Detecting gamma-ray bursts from M31 with the wide field X-ray cameras on board BeppoSAX

Gamma-ray bursters emit a small fraction of their flux in X rays, and because X-ray detectors are often very sensitive they may probe the gamma-ray burst universe more deeply than the current best gamma-ray instruments. On the reasonable assumptions that spectra of bursts observed by BATSE may be used to predict the X-ray fluxes of gamma-ray bursts, and that any corona of bursts around M31 is similar to the one around the Milky Way, we predict the rate at which the wide field cameras on board BeppoSAX should detect bursts from the Milky Way and M31. These rates are such that a one-month observation of M31 would have to either detect bursts from M31 or exclude most galactic models of gamma-ray bursts. (It is shown how the remainder can be dealt with.) Therefore such an observation would settle the long-standing dispute over their location.