The exceptionally extended flaring activity in the X-ray afterglow of GRB 050730 observed with Swift and XMM-Newton

We present the results of a detailed spectral and temporal analysis of Swift and XMM-Newton observations of the high redshift (z=3.969) GRB 050730. The X-ray afterglow of GRB 050730 was found to decline with time with superimposed intense flaring activity that extended over more than two orders of magnitude in time. Seven distinct re-brightening events starting from 236 s up to 41.2 ks after the burst were observed. The underlying decay of the afterglow was well described by a double broken power-law model with breaks at t_1= 237 +/- 20 s and t_2 = 10.1 (-2.2) (+4.6) ks. The temporal decay slopes before, between and after these breaks were alpha_1 = 2.1 +/- 0.3, alpha_2 = 0.44 (-0.08) (+0.1…