Nova Vulpeculae 1968 No. 2 (Kohoutek)

Nova Vul 1968 No. 2 (Kohoutek) has been studied on Asiago material obtained before and after the announcement of discovery. The nova, fainter than 20 magnitude at minimum, brightened on July 16. The maximum (9.25 B) was reached on July 19. From the light curve the star can be classified as a normal fast nova. Objective prism spectra taken near maximum display the presence of absorption systems with radial velocities from –550 to –2200 km/sec. On slit spectrograms obtained at the end of October, the nova was found in the nebular stage with wide emission bands of H, Hei, Heii,Nii,Niii and forbidden lines ofOiii,Nii,Oi. The degree of excitation is slowly increasing.The nova is strongly reddened by interstellar absorption.