V5558 Sgr - Nova Sgr 2007

 

V5558 Sgr was discovered on 2007  April 14.777 UT by Japanese Nova searcher Yukio Sakurai at magnitude 10.3 on two 20-s CCD images.  CBET 934 announced by Dan Green some two weeks later states that this is a most remarkable object, with the overall spectrum not resembling a classical Nova, but rather one at the pre-maximum stage.  The light curve does indeed show a remarkable variation for a Nova, with no less than four maxima observed up to the end of 2007 - although not all are visible on this plot, due to it's poor location in the sky.  See the AAVSO light curve generator for a more detailed plot.

 

Visually this object lies in the deep orange skies of Birmingham from where I observe, and if it were not for the brightness of the Nova, it wouldn't be visible at all.  At -18.5 degrees declination, this is the lowest declination object I have managed to compile a light curve for (that I have seen, not imaged - see GW Lib) - albeit somewhat fragmentary!