Community Corner
Local College Student Left Marathon Route Shortly Before Bombing
Water Mill resident Zoe Strassfield, who attends Boston University, had been just 1 mile from the site of the attack at the Boston Marathon, but she headed back to her dorm before the bombs detonated.
After watching the elite runners pass the 25-mile marker of the Boston Marathon, Water Mill resident Zoe Strassfield headed back to the Boston University campus, where she is a student, to grab lunch — less than a half hour before two bombs detonated near the finish line.
Strassfield said Tuesday that she was at Kenmore Square, which is 1 mile from the bombing site, cheering on the runners and clapping plastic paddles together to make noise. She passed her noisemakers to another spectator before she returned to her dorm room, which is 2 miles away from the finish line at Boylston Street, and said she does not know how that spectator fared during the attack.
Back at her dorm, she learned of the attack and the campus was put on alert. “We received texts and emails from the Boston University police telling us to stay in our dorms, not to go outside, not to go to the marathon route.”
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She recalled seeing several police officers in vans and motorcycles as the front runners on the race passed Kenmore Square, and she remembered how another spectator commented on how much security was at the race.
“I was wondering how it could have happened when security has been so tight,” Strassfield said of her reaction to the bombing.
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Hours later, students were told they could leave their dorms for dinner, but they still had to avoid Boylston Street, she said.
“Yesterday, the phone networks were tied up as well as the cell networks were shut down for security reasons,” she added. “That was very scary for the students on campus.” However, she said she feels safe on campus and is confident in the university's security and administration, having experienced crises before during Superstorm Sandy and Winter Storm Nemo.
“Certainly for students, this is frightening," she said. "It’s very shocking but we do trust campus security and we do wish that our families were here, though.”
On Monday, many sirens wailed, and sirens could be heard from campus again on Tuesday, as well as helicopters flying low overhead, she said.
“It’s definitely on everyone’s mind,” she said of the bombing. “You can tell.”
