FC parent, Steve Monke, was one of thousands of runners who participated in the Boston Marathon, April 15. As father of senior Meredith Monke, he has written his account of the day, including the bombings. Fortunately, Monke and another FC parent, Amy Brogan, finished before the bombs went off. Monke shares the experience he had that day below.
For another account of the Boston bombings, read the April 16 article, Column: Finding unity through tragedy.
This was my second time running at the Boston Marathon. My first time was five years ago when I ran the race along with wife, Audrey. We brought all our children and both my parents to come watch us race. Audrey and I are thankful that our kids were not at this one and home away from the tragedy.
I had a great day on Monday {April 15} until the explosions. Not only had I met my goal, but I ran my fastest marathon ever. Running down that last quarter mile on Boylston Street is the best part of the race. The sidewalks are packed with fans cheering for the runners. The area is loud and fun, and even after a long race, I felt energized. Loud fans line most of the course, and that really is one of the things that makes this race so special. To think about the evil in someone that would hurt these people who are just trying to support their friends and family is depressing.
I finished the marathon about one hour and 50 minutes before the bombs exploded. After I finished the race and waited to get my bag of belongings, I walked back up Boylston Street ? on the other side of the street from where the explosions would eventually happen ? to meet my wife to cheer on fellow FC parent Amy Brogan as she finished.
After we cheered for Amy, we walked to our hotel to get my cell phone and give Audrey’s phone a quick charge. After about 15 minutes in the room, we texted Mr. {Kevin} and Mrs. {Amy} Brogan to let them know we were coming to see them.
We figured out that the bombs must have went off as we were heading down the elevator. When we walked out of the door of our hotel, we noticed pretty quickly that something wasn’t right. People were running and looked scared. We looked at the shopping mall across the street and there were hundreds of people flowing out of the doors very quickly. I thought maybe there was a bomb scare in the mall.
We hadn’t heard the explosions, so we still thought there was a chance people were panicking for no reason. We walked up the sidewalk in front of our hotel and finally met a man holding a very scared boy who gave us what we would realize later as a very accurate description of what happened. He saw two bombs explode at street level, one near the finish line, and one farther up the course shortly after.
Soon many emergency vehicles drove by very fast. Lots of sirens could be heard everywhere for awhile. We heard enough, and went back to our room to turn on the news. Here we learned about what happened just like the rest of the world, only it was only a few blocks away for us.
Shortly after we were back in our room, our hotel was put on a lockdown. We were not allowed to leave our room, and no one was allowed into the hotel. We helped one Brazilian woman try to locate her husband, who had not finished the race. She could not speak English so we used Google Translate to tell her what was happening and that her husband was fine, but he was not allowed to enter the building.
When we could finally leave our hotel room, we were restricted where we could go and had to leave through an entrance through a section of the shopping mall away from the finish line area. It was eerie and quiet as the mall was empty and armed police patrolled our hotel and mall area.
We were able to find food in a nearby restaurant and met a runner there whose hotel was on lockdown, since it was right across the street from one of the blasts. He hadn’t taken a shower and finished the race six or seven hours earlier. In the restaurant, it was loud with people telling stories about their experiences, but the atmosphere was somber as the TVs that normally show sports had a few news channels playing continuous coverage of the tragedy.
We decided to come home on a flight 10 hours earlier than the one that was originally scheduled. I am feeling blessed to be back home with our family.
For more opinions, read the April 16 article, Column: Finding unity through tragedy.
