U01 claim a positional coincidence with the radio source GPSR5 37.278-0.226 and quote fluxes of $S_{5~\rm GHz}=78.1$ mJy (Becker et al. 1994) and $S_{1.4~\rm GHz}=8.1\pm0.7$ mJy (NVSS survey; Condon et al. 1999). However, these fluxes yield a spectral index greater than expected for optically thick emission and examination of the fields suggests that background source confusion renders the values quoted as unreliable; indeed Becker et al. (1994) quote $S_{1.4~\rm GHz}=198$ mJy for the same source.

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We note that PC02 suggest a higher temperature (>20 kK) for AFGL 2298, based on the strength of the He I 2.058 $\mu$ m transition in their low resolution spectrum. However the presence of low excitation species in our spectrum (Fe II, Mg II and Na I) - absent for higher temperature Ofpe/WN9 objects (Bohannan & Crowther 1999) - demonstrates that AFGL 2298 has a lower temperature than this estimate.

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... results

However note that due to the small number of observations comparisons are being drawn between stars of very different temperature & luminosity ranges, metallicities and evolutionary stages.

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...1987)

We are forced to make the implicit assumption that $v_{\exp}$ remains constant between the observations. However, given the contraction of AFGL 2298 one might expect an increase in $v_{\exp}$ if the correlation between $v_{\rm escape}$ and $v_{\exp}$ observed for other OB and LBV stars is maintained (e.g. NGC 2363-V1, HD 5980 and AG Car; Drissen et al. 2001; Leitherer et al. 1994), which would imply an even larger increase in $\dot{M}$ than we derive.

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... $1.2\times10^{4}$ yr

U01 quote several different values of $R_{\rm in}$ and $R_{\rm out}$ based on imaging and modeling results; we adopt the inner radius that resulted from modeling, $R_{\rm in}=0.12$ pc, and a value of $R_{\rm out}=6~R_{\rm in}$ (cf. Sect. 5.3 of U01) noting that this value is poorly constrained but exceeds the outer radius of the observed mid-IR emission. An expansion velocity $v_{\exp,\rm neb}=50$ km s^-1 and a gas: dust ratio of 100 were also used.

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