Comment by kevincennis | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kevincennis | Hacker News Reader

I keep hearing people claim that this was an overreaction, and frankly, it sort of confuses me.

Here's what we know happened before the lockdown:

- These two suspects allegedly planted two bombs that killed three and injured over 170 others.

- These two suspects allegedly killed an MIT police officer.

- These two suspects allegedly carjacked an SUV and held its driver captive for some time.

- During a chase with police, these suspects allegedly threw homemade explosive devices at law enforcement.

What we don't seem to know yet (and definitely didn't at the time):

- Did they have more explosives? There's certainly reason to believe they may have.

- Did they have other attacks planned? We don't know one way or the other, and that's sort of the point.

I really don't think it's unreasonable that given what we knew, and especially what we didn't, residents of Boston (myself included) were asked to stay indoors while authorities attempted to locate suspect #2. Remember, they didn't lock the city down immediately after the bombing. They did it after what the Boston police commissioner is calling the "execution" of an MIT police officer, a carjacking, multiple IED detonations (or attempted detonations, I'm not totally clear), and a shootout with police in a residential neighborhood.

Agree. OP also misses a big point: they 'shut down' because they thought they knew his identity and roughly where he was. Contrast this, for example, to the DC sniper, where they knew neither.

The only reason I can figure that these two bombers weren't in Mexico or someplace else far away by Thursday is that they weren't finished with their terrorism. I think a lot of us were thinking that.

On a related note, Gov Patrick impresses me with the way he handles emergencies. I don't always agree with his politics, but he's a helluva leader.

We were all on edge (I live on the North Shore); we knew that he may be able to get out of the city and seek to continue his rampage elsewhere. I think the authorities did an outstanding job all around, and perhaps got a little lucky. But the 'lockdown' seemed to help them get the job done in a deliberate, systematic way. Other cities will learn from this.

Further, I live in Boston and they didn't say you couldn't go outside, they just advised you not to. I walked across the Boston Common where people were playing with their dogs and grabbed a coffee from the coffee shop.

People from outside of Boston probably didn't realize it, but it was really just 1 neighborhood locked down with the mass transit everywhere else not working.

Weird day? Yes! Martial law? No.

I'm in Boston and I completely agree. It was a 20 block area, which is not even close to the entirety of Boston and it's surrounding neighbourhoods.

I went out too. Lots of shops, restaurants, bars still open in North End area.

Is Boston normally an incredibly quiet city? Incredulous at reports of the lockdown I looked at Boston highway cameras and it was close to a ghosttown. Helicopter video feeds of the Boston downtown showed, again, a ghosttown. Various post-apocalyptic pictures have emerged of Boston proper with hardly a soul in site.

I have never been to Boston (though will soon en route to a Patriots game), however I find it hard to believe it is normally that quiet.

No, it's not. Pictures like that never happened. I know it's anecdote and all, but all of the 15 or so people I know who work in Boston, did not work on Friday.

I vehemently oppose long-term civil liberty restrictions as much or more than the next guy, but I totally agree with parent.

Police were in an active search for a man believed to be:

- suicidal, intent on taking as many people down with him as possible

- armed with automatic weapons and numerous explosives

It would seem reasonable that he could show up at a bus or a subway stop and cause dozens of casualties.

To your point, people often forget that the lockdown likely played a part in the inability for the second suspect to escape. An entire city looking for you is certainly a possible cause for the second suspect to have been hiding in a boat.

The process certainly could have lead to the capture, even if indirectly.

I don't think that's forgotten, there's certainly no doubt in my mind that by removing a large chunk of the population it made it a lot harder for the suspect to get away. What I do doubt is the proportionality of the response.

They did it when they knew what area to lock down, didn't they? As in, when they thought they knew where the suspect was. Turned out the suspect was just outside the initial Watertown lockdown area (so it's a good thing they quickly expanded the lockdown, and it shows they got the area roughly right).

I agree with you in general. Seemed like a good call, not a sign of a police state. These were extremely temporary and timely measures, and normality resumed quickly.

If it's that gawdawful bad, then declare martial law already.

This is a seriously bad slippery slope, and I can see this escalating like SWAT teams have done in the last 20 years. How long until a "child abduction alert" turns into a city-wide lockdown and door-to-door search?

Wait for one of these to happen on an election day. That would be interesting.

Identify one warrant issued for the search of a home in this incident. Count homes searched.

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