Middei, R.R.MiddeiMarinucci, A.A.MarinucciBRAITO, ValentinaValentinaBRAITOBianchi, S.S.BianchiDe Marco, B.B.De MarcoLuminari, A.A.LuminariMatt, G.G.MattNARDINI, EmanueleEmanueleNARDINIPERRI, MatteoMatteoPERRIReeves, J. N.J. N.ReevesVagnetti, F.F.Vagnetti2025-01-102025-01-1020220035-8711http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12386/35616We report on the short and long term X-ray properties of the bright nearby Seyfert 2 galaxy NGC 2992, which was extensively observed with Swift, XMM-Newton and NuSTAR. Swift targeted the source more than 100 times between 2019 and 2021 in the context of two monitoring campaigns. Both time-averaged and time-resolved analyses are performed, and we find that the short-to-long term spectral properties of NGC 2992 are dominated by a highly variable nuclear continuum. The source varied in the 2-10 keV energy band from 0.6 to 12 $\times$ 10$^{-11}$ erg cm$^{-2}$ s$^{-1}$ during the two year long Swift monitoring. The fastest 2-10 keV flux change (by a factor of $\sim60\%$) occurred on a timescale of a few hours. The overall emission spectrum of the source is consistent with a power law-like continuum ($\Gamma=1.69\pm0.01$) absorbed by a constant line-of-sight column density N$_{H}=(7.8\pm0.1)\times$ 10$^{21}$ $\rm cm^{-2}$. The reflected emission is likely due to matter with an average column density N$_{\rm H}=(9.6\pm2.7)\times$ 10$^{22}$ $\rm cm^{-2}$, thus NGC 2992 appears to have a globally Compton-thin circumnuclear medium. This scenario is fully supported by an independent analysis of the fractional variability and by XMM-Newton multi-year spectra.STAMPAenArticle10.1093/mnras/stac13812-s2.0-85133714369https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/514/2/2974/6588057?login=trueFIS/05 - ASTRONOMIA E ASTROFISICA