Confirmation of Broad, High-Velocity Helium in SN 2009ip
ATel #4510; M. Childress, R. Scalzo, F. Yuan, B. Tucker, B. Schmidt (Australian National University)
on 23 Oct 2012; 00:57 UT
Credential Certification: Michael Childress (mjc@mso.anu.edu.au)
Subjects: Optical, Supernovae
We obtained a spectrum of SN 2009ip on 2012 October 22.4 with the Wide Field Spectrograph (WiFeS - Dopita et al., 2007, ApSS, 310, 255) on the ANU 2.3m telescope at Siding Spring Observatory, NSW Australia, using the B3000/R3000 gratings (3600-10000 A, 1 A resolution). In addition to narrow H and He emission features, the spectrum shows broad absorption features centered at 4320, 4750, 5690, 6370. The 5690 feature is consistent with He I 5876 at a velocity of 11,200 km/s, and the 4320 and 4750 features are roughly consistent with He I 4471 and 4922, respectively, at 12,000 km/s. The 6370 feature could be consistent with H-alpha, or could be part of a He I 6678 absorption feature that is partially filled by H-alpha emission. These results reinforce initial identification of He I from Jha, McCully, & Patel (2012; ATel #4491) and show strong support for the supernova interpretation of the latest outburst (Smith & Mauerhan 2012; ATel #4412). An image of the spectrum can be found here:
SN2009ip/wifes_SN2009ip_20121022.png">SN2009ip/wifes_SN2009ip_20121022.png"> http://www.mso.anu.edu.au/~mjc/SN2009ip/wifes_SN2009ip_20121022.png
