2008CBET.1282....1D

M. Dennefeld, Institut d'Astrophysique de Paris; I. Agnoletto, A. Harutyunyan, S. Benetti, and E. Cappellaro, Osservatorio Astronomico di Padova and INAF; M. Turatto, Osservatorio Astronomico di Catania; S. Taubenberger and N. Elias-Rosa, Max Planck Institut fuer Astrophysik; and A. Boselli, Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille, report that a spectrogram of 2008aw (cf. CBET 1279), obtained on Mar. 4.03 UT with the Observatoire de Haute Provence 1.93-m telescope (+ CARELEC; range 362-726 nm, resolution 0.8 nm), shows a blue featureless continuum consistent with a core-collapse supernova soon after explosion. A broad, shallow (FWHM about 14500 km/s) He I 587.6-nm line is visible with a P-Cyg profile, with the minimum being blueshifted by about 11000 km/s. A narrow H-alpha emission line with a velocity of 3290 km/s from the background H II region is present in the spectrum, in agreement with the host-galaxy recession velocity (3117 km/s, from Da Costa et al. 1998, A.J. 116, 1).