In the wake of multiple violent attacks and a five-day manhunt, the city of Boston is finally beginning a process of recovery.
On Monday, April 15, two bombs exploded near the finish line of the 117th annual Boston Marathon. Three people were killed: 23-year-old Boston University graduate student Lingzi Lu, 29-year-old restaurant manager Krystle Campbell, and 8-year-old Martin Richard. More than 170 people were wounded.
Late afternoon on Thursday, April 18, the FBI released surveillance photos of two suspects, who would later be identified as brothers Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26-years-old, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19-years-old.
Approximately five hours after the photos were released, Massachusetts Institute of Technology officer Sean Collier, 26-years-old, was shot and killed on campus. Police say they believe the suspects are responsible for his death.
Later that night, local law enforcement pursued the suspects, who had carjacked a vehicle in Cambridge, to the neighboring city of Watertown. Gunfire was exchanged, resulting in the death of Tamerlan Tsarnaev early Friday morning.
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was found that evening in a parked boat on the property of a Watertown residence, concluding the manhunt that locked down the city for the day. He is currently in the intensive care unit of Boston’s Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. Police have yet to identify a definitive motive for the attacks.
Because the Boston area hosts over 50 colleges and universities, many students were affected by last week’s events.
Lisa Bartucca, a Northeastern University sophomore who attended the marathon but left early, says, “We got the most emails we’ve ever gotten from Northeastern… We were not supposed to leave our dorms.”
She adds, “There are a couple of students that were hurt [in the marathon]. It happened so close, and it hit us pretty hard. It was really creepy how close it was.”
Morgan Babbs and Kathy Shields, both Tufts University sophomores who graduated from San Mateo High School and Aragon High School, respectively, noted the confusion that followed the MIT shooting on Thursday night.
Babbs says, “There were Facebook statuses and people texting me asking what was going on. People didn’t know it was related to the bombing… At about 5 a.m., they shut down the school. The campus was on lockdown. There was nothing to do and nowhere to go. Only the dining hall was open besides the dorms. They had police officers outside of each building.”
Shields adds, “It seems like pretty much everyone [was] confused and stressed out. People [were] just hanging out in their dorms and trying to distract themselves. At lunch, a provost was walking around and sat down and talked with us and checked in to see how we were doing… For people who [are] away from their family for the first time, it’s strange for them to be on their own and handling a crisis.”
Since admissions decisions were released earlier this month, many prospective college students were in the Boston area around the time of the bombings.
Stephanie Traver, a senior from Dana Hills High School in Dana Point, California, arrived in Boston on Saturday, April 13 to visit colleges. She says, “I was about two miles away on the T [subway] heading towards the finish line [on Monday]. Right when we were getting on the T, there were a group of seven policeman who drove away from the station. We didn’t know what it was. Then, after a block or two, the T driver yelled for everyone to get off because service was shut down. They made us get off the track, and everyone around us was on their phone and running and crying, and we didn’t know what was going on. They shut down cell service, and we couldn’t get a cab because there weren’t any around.”
Later that week, Traver departed earlier than planned with her parents. She says, “I got up on Thursday to shadow a class, and scrolling through Facebook, I saw people saying they couldn’t believe what was going on at MIT, so we turned on the news. We saw that all the universities were closed and that Boston and the other cities were on lockdown… We thought it would be safer to be in the airport past security.”
Aragon senior Melissa Moy plans on attending Boston University in the fall. She was not visiting Boston at the time of the attack, but says she first heard of the bombings from the New York Times app on her iPhone.
Moy says, “The initial article didn’t give much information…And then throughout the day, more information surfaced, and the death toll and number of injuries kept increasing. So by that point I felt really upset about it; not just because it was an extremely horrible act, but because the site of the explosions was literally a few blocks away from my future school.”
However, when prompted if recent events changed her feelings about attending Boston University in the fall, Moy replied, “Not at all. Many reports that I read talked about the people of Boston opening up their homes to runners, the blood bank being filled within hours because of all the immediate donations, people running towards the blasts to help… Hearing about the wonderful job the communities in Boston did in response to it actually made me feel better about being there next year. Also, since it was a localized incident and Boston is a really safe city otherwise, I didn’t feel too worried.”
Since the city-wide lockdown has been lifted, recovery efforts have already begun. According to NBC News, the accrued medical costs of citizens requiring surgery and rehabilitation may reach $9 million. In addition to various fundraisers for individual victims, the city has also received donations from the Eastern Massachusetts division of the American Red Cross and One Fund Boston, among other organizations.
Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren paid her respects and an impromptu memorial in Boston on Sunday, April 21. When asked by a young boy about the tragedy, Warren replied, “It is very sad, but see all these people? They show just how kind and loving people really are.”
Outlook Features Editor and Aragon senior Taylor Westmont arrived in Boston on Tuesday, April 16 to visit colleges. She reported on ongoing events during her time there and and returned safely to San Mateo on Sunday, April 21.
