What Happened to the Fe K Line?
Production of the fluorescent Fe K line requires that an X-ray continuum illuminates cold target material of sufficient optical depth and covering fraction. In ordinary Seyfert galaxies, it is thought that the only target with the necessary properties is the accretion disk. In the context of this scenario we consider possible reasons for the weakness of the Fe K line in Pictor A. We seek an explanation which is not just specific to Pictor A, but rather one that is also consistent with all (or at least most) of the available data as they are summarized in Table 3, including the widths of the Fe K lines and the independent information on the disk orientation obtained from the radio properties. 1. A highly inclined disk.The inclination angle of the accretion disk of Pictor A is likely to be large. The radio core-to-lobe luminosity ratio (log R = -1.82; Jones & McAdam 1992) and the projected separation of the radio lobes (Table 3) imply i > 24°. If this is the case, then there are two effe
