Living 2 miles from the Watertown Manhunt

KillRamsey

Hall of Famer
Location
Hood River, OR
Name
Kyle
Hiya folks. My house is on the main route to/from Watertown, about a half mile from the town line. In the interest of sharing, I thought I'd briefly relate what that was like. I have NO desire to in any way glorify any of what happened, because it was tragic and awful. There was nothing to celebrate afterwards, this was just stupid and tragic. But I did want to document what little I could from my house.

Thursday night/friday morning at about 12:45am, we heard sirens racing by, but this is also the main route for Mt Auburn Hospital so that happens often enough not to wake us up. But then it was 2 car, and then a block of what sounded like 20, and then more and more and more... we woke up and looked out the windows. From the 3rd floor where our bedroom is, my wife could see a long string of blue lights coming from east of us (harvard square, storrow and memorial drive) and all converging on Mt Auburn Street going west. All of them appeared to be going INCREDIBLY fast. She went downstairs to check online / tv for news. Meanwhile sirens and floored V8 motors kept screaming by. I estimated that something over 100 went by, and I would believe it was over 200 if someone told me so.

As soon as she got downstairs, we both heard a bomb go off in the distance. It wasn't close, but it was a deep, low boom that we both felt. My wife thought it was a cop car that had lost control and slammed into a tree. Then a friend in Watertown said something on facebook about "grenades" and a gun fight. With that, she came upstairs and tried to go back to sleep.

When I got up at 7, I had messages from our daughter's preschool and my work (both local) not to come in, and in fact not to leave the house. So we spent the entire day cooped up inside, watching silent news or listening to the police scanner feed online while our daughter (3.5 yrs old) watched movies, etc. Every kind of sirened vehicle you can imagine - and some I couldn't - continued to race past the house in both directions, more or less all day. Honda CRV's with embedded flashing lights, gigantic troop transports with a gun turret up top and 20 guys hanging off it, and what seemed like four thousand crown victorias. Every few minutes a civilian vehicle would go by, and some of them I saw getting pulled over by police - especially those headed west towards Watertown. A few pedestrians or cyclists were out, including one guy in a backwards white ball cap complaining loudly into his phone that the cops had stopped an questioned him for ID. No sh_t, sherlock.

Finally around 7 they lifted the ban, and we took the dogs for a walk. As soon as we got back, we heard a MASSIVE group of cop cars coming at full throttle from the east (probably about 20 at one time), and knew something had happened. About 4 minutes later, the TV said they'd cornered him. Once they announced that he had been taken alive, I trotted outside with my X100 and waited, hoping to catch one of those massive troop transport things. About 15 minutes later, an ambulance came by with police escort, which may well have been him.

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While this may be of little solace, especially during the mayhem, but the entire country was with you guys in Boston and Watertown. We were with you at the Marathon, we were with you during the identification process, we were with you during the manhunt and you guys were in our condolences, our best-wishes and our prayers. We all individually hoped there was more we could do to help out.

When the last suspect was caught, we all let out a collective sigh of relief. Thank you for your update. I, and I am sure the rest of the forum, are glad no harm came to you and your family.

Boston Strong,
Gary
 
While this may be of little solace, especially during the mayhem, but the entire country was with you guys in Boston and Watertown. We were with you at the Marathon, we were with you during the identification process, we were with you during the manhunt and you guys were in our condolences, our best-wishes and our prayers. We all individually hoped there was more we could do to help out.

When the last suspect was caught, we all let out a collective sigh of relief. Thank you for your update. I am glad that no harm came to you and your family.

Boston Strong,
Gary

I'll second that. With you every minute. My daughter's boyfriend is a phd student at Harvard and was cooped up in his dorm all day - listening to all of the sirens and gunshots and bombs. I guess that part of the Boston area is small enough that everyone from Cambridge on out was pretty intimately aware... I personally can't imagine, but I grieve for the dead, suffer for the injured, and am thankful for all of you who came through it in good shape. Hell of a terrible thing...

-Ray
 
Thanks man. Looking at it rationally, I was pretty much just inconvenienced a little. People in a lot of places in the world would love to be cooped up in my house for 24 hours, sirens or no sirens. When it was open-ended, that is when nobody was sure what was happening or where, it was a bit unnerving. Once it was just one wounded guy and we knew we had him cornered, things began to be much easier. As I said, everyone I know here is mostly just sad that a bright kid can turn into something like this. There is no cheering or jingoism where I'm at, just heavy stares and a renewed appreciation of the blooming flowers outside.
 
much better than living through a first hand account is reading yours. I'm glad I was nowhere near that stuff. Glad you are all OK, and that shot of the ambulance is a winner. It will ensure you never forget those last couple days.
 
Thanks for sharing. Adds some dimension to this terrible story. I "listened" via the residents of Watertown that were tweeting about it.

In a way I did too. Two good friends live about half a mile closer (when we have dinner at each others' houses, we usually just walk instead of biking), and they were included in the house-to-house searches. She sent me cell phone pics, the first few of which showed guys in black combat gear with weapons drawn carefully stalking up to the front doors:
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I was getting really stressed about them having guns pointed at their house, but then she sent the third picture, captioned "neighbor's dog don't care" and I had a good laugh.

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Glad y'all are okay! Thanks for sharing.

Honda CRV's? Law enforcement folks there drive CRV's?

Wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it. CRV's with lights hidden behind the grill, and I swear some Nissan Sentras too, something like that. Maybe Camrys. Definitely a CRV or two. And then a troop transport would rumble along behind it with a guy in a gun turret up top... surreal.
 
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