TITLE: GCN GRB OBSERVATION REPORT NUMBER: 4352 SUBJECT: GRB 051215: Swift detection of a possible burst DATE: 05/12/15 01:32:29 GMT FROM: Scott Barthelmy at NASA/GSFC S.T. Holland (GSFC/USRA), S. Barthelmy (GSFC), D. Burrows (PSU), J. Cummings (GSFC/NRC), N. Gehrels (GSFC), C. Gronwall (PSU), J. Kennea (PSU), H. Krimm (GSFC/USRA), D. Palmer (LANL), M. Perri (ASDC) on behalf of the Swift team: At 00:39:49 UT, Swift-BAT triggered and located possible GRB 051215 (trigger=172767). The spacecraft slewed immediately. The BAT on-board calculated location is RA,Dec 163.139d,+38.626d {10h 52m 33s,+38d 37' 34"} (J2000), with an uncertainty of 3 arcmin (radius, 90% containment, stat+sys). The TDRSS lightcurve is consistent with noise which means it is either a weak short burst (less than ~0.1 sec) or a cosmic ray event. We can not determine which until we get the full data set during the next Malindi downlink in about 3 hours. XRT began observing the field at 00:41:08 UT, 79 seconds after the BAT trigger. The on-board centroiding algorithm did not converge on a source, so no prompt X-ray position is available. The XRT prompt spectrum and lightcurve show no signficant X-ray emission in the field. Further analysis will require processing of the XRT full telemetry data following the next ground station contact. UVOT began observing at UT 00:41:06, 77 seconds after the BAT trigger. There is no new source with respect to the DSS in a 200 second V-band finding chart image to a limiting magnitude of V=19.3. The extinction towards this field is A_V = 0.05. The finding chart image covers 12% of the BAT error circle. The TDRSS Notices were delayed by ~7 min due to this trigger happening during a Malindi downlink pass when TDRSS is buffered for delayed transmission.