U Scorpii campaign

[DHEB]

To all variabilists in SGL!

AAVSO has recently released an alert encouraging variable star observers to begin closer monitoring of the recurrent nova U Sco before its coming next outburst:

Alert Notice 664: Monitoring recurrent nova U Sco to discover its imminent eruption

The outburst is expected to occur sometime in the coming 12 months, but can in principle happen any time from now on.

U Sco is one of the few known recurrent novae, and is the one with the fastest known recurrent time of about a decade. U Sco is normally about mag 18, but can rise up to mag 7.5 during an outburst. The outbursts of this star are known to be quick, both to rise and fade.

This could be a very interesting project for both visual and photometric observers. For us in northern latitudes this will be a difficult star to observe because Scorpious lies close to the horizon for us, and is best seen amidst the summer twilight. In any case I wish you good observing (and reporting)!

This is a plot of AAVSO data from last outburst:

 

[coatesg]

Not a practical one for me at the moment - U Sco doesn't rise above my roofline as viewed from my observatory! :-0