TITLE: GCN GRB OBSERVATION REPORT NUMBER: 1061 SUBJECT: GRB000418: HST/STIS Second-epoch Observations DATE: 01/05/12 21:37:22 GMT FROM: Andrew S. Fruchter at STScI A. Fruchter and M. Metzger report for a larger HST GRB Collaboration: The field of GRB 000418 was re-observed by the Hubble Space Telescope starting on UT 2001 Feb 11.64 using the STIS camera in open (50CCD) mode. The individual exposures were combined using Drizzle for a total exposure time of 5120 s. When this image is subtracted from that obtained by HST on 2000 June 4.17 a small residual of magnitude R~28 is found at the position of the compact galaxy believed to be the host galaxy (GCN 669); however, the residual is sufficiently faint to be consistent with no detection at about the 2 sigma level. Taking into account the varying brightness of the host galaxy we find an upper limit to the brightness of the OT on 2000 June 4.2 of R > 27.5. This upper limit on the R-band flux implies that the decay of the optical transient steepened to at least t ^ -1.75 to -2 at late times, in agreement with the result obtainted primarily from radio data by Berger et al (20001, astro-ph/0102278). The images of the STIS field, with transient location indicated, can be seen at http://www.stsci.edu/~fruchter/GRB/000418. This message may be cited.