The final days of the LHC proton physics Run II are here

On 24 October, the LHC Operations team flipped the switch in the LHC island of the CCC to dump the last proton production fill of Run 2

Since the recovery from the recent machine development period, the LHC has been in luminosity production mode, crawling its way up towards 60 fb-1

At 2.02 p.m. on Saturday, 7 July, the last fill of the special physics run was dumped, ready for standard physics to resume

As I write this report, the integrated luminosity counter for ATLAS and CMS is at 23.1 fb-1, exceeding our goal of around 18 fb-1

The LHC is in full production mode with 2556 bunches per beam and has already successfully provided 14.6 fb-1 to each of ATLAS and CMS

On 5 May, the last step in the intensity ramp-up process was completed, ten days ahead of schedule. The LHC is now filled with 2556 bunches per beam

On 28 April 2018, 13 days ahead of schedule, the operators of the LHC successfully injected 1200 bunches of protons into the machine and collided them

The 2018 proton season has started well ahead of schedule

Despite the tight schedules, all machines were closed in time and first beams will be injected as scheduled

Now that the successful 2017 run has ended, let’s take a look back at a year full of events

Not only has the LHC reached its 2017 production target ahead of schedule, it has also doubled its design luminosity