Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line | Hacker News Reader

Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

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872 pointsrecoiledsnake586 comments

The worst part for me (and I really am feeling bad about this) is that I should be concerned about the victims right now, but I can't stop thinking about what freedoms I'll be losing as a result of this.

I feel like everyone expects a reaction and increased security and such, but sometimes this type of reaction won't be fruitful. What could we learn from this -- check every trash can for a bomb at every big event? There are an unlimited number of places you could hide a bomb. If someone trying to blow people up saw the 'reaction' being checking every trash can, they would just learn not to hide their bomb in a trash can. There's just no chance we can prevent disasters like this with security increases alone.

I feel like at this point that we should be examining who did it, and what caused them to do it rather than how it could have been prevented with security measures. Get to the root of the problem and solve it there, rather than a surface-level patch. Was it a mental health thing? Was it spurred by our culture of violence and/or attention to violence? Was the attacker after a specific person? Certainly not easy to find out these answers, but would probably be effort better spent than checking trash cans.

I'm sure there will be some silly knee-jerk response that serves no good for the public and likely just inconveniences everyone. I'm also sure that people working in the government understand these short-term reactions are almost always useless. Why does it continue happening?

Is there some "silly knee-jerk" response to every such event? I don't remember the knee-jerk response to the Oklahoma City bombing. Or the Atlanta Olympics bombing. Or the first WTC bombing. Or the attempted 2010 Times Square bombing. The response to Sandy Hook is better described as "belabored" rather than "knee-jerk."

As for 9/11, that involved 3,000 people dead and the collapse of a major American icon. It killed more people than the Pearl Harbor bombing and involved direct costs and losses approaching $100 billion.[1] Jury's still out on whether it was a "silly knee-jerk" response or a reasonable wake-up to the threat of global islamic terrorism.

[1] http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505123_162-57292565/cost-of-911-...

> What could we learn from this -- check every trash can for a bomb at every big event? There are an unlimited number of places you could hide a bomb.

France, in response to terrorist attacks in the 1995 mandated that all public locations have transparent bags held by posts [1] [2]. I don't think that's a unreasonable compromise, considering the alternatives.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste_container#Media

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Trash_bin_in_Paris.jpg

> check every trash can for a bomb at every big event?

Actually, I think they already do that, with bomb-sniffing dogs. But they have dubious reliability, and don't catch someone who's willing to place the bomb shortly before it detonates, as may have been the case here.

Due to the sarin gas attacks in Japan in the early 90s Tokyo no longer has trash cans in public areas for the most part.

The attackers hid the canisters in trash cans in that instance as well.

When 9/11 hit my first thought was, "Travel is really going to suck now." When the Bali bombing hit, I thought, "I've been to that bar, holy sh*t!" This time around I'm thinking, "I know some people who were running."

Reaction to issues is tied to how much you can personally relate to the victims. It's also why 2 people dying in a stream in your neighborhood seems so much more relevant than 100,000 people dying in an earthquake halfway around the world.

If you are feeling bad, why are you saying it? This feels like you are standing on a soapbox and it's hard to think you are actually sorry for it when you are doing it intentionally.

I'm just a dude facing a big stab of mental dissonance right now. I'm not trying to push a political agenda. My brother ran in and finished the marathon last year. I didn't make it out to see him and I wish I had. So the first thing I feel is dread, it takes a moment to resolve that he wasn't there, and then I think will I ever be able to get close enough to reach out my hand to him as he comes down the final stretch again or did I miss that chance forever?

Will it be all police cars, dogs and jersey walls from here on out? This sucks.

Feeling bad about having a legitimate stance in the face of a tragedy isn't cause for self censorship. It might be social pariahism, but it's not cause enough for one to bite their tongue.

Because guilt isn't an emotion that can always be trusted.

I felt the same way. My first thought was that I was glad there weren't any assault weapons involved, for which I was immediately ashamed. Immediately after that I was disgusted that Bloomberg.com wanted me to watch an ad for a new Mercedes before I could check on the well-being of my fellow humans.

I'm not proud of my thoughts, and I'm not proud of the hundred or so sarcastic remarks that I've thought of since I first heard the news either.

I am genuinely saddened that this happened, and my most sincere hope is that whomever did so is apprehended quickly and that nobody else is injured or killed while that happens. At the same time, the explosion looks (at least to me) like Tannerite, and I'm also thinking that perhaps Tannerite is going to get banned, or regulated, despite being, basically, iron oxide; which would make such a ban pretty futile.

because he desperately needs attention and right now boston has it.

The first thought on my mind was what mysterious 1000 page bill is going to show up and get rushed through congress because of all this?

My second thought is how weird it is that for the next couple of days the attention and focus of a 100s of millions of people's will be directed at the circumstances surrounding the deaths of perhaps 20 people of no particular notability. It's as if these are the only 20 people that died lately. The attention and focus of the public in this modern era of global communications is a strange thing.

Would you like Federal Information Security Amendments Act, Cybersecurity Enhancement Act or Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA)?

Problem, reaction, solution.

Sounds legit to me. Do you feel bad about the hundred of people murdered every day? I don't. Its just that they aren't on the news. I'd feel bad for the people i remotely know, or for the families if I were to meet them, but otherwise.. it's not any different. It's bad, but doesn't make one feel bad - and that's perfectly fine.

Speak for yourself.

Couldn't agree more so. What "precautions" and new reforms are we gonna see in the name of security?

Who knows. But after every crisis there should be a post mortem and we should learn from what went wrong. And why does every change in policy and approach have to be seen as a threat to anybody's freedoms? Not that many of the short-sighted response aren't just that, but this sort of knee jerk reaction seems just as unhealthy.

No doubt some "reforms" will be implemented that will funnel even more money into the pockets of lobbyist-using companies and big-time campaign donors.

"we gonna see in the name of security"

Watershed events always create these emotional knee jerk reactions. As opposed to "well we can save lives by driving 50 mph instead of 70 mph but since that's legacy we aren't likely to not consider the impact on society as a whole by lowering the speed limit."

No worries, you're simply thinking pragmatically, when everyone else is emotional. The killings are nothing but a mode of transport for destruction of freedom.

I'm not worried about me as much as I'm worried about the poor citizens of the country these people are from, if it's a foreign group.

The fact that this is the top comment for this thread makes me sad.

To be quite honest, me too. I expected it to just be background radiation: I too feel badly, conflicted and confused. I didn't expect this.

Sitting at the top like that it really does start to look like soap-boxing or attention whoring. Apologies all, I really didn't mean it that way.

Why is this the top thread? I'm being serious here... I honestly don't understand how this got all the way up to the top where as others of much greater worth (IMHO) sit below...

I agree totally. I'd delete it if it would take it from the top instead of leaving the discussion there behind a curious "deleted".

I've scrolled down and up-voted as many of those more valuable comments as I could. I encourage everyone who reads this far to go and do the same.

As I said, I thought this would be a "one voice among many" kind of post, not become the lightning-rod of this thread. Parent is right. Go read the better stuff.

Because most people think violent attacks on high-profile innocents is more meaningful than, say, the merits of blogging without an audience.

Thousands die every day, but freedoms should persist.

Besides with a little luck this is North Korea and we don't have to loose any more freedoms (do we even have more to lose?)

Are you really asking whether we have more freedoms to lose in the same sentence that you mention North Korea? Really?

You seem to be implying that because North Korea is less free than us, we are completely free with nothing to lose. That's pretty faulty logic. Better to be aware of the freedoms we are losing (even though we still have many) than to risk ending up like North Korea.

It'll probably kick-start an invasive drone surveillance bill and some unrelated oil-rich country being turned into dust. I wish this was hyperbole but based on previous US reactions this makes the most sense.

For what it's worth, I upvoted this question despite so many comments bemoaning its existence.

The facts will be fleshed out over time on the regular news, so I see less value in comments just parroting that. Rather, (if this is to be discussed on Hacker News at all), I'd prefer it to be about the ramifications of the event, and especially how it relates to technology, or laws/regulations that foster the development of technologies.

I'm a Bostonian (at work about a mile from the explosions), and I wish everyone would just cool their jets a bit until more is known about what's going on.

If anything a successful terrorist attack should be a condemnation of the freedom-sacrificing mechanisms that have been put in place like the PATRIOT Act. They just failed.

The most likely change to your freedoms is 'none whatsoever' -- tragedies on this scale don't threaten society as a whole and therefore are dealt with by existing laws.

9/11 didn't threaten society, either. Just a few nutcase cultists who got lucky with a single attack that they couldn't sustain.

How is the scale of this disaster any different than that of Newtown's? That has obviously had a large political impact.

I think it largely depends on who will be found as the culprit.

If it would be found that this is an Islamist terror attack the aftermath will be much more pronounced then a scenario where the blame will be on say some extreme right wing group.

Much of the lose of freedom we all suffer from is due to entrenched xenophobia becoming political agenda, it seems much harder to enact changes when the criminals are white Americans ala Timothy McVeigh or some horrific mass shooting

Culprit (Saudi national?) may have been found. http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/authorities_under_susp...

They're going to be searching peoples bags on the subway tomorrow, no mention of the 4th amendment given.

ah jesus. relax.

Another thing to focus on is the infrastructure. Telephone lines and data networks must be clogged, it just goes to show how much we need reliable networks and data infrastructures for such vital occurrences!

Of course, because you are spoiled, whining nerd, who has no idea about real suffering.

Fuck off. How much blood has the western world lost to achieve freedom, privacy, and a government by the people for the people? We cannot continue to allow the enemy to terrorize us into giving up our liberties.

Also, fuck off with the "whining nerd" shit.

If you're not for the third world then you have no idea at all about REAL suffering.

A bomb in a sports event? That's suffering people eat for breakfast around other parts of the world.

Seriously? Because you had so much more freedom in 1999?

Are you kidding? We're demonstrably less free today than 1999. The TSA springs to mind, the patriot act..

You haven't traveled much lately, have you?

At least I could take nail clippers on an airplane in 1999.

In the sturm und drang that has resulted from this tragedy, and the weeks to come of hand wringing about terrorists/crazyfolk/etc across the major news networks, I hope against hope that we can stow our reptilian brains for a brief while… In the 3 hours that have passed since the top comment was made, 205 people in the US have died from heart disease(1), an almost entirely preventable disease. This observation may be construed as heartless, insensitive to the victims, and "if it were your X then it would be different"… but I contend that each time we act like chimps and allow our attention to be drawn to the latest epidemiologically insignificant tragedy we lose as a species. A van distributing a year's supply of aspirin to the fleeing masses would have been more helpful than any ambulance..

(1) http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/lcod.htm

I've never quite understood that argument. It's not about it being insensitive, just irrelevant. It seems to have an implicit but completely unsupported premise that every death is equal.

First, there's age: deaths from heart disease tend to happen at old age. In most cultures, death at old age is considered less tragic than the death of an infant or young adult. Also, there's the perceived "naturality" of death: death by natural causes is considered less tragic and less repugnant than murder. And finally there's the fear aspect: a specific murder of A by B for reason X is repugnant but it doesn't necessarily makes other people fear for their lives, while a bombing in a public setting makes people worry that they and their loved ones might be targets too.

And when humans first landed on the Moon, think of all the other people (not to mention animals) that landed elsewhere that same day! But the sensationalist media only covered the Moon landing.

I think there is a small bit of difference between you choosing to live your life in such a way that heart disease will be your end, vs someone else deciding to blow your limbs off.

Well said.

Really PG?

https://twitter.com/paulg/status/323909260826259457

"[R]andom acts of benevolence are a good reaction to random acts of violence."

I find some kind of beauty in that. It might just be the phrase "random acts of benevolence", which I've never seen before, but I intensely respect this position.

https://twitter.com/paulg/status/323914172528197632

I agree. It seems like a good strategy to me, a good way to channel feelings of anger and helplessness into something productive.

So what if it's affiliated with YC? It's a charity that pg trusts to help people effectively, which is the point.

My first reaction was that pg's original tweet was really tasteless, but after mulling it over, I went and donated anyway. Perhaps at least a tiny bit of good can come from this.

What a jerk! Being inspired to donate to charity and whatnot!

I guess the problem is that PG phrased it like a robotic commercial advertisement.

Watsi's a nonprofit, so I'm pretty sure neither YC or PG are getting rich off of it.

I think it's a good reminder that serious shit isn't going down just in Boston right now, and that you can help people suffering right now, wherever they are.

Just a little too soon after, only a couple hours, combined with confusion over for-profit status makes it look tone deaf but it is really not. People are suffering - help suffering people.

While this is buggy/not ready for release, here's a way to follow this on social media.

http://fastlane.grasswire.com/

PS. Here's our launchrock page if anyone cares http://grasswire.com

I would like a way to filter out everything that includes the word "pray" in it unless it is from a respected news source. 90% of what any person ever says in response to everything that happens in america is "pray for it". It's sort of muddy to look at.

Actually it's just completely obnoxious. I like the site though.

You're absolutely right. "Pray for boston" is trending on Twitter and Instagram right now, so it really muddies up the feed. We'll get a way to put negative search terms in there.

"Favorites" is a morbid word to have on this page. Maybe consider "Highlights" instead.

Good call, thanks for the feedback!

Highlights is pretty bad too.

We used to call it "best of" then went to "favorites." It obviously won't be favorites anymore - didn't think of this use case.

How about "Notable"

as a general rule, avoid the word favorites altogether in any software, unless you are certain it will only be used in the US. We spell it favourites, and "favvOrrittez" as you seem to spell it, really grates. Esp in IE, whereas Net/moz always called them bookmarks. Fayvritz.

Perhaps just a star? You can call them "starred" posts. Seems somewhat more neutral.

JUST FYI: This is camping on a simple dev server, so I'm sorry it keeps going down. I'm doing my best to keep it online. Thanks!

Should be up now

This is incredible.. but at the same time you've exposed me to the multitudes of people that are just so hungry to make a "viral" image. I can't believe it.

One of the many:

http://distilleryimage7.s3.amazonaws.com/a9ba58b6a61111e2901...

Yeah, this is a problem, especially with Instagram. As a random aside, watching this has been a really interesting look into how viral marketing is done.

Love it! This is the future of news consumption: firehose.

You should really have linkbacks to the text/photos you're pulling in.

if it's yours: nice, but consider refresh rate of 'media' a bit lower. I can't read the captions before it's pushed down.

Would be great if mouseover froze the lane underneath. For bonus points you could continue to load new tweets but add them above the screen.

Will do. It is by no means ready for release, but you know...

This looks to be shaping up well. Might I suggest a new word for "Favorites" though. Maybe it is silly but it seems odd to me to Favorite gore pictures et. al. "Important" or "Impactful" or something else might be a better word when the content could be that of loss and suffering.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand, it's gone... Shouldn't have told everyone about it. Clearly it's quality made it viral.

It's pretty good at holding traffic. Not so much when it comes to curious "stop by, see what's up, open a websocket, leave." But we're working on making it better, and it is back and running smooth now. Thanks for checking it out :)

Congrats. You have a hit!

cool, I get it. I see there is a lot of ux polishing ahead, but I like the overal concept.

an on/off button for auto-refresh may be a good idea.

signed up for the notification email.

I am interested in what this was as it sounds cool, but it is down at the moment. Could you tell us a bit more about it?

Basically it searches and refreshes all of the social media networks in real time (twitter, youtube, instagram, flickr, wordpress, blogger) and shows them in three streams, allowing you to "favorite" the best stuff you see and separate it out.

But the really cool stuff is what we can do with data of what users have favorited.

How do you plan to get around the Twitter syndication rules and regulations once this site takes off?

This is a really good question, and should be referring to all apis and their limits. This was my approach: Create a parser that lives off of apis, just under posted limits. Although we had a few thousand visitors today, there was only one direct line to each data source. There's a viewer server that reaches for data every so often depending on your desired speed (I think it's set to somewhere between 1 and 2 seconds) and broadcasts it. So if the parser goes down, or tags change, or services get mad, you can fix and restart without requiring clients to refresh. I'm still not in love with the solution, but it worked nicely today. Thanks!

Thanks for the explanation. I worked for a one of the eleven companies that still had rights to access the Firehose after the debacle and I saw a lot of great projects stymied by the new rules.

This is fantastic. Truly!

Would you say that your site traffic is blowing up in response to this event?

EDIT: Sorry, sorry--in a weird headspace from the news. In all seriousness, did you actually just launch a product in this thread?

EDIT2: Just remember, when launching a product--it's not a sprint, it's a marathon.

150 visitors on the site right now, so I guess it depends on your definition of "blowing up." We're getting visits from YouTube, Twitter, Reddit, etc. but I haven't dug into where exactly.

Proof: http://d.pr/i/LDao

And as to "launching" in a thread, I don't really consider this a full "launch." Our product is needed, so even though it isn't ready we pushed it live.

I checked it out, and it's a cool product. I agree with somebody elses's comment--this is a useful thing to have in this day and age.

Out of curiosity, how are you picking which things to feed? Your ticker rate for tweets seems fixed, so you are discarding some things, right?

Yeah, like I said the product is brand new. It discards everything with "RT" or "Retweet" as well as a few other things in it (if it weren't finals week it would discard everything with "pray," but we should be taking our exams right now). Soon it will split up different tweets and show them to different people.

I don't really think your "EDIT2" is called for.

Anyone ever see the movie "Four Lions"? Basically it's a dark comedy about a bunch of jihadist trying to bomb the London Marathon, but fail because they're incompetent.

Too bad life doesn't always imitate art.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Lions

I watched it this weekend. Very eery feeling right now. Sadly, although they "fail" in the movie, they do take out at least a few innocent citizens.

Actually weren't these bombers incompetent? How many people were running in this marathon? As far as I understand, if the bombs would have went off about 10 minutes earlier it would have been really bad.

Slightly off topic, but is anyone else confused by the fact that several runners in this video[1] reacted to the explosion but did not turn and proceeded to keep running? These people weren't exactly leading the pack (at a 4+ hours finish time), so my guess is that they are just severely deprived of nutrients and aren't processing what's happening, but it's still a bit baffling to me why some didn't turn to see what was going on.

[1] https://vine.co/v/bFdt5uwg6JZ

*EDIT - thanks to those who confirmed. My confusion is now totally irrelevant after seeing the finish-line view of the same people[2]. It just took them a few seconds to register and they were just in a running flow.

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=046MuD1pYJg

I've never run a marathon, but I've attended several supporting runners I knew. I spent my time at the finish line watching the runners come across.

Pretty much everyone who finishes is some level of fucked up. Their body chemistry is way-the-hell out of whack, with problems from dehydration, hyponatremia, glycogen depletion, and boosted or dampened immune system reactions. Usually there are people at the finish looking for trouble cases and shunting them directly to the medical tent. (Because the runner might not even recognize that how bad a state they are in.)

I've had hyponatremia once after an ill-advised hike, and I literally couldn't form sentences out loud.

It doesn't surprise me that people weren't reacting in a normal way, because they weren't in a normal state of being.

If you've ever run a marathon, you'd know. 4 hours is still a pretty decent time for 26 miles and, for most runners, the last leg up to finish line is usually a pretty exhausting/euphoric time. Aside from your own heartbeat and breathing, you really don't notice much else.

To me, it looks like they respond physically to the shockwave but are not mentally registering anything other than the finish line.

I raced bicycles in college and I can say with confidence that after a 4-6 hour training ride I was wiped out physically and mentally. Had an explosion gone off when I was in that state and only a few blocks from home I would have made sure I was OK and kept pedaling for gatorade and a shower. I don't see their behavior as terribly puzzling given my fairly extensive experience with an exhausted state of mind.

To be totally honest, if you heard a huge explosion behind you, would YOU stop to see what happened? Personally I'd book it harder.

I thought it was a pretty wel known response that people under duress or stress fallback to their normal behaviour, as if nothing happened.

Yup, at that stage you are focusing on "the goal" and that is pretty much it.

Whenever I finish an event, my mind is offline for about 30 minutes. If this had happened to me, I would probably kept on running and not react.

I'm quite astonished by the disproportionate media attention and hysteria. For comparison 55 people died today in an Iraq bombing and about 80 people die every day on the U.S. roadways.

I tried explaining this to someone earlier... apparently it's not a numbers game because of assumed risk. There is little to no risk to watching a marathon, whereas living in Iraq or speeding on the highway there is implied risk.

I'm not trying to discredit what you're saying, just pointing out why people (my friend and probably a lot of others) go into hyper sensitive reactionary mode.

> disproportionate media attention and hysteria.

What is disproportionate about it? Large bombs don't go off in US cities every day. Are you surprised that there are bombings in Iraq? Is that something you don't expect?

It's also getting widespread coverage everywhere, especially TV News. So this is entirely inappropriate for HN.

Our behavior is interesting, given the post I just read on how news is so rarely worth reading and watching. I see a lot of people at work looking for the latest updates. Someone’s watching TV in the next room – they’re just repeating everything over and over, mixing in the new tiny details they learn.

I’m really sad about this, but where I know no one in Boston and can’t do anything about it, I’m just going to check back tomorrow when we know more rather than working myself up looking for the latest like I usually would.

> I know no one in Boston and can’t do anything about it, I’m just going to check back tomorrow when we know more rather than working myself up looking for the latest like I usually would.

To the best of my ability, I'll do the same.

There's nothing we can currently do. The news for the next 24 hours will be nothing but the newscasters making assumptions, bad connections, and conjecture. The rest of the time will be filled with interviews from people "on the ground." We'll gain nothing from watching it.

I feel like the smallest, tiniest "fuck you" I can muster to the person who did this is to spend this time working on something to make a slice of society marginally better, rather than spending the night passively absorbing all the negativity and sorrow he/she has caused.

Google's Person Finder:

http://google.org/personfinder/2013-boston-explosions

We're in Boston and have successfully found people with this. Highly recommended if you can't get in touch with someone you know.

Holy shit... my cousin and his wife were supposed to be there, as his wife was running in the marathon this year. Still haven't managed to get in touch with them, but my cousin's sister heard from them... they were a block away when the first explosion happened. %@#%! I'm... shit... don't know what to say, other than being very happy they are still alive. But apparently there's been a bomb threat at the hotel across the street from theirs, so they're still kind of panicking.

Jeeezzz....

If you know someone who was running the marathon and haven’t heard from them, you can see if they logged times here: http://raceday.baa.org/individual.html

From the comments, "Roupen Bastajian, a 35-year-old state trooper from Smithfield, R.I., had just finished the race when they put the heat blanket wrap on him and he heard the first blast.

"I started running toward the blast. And there were people all over the floor," he said. "We started grabbing tourniquets and started tying legs. A lot of people amputated. ... At least 25 to 30 people have at least one leg missing, or an ankle missing, or two legs missing."

The #s will probably get much worse than 2 and 23.

There is something extremely hellish about marathoners missing legs.

Whoever did this is getting their terror/propaganda effect - 30 people with lost limbs will have a much higher media impact than 300 dead in, say, an airliner bombing.

>Boston scanner: "EMS is reporting another device" in front of Mandarin Hotel

https://twitter.com/katz/status/323878815245946880

c'mon, people have smartphones. companies like facebook, twitter, foursquare, etc know your location and should be able to push notifications alerting people to stay away/at home.

EDIT: Thanks for the downvotes guys, here I was trying to show a real need. I've been calling friends in NY/Boston the past 30min asking to see if they are OK + stay at home.

This photo is amazing.

https://twitter.com/BGlobeSports/status/323889004246343681/p...

To me it looks like they didn't really know what to do at this moment. What is the standard police procedure?

A witness/first-responder just said he is a veteran and he said he recognised the smell as cordite.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cordite

PS - This is a witness who was talking to BBC News UK.

Boston marathon start times 2013 EDT:

9:00 am Mobility Impaired

9:17 am Wheelchair Division

9:22 am Handcycles

9:32 am Elite Women

10:00 am Elite Men & Wave One

10:20 am Wave Two

10:40 am Wave Three

Explosion happened somewhere around (edit) noon PST, 3pm EDT. A little before. Elite women marathon times are in the 2:15 and slower range. Elite men are 2:05 and slower. Not sure about likely times for the earlier groups.

Noon? Umm, are you on the west coast?

I think you are using start times in East Coast time and then doing calculations based on the explosion occurring West Coast time.....

The elites were long, long over the finish line when this happened.

There is a vine link that shows the explosion elsewhere on this post; it shows a gun time of 4:09:44 (although not sure when 0:00 would be)

A video from AP [1] shows the finish line timer displaying 4:09:44 when the first explosion goes off.

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vJnC2zgriU&feature=playe...

Nitpick: those times are EDT (UTC-04:00), not EST (UTC-05:00).

Your explosion time is off. Happened around 3pm Eastern

What? The explosion was just before 3:00 pm.

Crazy people.. Another image [NSFW]: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BH6fwFvCUAA-PWb.jpg:large

I'm glad people are posting photos like this - I hate how traditional media almost always post 'clean' pictures and video taken afterwards that make it hard to discern what actually happened.

[NSFW]

That's really disturbing...

FWIW, watch out for the Бостоне ("Boston" in Russian/Cyrillic) trending topic on Twitter. There's at least one extremely graphic photo of a gentleman who has lost the majority of his left leg. After seeing that, I'm opting to avoid further photos.

You should add a NSFW tag. Fuck... :(

Edit: nevermind, that's to graphic to share.

horrible , is that blood floating around ?

Jesus Christ...

Ridiculous and sad are the two emotions that come to mind. I've run the Boston Marathon and plan on running again next year (want to re-qualify, but will likely run with a charity anyway). I grew up close to the route and have spent pretty much every April watching family or friends run. It's ridiculous because I don't know how else to describe it and sad because a great tradition is going to change, likely in unfortunate ways, for the foreseeable future. It's just an empty feeling, like memories from the years before will never be possible again.

If you've never run a marathon, and especially a big one, it's a unique experience. Rarely are elite athletes on the same course/playing field with "regular" people and all being cheered on (with no barriers) by residents. Watch any footage and you'll see onlookers almost bump into the fastest men/women in the world (hell, they even give out cups of beer at BC). Talk about feeling close to a community and feeding off their energy, I can't think of anything else like that.

It's sad that something like that has likely changed forever. I hope more than anything in the coming months and years this disruption/incontinuity can be turned into a positive that makes the event even better, that the community will overcome everything that's happened. I'm confident it will, but right now it's just sad.

Authorities ID suspect as Saudi national in marathon bombings, under guard at Boston hospital

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/authorities_under_susp...

EDIT: Two media outlets reporting conflicting information, so not sure if this is reliable information.

The BPD already shot this down. Don't breathlessly follow the initial reports; they're chaotic, reporters are incentivized to jump the gun.

I wouldn't trust the NY Post at all. They're also still reporting 12 dead even though everyone else is saying 2.

http://www.inquisitr.com/620300/ny-posts-saudi-national-stor...

Also denied about 15 minutes ago by the Boston Commisioner of police.

The NY Post is the only one reporting this, and they're not exactly known for accuracy.

Yeah, pretty sure it was the case of being a Saudi nearby the explosion.

10-to-1 this is a domestic issue. If it was international terrorism, wouldn't someone have claimed responsibility by now?

Reddit thread being updated right now.

http://www.reddit.com/r/news/comments/1cen3t/there_was_just_...

Successor thread:

http://www.reddit.com/r/news/comments/1cf17c/boston_marathon...

Update: (4:35PM EST) "A federal law-enforcement source confirmed to The Post there are at least 12 dead and nearly 50 injured." [1]

[1] http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/two_explosions_at_bost...

the post isn't necessarily a reputable rag to be linking to as a source...

If this continues I wonder if we're going to start seeing drones with "Persistent Stare" (24 hour recording of a massive area that creates an enormous video of the entire city) employed over American Cities.

Had one been used already, they would have been able to take the video, slowly reverse it to see who dropped off the package in the dumpster, and then follow that person back to their home or business. Thus finding out who did it.

Not sure if you did it on purpose, but you just perfectly described ARGUS: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGxNyaXfJsA

It's horrific to see this happen. I hope that people make it out of this ok, and they get to bottom of who did this. Seeing these kinds of senseless attacks on the innocent is just disgusting.

Agreed. I try to be very understanding of the fact that it is usually the winner that decides who is the "good guy" and the "bad guy" in history, but doing something like this is "bad guy" regardless of the reason. Nothing but a senseless tragedy. My thoughts are with anyone who has friends and family affected.

Drones are flying over Afghanistan and Pakistan right now, atatcking innocent families. A Zionist invasion of Palestine in the 1940s is pushing into Gaza, the West Bank, southwest Syria, and innocent Palestinians are being killed daily - with US backing. The US is doing this all over the world, or enabling it. It's a laugh to see the people who invaded Iraq and tortured prisoners in Abu Ghraib getting on their high horse. The chickens are just beginning to come home to roost in this case.

Dennis Crowley was running the marathon and tweeted that he and thousands of other runners have been stopped at mile 26: https://twitter.com/dens

Mile 26 was dedicated to Newtown

Looped "Vine" of the explosion: https://vine.co/v/bFdt5uwg6JZ

Video of second explosion: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jMYObtjToU&feature=youtu...

Second angle of both explosions: http://bcove.me/qwi5k6ap

Yet another example of how "News is bad for you – and giving up reading it will make you happier": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5549054

Or, for the people who are in Boston or know anyone who is in Boston, this news is a very important notification. I don't think the news media was responsible for this incident.

Ignorance is bliss. My cat knows it best. Not a care in the world.

Guys,

I was watching the marathon about a mile from the finish line. I saw how a great celebration turned into sadness and fear. But as sad as this made me feel, it made me feel even worst that this is what my loved family is living in Mexico every day. Just across the border from this beautiful country. As important as this is, shouldn't every child be as valuable no matter where they are born? Today, I saw a lot of anger on my friend's faces, but it seems that as long as it is not happening here it doesn't matter that much, it seems that only Americans are entitled to feel safe.

A second tragedy need not make the first less tragic. Americans mourn tragedies in America more than those outside of their borders because they hit closer to home.

Since the news is bad for me and ignoring it would make me happier, should I just forget about it?

Yes, probably.

The bell tolls for thee and all that, but unless you're directly involved somehow or are in a position to do something about it, there is very little point to focusing your attention on it. This goes double if you have tendencies to obsess or get depressed about bad news like this.

Most likely.

While I offer my condolences to the victims and their families, this isn't the most fatal or most gruesome incident even this month - simply this one happens to involve white western people, so it will be considered by news agencies as more important than the civilian suffering in Syria, Afganistan, North Korea, Somalia or Mexican drug wars.

If you and your relatives are safely far away from Boston, then your happiness would benefit from ignoring the news. Just as what people do when they and their relatives are safely far away from Syria etc.

My take on that article was to find some middle ground.

It makes sense to at least be informed of the latest news but there's no need to keep compulsively checking news websites while they are in full "Death Toll" mode. It's probably best to wait 24 hours until a clearer story is available.

Its things like this that really make me wonder how we can progress as a society with nutjobs like this. Without sounding like a hippy, the world is filled with so much violence and hate. If these people (and they're all over) put more effort into building society instead of destroying we could really progress.

It takes a special kind of asshole to do this.

I don't see the point in imagining a world without psychopaths. It'd be lovely, but no amount of societal structure will ever remove them, we can only try to reach them whenever possible and lessen their influence on others.

Yesterday I watched an old TV show with Sagan, Hawking and A. C. Clarke. At some point, discussing about violence and politics and the future, Clarke said: "we are a very unevolved species."

Seems kind of appropriate in this context.

All we can do now making sure we do not fuel more violence with reactive violence.

Of course the people who did this have to be separated from society, but any response should be measured even if that seems difficult.

While there will likely always be assholes who do shit like this, every time it happens an order of magnitude more people help those in need. Fuck the assholes society will keep moving forward.

We are all capable of acts like this. We are human.

I live in Charlestown, which is Boston's northeasternmost neighborhood, which is actually across the Charles River.

For the past hour I've nothing but ambulances going down 99 or along 93.

Deleted comment

I think there is already 3 confirmed dead... [1] [2]

[1] http://www.ibtimes.com/update-3-dead-explosions-rock-boston-...

[2] https://twitter.com/edhenryTV/status/323881163619962881

Update: (4:35PM EST) "A federal law-enforcement source confirmed to The Post there are at least 12 dead and nearly 50 injured." [3]

[3] http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/two_explosions_at_bost...

The Boston Globe has uploaded a footage at the moment of explosion at the Boston Marathon. This one shows how the moments panned out. The best I have seen so far.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=046MuD1pYJg

According to AP cellphone service is being suspended to avoid allowing 'detonation of remote devices'.

Source: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/official-cellphone-service-sh...

4.14 pm Central.

This report was later retracted I think.

Live video feeds:

http://www1.whdh.com/video/7newslive/

http://www.myfoxboston.com/category/235888/fox-25-live-video...

I am seeing a lot of comments which makes assumptions about this being detonated explosives. Has there been any confirmation about this?

https://mobile.twitter.com/BostonDotCom/status/3238868777467...

This tells me the Boston PD found one or more devices and are in the process of detonating them.

I wouldn't call it "confirmation" at this point, but emergency services have been reporting the discovery of "secondary devices", so it does appear to be something intentional and not something along the lines of an accidental gas line explosion.

The two explosions were on opposite sides of the street. Take from that what you will.

Listening to BFD radio, you hear a lot of chatter about additional "secondary devices" and "suspicious packages" even now. Apparently they have a large group of bomb-sniffing dogs they are moving around to check these things out.

Reddit user in boston giving great updates as he hears them.

http://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/1ceng3/boston_marathon_...

Short video right before second explosion: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jMYObtjToU&feature=youtu...

A Boston Police, Fire, EMS Scanner feed is available here: http://www.broadcastify.com/listen/feed/6254/web/?rl=rr

Why do the top links on reddit stop leaving the front page?

This link was #1 for about 10 minutes:

http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/1cen7i/explosion_...

and now has vanished, along with all other sponsored links. A horrible tragedy like this seems leagues more important than the current top link:

http://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/1cebz2/spotted_cookie...

I don't know what happened to the /r/worldnews post, but that subreddit's rules do say that it's for non-US sources and news. Also, that post linked to a Gawker site, which for many is reason enough to kill it.

I think its because the threads are getting too much traffic. It seems like reddit first will make a thread read only then will remove it from the front page, this all seems temporary. This is all from observation though Im not sure the actual algorithms involved here.

That's because the mods keep removing it -- reddit will have some contract with telegraph.uk or other such websites (they pay reddit for the higher traffic)

The Boston Marathon just issued a statement and used the word "bombs." Not sure if that's just a hasty description, but that is the word they used.

[Some random unsourced people on the internet are saying that...] Police are saying they're finding multiple secondary devices, as well.

I'm guessing they're not talking about cell phones.

Another explosion just happened at the JFK library according the police scanner. Or a fire. Could be unrelated.

There was another bomb they found downtown and set off in a bomb squad van in a controlled way (heard it on the scanner and another friend living down there confirmed hearing that).

I'm impressed at the police response- very organized.

High quality video of the explosion: http://www.boston.com/video/viral_page/?%2Fservices%2Fplayer...

Twilio put up an app to call your family if needed: http://callyourfamily.twilio.ly/

Not a Bostonian but The Hub's been my hometown when I spent some time in the US... My prayers go to all of you.

CBS News reports - police confirm (somewhat) that these were bombs and mostly likely planted in Trash cans. Also, it appears at least 1 other unexploded bomb found and disabled by the Boston Police Bomb Squad. (may be more then 1 found)

Video of the explosion (very poor quality) - http://deadspin.com/heres-video-of-the-moment-the-boston-mar...

Hoping for everyone to be safe.

Lets not panic and spread the fear. Let authorities do their work

Another source to listen in to Boston emergency communications:

http://tunein.com/radio/Boston-Police-Fire-and-EMS-Scanner-s...

A friend of mine from MIT was at the race. Luckily, he walked away unscathed. I hope all of your friends and family from Boston are safe and sound.

I would argue that this is not the time for political discussions.

Thoughts and prayers with the victims and their families. I just watched the movie "Four Lions" this past weekend and anyone who has seen it may have the same eery feeling I currently do.

Google Person Finder:

http://google.org/personfinder/2013-boston-explosions/

Hopefully this can put someone's mind at ease. :(

if the raw video streams from all of the surrounding areas were provided to the internet as a collective, I would bet they could trace the source 10x faster than the police.

Reuters live-updating feed: http://live.reuters.com/Event/Boston_Marathon_Explosion

Just learned about google person finder.

http://google.org/personfinder/2013-boston-explosions/

Can someone just run a plain marathon without having to worry about this in modern civilized life? Come on. This isn't even crime, this is just insanity.

I'm willing to bet that running in a marathon is still statistically safer than taking the same trip in a car.

No more how much modern life keeps improving, tragedies will happen, whether by natural disasters or nutjobs. Actively fearing that which is outside of your control is pointless.

>Can someone just run a plain marathon without having to worry about this in modern civilized life?

In lots of places in the world, no.

Apparently not.

I know it is too early to speculate, but my money is on the muslims -- homegrown terrorists/IRA use car bombs and you couldn't get a car there, crazy people seem overwellmingly to prefer guns.

Fire Dept Live Feed: http://www.broadcastify.com/listen/feed/497/web

"A confirmed explosion at the JFK library, we're going to need to deploy resources there" on the EMS scanner just now - that's a third?

Do you think IRA (or one of its forks like Real IRA, Continuity IRA or one IRA extremist supporter) might have been involved?

Today US supreme court has ruled to give tapes containing testimony to Irish police: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/apr/15/ira-tapes-police-su... .

Vanishingly unlikely. Boston is full of Irish people, so for an Irish terrorist group to set off an explosion where they're more likely to injure Irish people than elsewhere makes no sense. If they were to set off a bomb in the US, which has never happened, the obvious target would be a courthouse or US attorney's office.

I'm Irish and intimately familiar with the politics of terrorism, FWIW.

This idea is completely inane. The Volunteers declared war against the England that was on their soil in 1916, that they would shift suddenly to a war against the U.S. is ridiculous. Also, purposefully killing civilians gathered en masse without warning is more along the lines of British Army terrorism (Bloody Sunday, Amritsar), not the Irish volunteers who give warnings and tend to attack military targets, back when they did so.

Also, the ruling came somewhat unexpectedly, a few hours before this happened. That's a short space of time to set up a bombing of a marathon. This bombing was obviously planned for days, if not weeks in advance.

CBS LOCAL reports that security footage shows man with multiple backpacks near the scene before explosion, reporters suggest devices were placed in trashcans, and police have recovered at least one unexploded device: http://boston.cbslocal.com/2013/04/15/several-hurt-in-explos...

Update: Police commissioner Ed Davis claims there is no suspect in custody: http://www.businessinsider.com/live-boston-mayor-holds-press...

Original NY POST reporting: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/two_explosions_at_bost...

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/authorities_under_susp...

WBZ NEWS 1030 is reporting that a Saudi national was tackled and turned into police, they are questioning him, but he's cooperating and denies any involvement. live feed: http://tunein.com/radio/WBZ-NewsRadio-1030-s27704/

Boston Police says they have no idea where NY Post is getting it's information from.

I wouldn't rely on the NYPost, at all. They're still saying the death toll was 12 when everyone else says it was 2.

So much for quitting news.

Authorities ID suspect as Saudi national in marathon bombings, under guard at Boston hospital

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/authorities_under_susp...

This is a rumor BPD shot down after NY Post ran it.

I found this unreal set of photos on Flickr from before and immediately after the explosion. Includes high res photos of the crowd: http://www.flickr.com/photos/hahatango/sets/7215763325244513...

They police are saying, "Don't use your cellphones, as they can set off other devices."

Is there real science behind this?

I'd say mostly BS, unless the bomber is a technical idiot. If any random cellphone freq can set it off, it could be set off before the bomber drops it.

Being detonated by cell phone, maybe setting all numbers but one to a ringer of silent and then using the speaker would seem more plausible, but figuring that out probably takes more time than they can spare right now.

sounds like a corruption of the (mistaken) idea that they shut off cell service to prevent the bomber from dialing other devices to set them off

Science behind what?

Explosions kill people :-(

Search on this page for "civilian" and "child" for examples of "legal" murder of innocent people:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_drone_strikes_in_Pakist...

This is the craziest thing. Last Friday, my fiance (works near Boston) said she had to leave early because someone called in a bomb threat. We laughed it off "ha someone wanted to go home early on a Friday..." no idea if related, but crazy...

Hi Res video of the explosion: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=046MuD1pYJg

Obama about to go live to speak on this: http://www.whitehouse.gov/live

Timeilne: http://tech.mit.edu/V133/N18/explosions.html

Relevant: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5551069

broadcastify seems to not handle the pike in traffic. Here is a working link for the boston police scanner http://www.broadcastify.com/scripts/playlists/1/6254/-546422...

I wish everyone should be safe.

A third explosion is confirmed at JFK library by Ed Davis, commissioner of police.

Via reddit -> Update 25: Scanner: Confirmed explosion at JFK Library.

http://www1.whdh.com/video/7newslive/ Just confirmed that the fire at JFK library was unrelated and mechanical?

Source?

higher quality MSNBC footage of the explosion.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=3...!

Do we really need to "see" the explosions and mangled people?

Americans, please don't start another war because of this.

I wonder the reasons of doing this.

:( Anybody knows who's behind this?

Just before noon PST it seems like.

Can someone explain me what this news has to do with hacker news, IT, programming, hacking??

Devastating. Horrific.

So timely, gives more reasons to oppose the immigration reform next week.

Edit: Boston police reporting at least 2 dead, 22 injured and 10 people losing limbs.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/04/15/explosion-reported-near...

Looks like there were two explosions.

Picture: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BH6fCgFCQAERWMB.jpg:large

More details http://www.wcvb.com/news/local/metro/Explosions-reported-nea...

"Witnesses said several victims lost limbs, and the area was being evacuated.

Many of the injured appeared to be spectators who gathered for the 117th running of the race."

Many more pictures(warning NSFW Gore):

http://deadspin.com/explosions-reported-at-the-boston-marath...

For some reason this reminds me more of the Atlanta Summer Olympics or Moscow than the attacks on the World Trade Center. [edit to add links for clarity]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_apartment_bombings#Ryaz...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centennial_Olympic_Park_bombing

Condolences to friends and families of the injured and dead.

The Boston Globe ‏@BostonGlobe 34s

BREAKING NEWS: Police getting multiple reports of unexploded devices around Boston

3.38 pm Central time.

Update:

The Boston Globe ‏@BostonGlobe 28s

RT @billy_baker: "It's not safe to be here." - Boston Police evacuating Commonwealth Avenue mall at Gloucester.

3.45 Central time.

Update:

The Boston Globe ‏@BostonGlobe 1m

Boston Police: If anyone knows of any information call about explosions: 1 800 494 TIPS

3.55 Central time.

Holy crap! UPDATE:

Apparently cellphone service is SHUT DOWN! To make sure new devices are not remotely detonated!

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/official-cellphone-service-sh...

4.10 PM Central Time!

vine vid of the explosion: https://vine.co/v/bFdt5uwg6JZ

https://twitter.com/letsrundotcom/status/323874395632328706/...

this looks really bad.

Has anyone set up a charity to raise money for the victims? Something to help pay for prosthetic limbs?

The explosions is so timely it gives more reasons to oppose any US immigration reforms next week.

Secondary explosions ( and/or fires ) reported (on MSNBC shortly before Chris Jansing took over coverage at 4PM EST) at the JFK Library and another undisclosed location.

Footage of black fumes from (allegedly) the JFK Library has been briefly shown before cutting back to the coverage of the main explosion at the Boston marathon.

The fire at the library has been initially reported to have been controlled. No casualties or injuries have been reported.

A curious mention of "manuscripts" (not being damaged) has been reported (on MSNBC) as well.

CNN is yet to report any such secondary explosions as of the current time (4:10 PM EST).

CNN has also not shown any footage of black fumes from a different location.

The fumes at the Boston marathon explosions were distinctly white in color.

The fire at the JFK Library has just been reported as mechanical and non-suspicious or 'affiliated' with the explosions.

Source: http://www1.whdh.com/video/7newslive/ 7-news live broadcast

Update:

https://twitter.com/BostonGlobe/status/323886879453892609

It was an intentional and controlled detonation of a 'device'.

Triage numbers

FAMILY MEMBER HOTLINE:

617-635-4500

POLICE TIPS NUMBER:

(800) 494-8477

https://twitter.com/E3Chicago/status/323909398915317761/phot...

Well, TSA will start checking marathonists anytime soon.

Ban me or whatever you need to do but the reality is that one bomb and Americans cry, while at the same time incentivate thousands of bombs and deads in Mexico for their useless "war on drugs" and also creating pointless wars around the world (eg. Iraq)

Classless.

You are making political excuses for murder.

Two of my friends flew over from the UK and were running in it, it happened right in front of Chris, luckily he's ok, she's ok. Fucking bombing bastards.

Boston police triage numbers:

For families of the victims, primarily:

617-635-4500 (Mayor's Hotline)

If you have any information about the explosions and/or were at the site of explosions:

1-800-494-TIPS

NYPOST reporting that a suspect has been identified and is being held under guard at a hospital:

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/authorities_under_susp...

Update:

Steve Silva's Ground Level View Video (Boston.com)

http://live.boston.com/Event/Live_blog_Explosion_in_Copley_S...

Person walking on roof of a building near the site of the incident at the time of explosions:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQJsyqAOofg

I keep seeing this get posted all over the place. People want to spread this photo for some reason.

It's a fucking silhouette made up of 20 pixels. It's a person on a roof who was likely watching the event. People are so desperate for somebody to blame, this is just ridiculous.

Right on time to make us all forget about Gitmo.

Makes me think where's Stellar Wind when it's needed…

edit: "Thoſe who would give up Essential Liberty to purchaſe a little Temporary Safety, deſerve neither Liberty nor Safety."

North Korea, Al Qaeda, racists, or something else?

I honestly think anyone could claim responsibility but given the high explosives and the seemingly professional nature of the attack I'm guessing either NK, AQ, or a false-flag to start a war on the Korean peninsula.

edit: Nice downvotes? We cannot speculate who?

It is waaaaay too early to be speculating who's behind it. Nobody knows any details, early reports from the scene of a terrible event like this are frequently confused and contradictory. Speculation at this moment is just firing shots in the dark.

Random person with mental problems? Like all of the other shootings, stabbings, etc that have occurred in the last 10 years.

Speculation is pointless when you don't have any element to work with.

North Korea hasn't ever done anything like this so it's truly out of line to begin speculating that it's a "false-flag to start a war on the Korean peninsula" - way to blame the victim

Your comment is showing up in a very faint grey on my screen, whereas everyone else's is black. Why is that?

How would a pipe bomb at the Boston Marathon conceivably start a war with North Korea? Wtf.

ur about to finish running a fucking marathon... you grew up in Kenya... trained your whole life... BOOM

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