The presence of extreme horizontal branch (EHB) and blue hook stars in some Galactic globular clusters (GGCs) constitutes one of the remaining mysteries of stellar evolution. While several evolutionary scenarios have been proposed to explain the characteristics of this peculiar population of evolved stars, their observational verification has been limited by the availability of spectroscopic data for a statistically significant sample of such objects in any single GGC. In this first paper, we focus on {omega} Centauri, a peculiar, massive GGC that hosts multiple stellar populations. We use non-LTE model atmospheres to derive atmospheric parameters (Teff, log g and N(He)/N(H)) and spectroscopic masses for 152 EHB stars in the cluster. We also search for close binaries among these stars based on radial velocity variations. The majority of our sample consists of sdOB stars that have roughly solar or super-solar atmospheric helium abundances. It is these objects that constitute the blue hook at V>18.5mag in the {omega} Cen colour-magnitude diagram.

Cone search capability for table J/A+A/618/A15/tableb3 (Spectroscopic EHB stars in {omega} Cen)