The Low-Latency Detection of GW170817

At 12:41:04 UTC on August 17th, 2017, gravitational waves from the merger of a binary neutron star passed through the LIGO and Virgo detectors, an event now known as GW170817. 1.7 seconds later, a short gamma-ray burst, GRB 170817A, was observed by Fermi GBM. The joint detection of GW170817 and GRB 170817A led to a several week campaign with over 70 astronomical partners that identified electromagnetic counterparts in the x-ray, ultraviolet, optical, infrared, and radio bands. In this presentation, I will discuss the initial low-latency gravitational wave detection of GW170817 by the GstLAL-based inspiral pipeline.