“Explosions injure dozens at Boston Marathon; many locals in race.”
So read the headline that Gazette reporters, still in shock, wrote atop a breaking news story on the afternoon of April 15, 2013.
For nearly four days, the news only got worse, and it frequently involved the LMA. Local hospitals filled with victims of the maniacal bombings. Military vehicles and police officers with assault rifles guarded the doors.
On April 19, after a long and violent day on the streets of Watertown, the two sibling suspects in the bombings and related crimes were treated at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. One was pronounced dead there. The other received world-class treatment for serious wounds and survived to await trial. Authorities charged him with the bombings as he lay in his hospital bed.
As the surviving suspect underwent surgery a half-mile away, hundreds of college students filled Mission Hill streets to cheer his capture.
We said at the time that Boston and the marathon will be defined by the collaborative goodwill of all Bostonians, not by the mayhem of senseless criminals. In the past year, Boston has proven that truth over and over.
The locals running this year’s marathon are great examples. Some ran last year, coming close to being bombed; their response was that they absolutely must run again this year. One is a doctor who helped treat the victims and sought special permission to run this time herself.
We continue to mourn the victims lost forever and the wounds that can never be made whole again. We also applaud the survivors and the participants who are responding to terror, hate and madness by getting back up and running to that finish line once again.