The image above comes from a single 120-second exposure, unfiltered, remotely taken with the Celestron C14+Paramount ME+SBIG ST-10XME robotic unit robotic unit  available as part of the Virtual Telescope Project in Manciano, Italy. The transient is clearly visible on the left, marked with two white lines. We estimated the transient at R=8.2 (R-mags for the reference stars from the UCAC4 star catalogue). The target was just 20 degrees above the SW horizon.

This transient was discovered on 19 Aug. 2026.

We also managed to use our spectroscopic grating (200 lines/mm) available on the Celestron C14+Paramount ME+SBIG ST-10XME robotic unit to detect the nature of this transient, finding it was showing a very strong H-alpha and H-beta emission, as well as at O I 7773,  as expected from a classic nova. The plot below was not corrected for the instrumental response, but it was calibrated in wavelengths.

Spectra were reduced an analyzed using the RSpec software.

We will keep an eye on this nova for the next weeks.

Back to Novae page

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