On October 30, 2002, Mike Simonsen (US) announced the detection of a relatively rare outburst of AW Sge (vsnet-outburst 4672). This is a little studied CV, known to be a member of the UGSU-type dwarf novae. The variable star had its last (super)outburst in July 2000.

There was a short break in the cloud cover over Belgium, on October 31, 2002, allowing me to obtain unfiltered CCD time series photometry of AW Sge, using the 0.35-m f/6.3 telescope (ST-7 CCD). The session lasted for 2.6 hours and resulted in the light curve below. It is obvious that no superhump signature is present, but rather large "irregular" variations are superimposed over the fading trend. It may be that the object is experiencing the earliest stage of a superoutburst, before the growth of genuine superhumps.

Follow-up observations over the next nights will tell ...