATel# 15592), 0.5 ks Swift/XRT target of opportunity observation was performed in Photon Counting (PC) mode on 2022 September 6 (MJD 59828) beginning at 19:57:24. We detect a piled-up X-ray source at the following location: RA/Dec(J2000) = 255.2429, -46.1860 which is equivalent to:

RA(J2000) = 17h 00m 58.29s,
Dec(J2000) = -46d 11m 09.7s,

with an error radius of 3.5 arc-seconds (90% confidence). The location of this source is consistent with the known location of XTE J1701-462 (ATel# 696, #700, #702, #777). The estimated averaged count rate during this observation is about 4.5 cts/s.

The source was first detected in outburst beginning 2006 January (ATel# 696, #700, #702, #703, #704, #708) and possible radio (ATel# 710), optical (ATel# 706) as well as infrared (ATel# 712) counterparts of the source were identified during follow-up observations. Swift/XRT observations of XTE J1701-462 confirm the 2022 outburst of the source.

Follow-up multi-wavelength observations are encouraged.

We thank the Swift Team and Observatory Duty Scientists who made these observations possible.