April 16, 2013
In Grisly Image, a Father Sees His Son
By TIM ROHAN
BOSTON — When Jeff Bauman woke up in a hospital bed on Tuesday, an air tube was down his throat, both of his legs had been amputated at the knee, and his father was by his side. He tried to talk, but he could not.
He looked angry, as he motioned his arms up and out like shock waves and mouthed: “Boom! Boom!”
Jeff Bauman is the man in the photograph that has become an icon of the Boston Marathon attack, the one showing a bloodied, distraught young man, holding his left thigh, being wheeled away by a man in a cowboy hat. If the world could not identify him immediately, Mr. Bauman’s father — also named Jeff Bauman — certainly could.
That was his son with his legs destroyed, wearing a favorite shirt. That was his son.
When the explosions went off at the Boston Marathon, Jeff Bauman, 52, called his son’s cellphone again and again — no answer. He knew his son was there, to cheer for his girlfriend, Erin Hurley, who was running her first Boston Marathon. For an hour, he kept calling, calling. No answer.
Then his stepdaughter, Erika, called him. “Did you see the picture?” she asked. “Jeffrey’s on the news. He got hurt.”
“Are you sure? Are you sure?” He was shouting now.
“Yes! Yes! I’m sure!” she shouted back.
Mr. Bauman found the picture on Facebook. It was not the whole picture, the one that showed Jeff’s left leg blown off at the calf. He started calling Boston-area hospitals and found his son registered at Boston Medical Center. He and his wife, Csilla, drove from their home in Concord, N.H., and reached Jeff’s side just before 8 p.m.
The surgery was already done. Both Jeff’s legs had been amputated at the knee. He had lost an excessive amount of blood. During surgery, the doctors had to keep resuscitating him, giving him blood and fluids, because he had lost so much.
Jeff, 27, is a good kid, never got in trouble, his father said. He likes playing guitar. He works behind the deli counter at Costco. He plans to pay off his student loans and go back to school at the University of Massachusetts Lowell.
During the marathon, he was standing at the finish line waiting for Ms. Hurley, alongside her two roommates. Ms. Hurley was still about a mile away when the blasts went off, far enough away that she did not know what had happened. Why had everyone stopped?
Jeff was the first casualty brought to Boston Medical, his family was told. He went through the first operation and then a second, about 1 a.m., to drain internal fluids caused by the blunt trauma.
That night, Jeff’s half-brother, Alan, called from his boot camp at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Tex. His father told him Jeff had been hurt but did not say how badly. He planned to tell Alan the whole truth later.
The Baumans knew how lucky Jeff had been. “The man in the cowboy hat — he saved Jeff’s life,” Ms. Bauman said. Mr. Bauman’s eyes widened. He said: “There’s a video where he goes right to Jeff, picks him right up and puts him on the wheelchair and starts putting the tourniquet on him and pushing him out. I got to talk to this guy!”
The man in the cowboy hat, Carlos Arredondo, 52, had been handing out American flags to runners when the first explosion went off. His son Alexander was a Marine killed in Iraq in 2004, and in the years since he has handed out the flags as a tribute.
With the first blast, Mr. Arredondo jumped over the fence and ran toward the people lying on the ground. What happened next, he later recounted to a reporter: He found a young man, a spectator, whose shirt was on fire. He beat out the flames with his hands. The young man, who turned out to be Jeff Bauman, had lost the lower portion of both legs. He took off a shirt and tied it around the stump of one leg. He stayed with Mr. Bauman, comforting him, until emergency workers came to help carry him to an ambulance.
He helped only one man, Mr. Bauman.
On Tuesday afternoon, the Baumans wondered what had become of the man in the cowboy hat. They wanted to tell him that their son was alive, that he was moving his arms and legs.
But he might be in the hospital for two more weeks. What would he do when he was not so sedated? They plan to bring him his guitar. What would they say to him when he came to?
The elder Mr. Bauman covered his mouth with his hand. “I just don’t know,” he said, and he started to cry.
Third Boston bombing victim identified as Chinese student Lu Lingzi
Boston University confirms 23-year-old actuarial science graduate student died while watching the race on Monday
A Chinese student has been identified as the third person to have died in the Boston marathon bombings.
Boston University confirmed that a statistics student, Lu Lingzi, 23, died when she was watching the race on Monday.
China's state newswire Xinhua said she been watching the race with two friends when the bombs detonated. The report did not reveal her full name, citing relatives' requests for anonymity.
Yet internet users on the popular microblogging site Sina Weibo have identified the girl and transformed her profile page into a de facto memorial. Her last post – published at 9am on Tuesday morning – has racked up almost 23,000 comments, flush with flickering candle emoticons and interspersed with flustered entreaties to honor her family's request.
"My wonderful breakfast!" the post said, above a photo of a fruit salad.
The injured woman, Zhou Danling, also a Boston University student, has undergone two operations and is now in stable condition at a local hospital, Xinhua reported. Zhou graduated from Wuhan University in central China and is reading a graduate degree in actuarial science.
Chinese president Xi Jinping "expressed great concern" for the students on Wednesday, according to Xinhua. "Consulate officials said they are doing everything they can to help relatives of the victims come to the United States and tend their loved ones," the newswire said.
At least 85 people from China, Hong Kong and Taiwan participated in the race, none of them professional runners. China's state media reported widely on the tragedy, and most major web portals dedicated link-strewn "special topic" pages to relevant coverage.
Lowell mom, daughter seriously injured in Boston blast
By Christopher Scott, [email protected]
Updated: 04/16/2013 05:33:43 PM EDT
LOWELL -- Sydney Corcoran has cheated death once.
While crossing a busy street at Salisbury Beach in June 2011, Corcoran was struck by a car driven by a senior citizen. The accident left her with severe injuries, including a fractured skull.
But Sydney, 18, a Lowell High School senior bound for Middlesex Community College this fall, dug deep and fought valiantly to preserve her young life. Family members breathed sighs of relief, hoping they would never have to relive such a nightmare.
But on Monday, shrapnel from one of the bombs that exploded during the Boston Marathon shredded both of Sydney's legs, leaving her with deep arterial injuries, said her older brother, Tyler Corcoran, during an interview Tuesday morning in the kitchen of the family's home in the city's Pawtucketville neighborhood.
Sydney, with her mother, Celeste, and father Kevin, were in Boston to watch her aunt, Carmen Accabo, of Westford, finish the storied event. Celeste, too, was struck by shrapnel and overnight had both legs amputated below the knee, Tyler said. Kevin received minor injuries, but otherwise was physically okay. He was at the Boston Medical Center bedsides of both his wife and daughter Tuesday, said his brother, Tim Corcoran, of Rhode Island.
"My brother is just heartbroken, just devastated," Corcoran said on his cell phone as he drove up Interstate 95 to be with his brother.
Kevin drives a delivery truck for F.W. Webb Company, a Bedford-based plumbing supply company. Celeste is a hairdresser who works in a salon on Newbury Street in Boston. Mr. Corcoran's uncle, Paul Corcoran, is a veteran Lowell police officer.
Like his uncle, Tyler was also heading to the hospital today to be with his father, mother and sister. Tyler had planned to be with his family at the finish line Monday, but the Middlesex Community College student was scheduled to meet with a study group.
"I was supposed to be there," said Tyler, fighting back tears. "I
didn't even think this whole thing was real until my phone started ringing like crazy later in the afternoon."
The explosive devices were detonated seconds apart, several hundred feet west of the finish line near the Boston Public Library, both near the Boylston-Exeter streets intersection. It's unclear precisely where the Corcoran family stood. Tyler said his father described a surreal scene of gusts of wind generated by the blasts and "debris flying everywhere." Three people were killed, including an 8-year-old Dorchester boy, and nearly 200 were injured, many seriously.
"My father said everyone seemed in a daze. He looked down and saw my mom and her eyes were open. Once he realized she was alive, he noticed both her legs hanging on by skin. He asked a guy for a belt."
Tyler said her sister was just nearby. "Her legs were hit pretty bad," said Tyler.
"I thought we were done with traumatic events," added Tyler.
"We're just so glad she didn't lose any of her limbs," said Janeiro, the family friend.
A gut-wrenching picture of Sydney being treated by two unidentified men is in today's Boston Globe, Tyler and his lifelong friend, Tom Janeiro, noted.
"We need to find out who those men were," said Tom. "We believe they saved Sydney's life."
"We just have to find out who those men were. Please help us."
Meanwhile, Corcoran's family has set up a website, http://www.gofundme.com/celesteandsydney, to accept donations.
"We're looking at prosthetics, house modifications," said Tim Corcoran. "We're looking at a long road here."
