The Spectral Evolution of Nova Velorum 1999 (V382 Vel)

Nova Velorum 1999 is the brightest nova that appeared in the last 24 years, being a good candidate for study of its shell. In this work we present the spectral evolution of the Nova Velorum 1999 shell during the first 3 years after the visual maximum. An average shell ejection velocity of 1600 km/s which decreases with time was found. The main results of this work suggest that the shell is inhomogeneous with a small filling factor (<0.1). We also estimate the electron temperatures and densities in the shell as well as the central source temperature. With this information we estimate the He numerical abundance and lower limits to the N, O, Ne, S, Ar and Fe numerical abundances. The results confirm that this nova is a neon nova. It is also found that iron is possibly enhanced in the shell, when compared to the solar value.