Death and destruction >struck in the last quarter-mile of the Boston Marathon. Among the nearly 27,000 runners in the world’s oldest marathon, those making their way towards the final stretch of the 26.2-mile run may have felt nothing but a combination of exhilaration and exhaustion.
Yet, as they approached the finish line at 2.45 p.m. on Monday the unsuspecting runners were violently hurled to the ground by the force of a powerful shockwave from “coordinated” twin blasts of shrapnel-spewing bombs. The blasts, which President Barack Obama described as a “heinous and cowardly act ... of terror,” left at least three persons dead and more than 176 injured.
Speaking in a subdued but determined tone at the White House, Mr. Obama admitted: “What we don’t yet know, however, is who carried out this attack, or why; whether it was planned and executed by a terrorist organisation, foreign or domestic, or was the act of a malevolent individual.” He cautioned that “people shouldn’t jump to conclusions before we have all the facts.”
At a press conference on Monday night, the Federal Bureau of Investigation announced that it was taking charge of the bombings probe. On Tuesday morning, The Boston Globe reported that the FBI had raided the Water’s Edge apartment complex at 364 Ocean Avenue, fuelling questions about “home-grown terror.”