On Saturday the 17th, September 2016, I was sitting in my pajamas in my apartment, binge-watching Blue Mountain State on Netflix, when I heard a loud bang, and my apartment physically shook from the impact of an explosion.
Shocked and scared, I paused my TV. I immediately heard screams, and 10 seconds later, a police siren sounded. There was no doubt in my mind. Something terrifying, and something deadly had just happened.
It is intriguing what goes through your mind when you are on the precipice of a potentially life-threatening situation. My first thought was: am I in immediate danger? I decided that my level of danger entirely depended on the proximity of the explosion, which led me to my second thought: did the explosion happen in my building? I could hear commotion and doors slamming in my hallway, but as no building alarm went off to signal evacuation, I had to assume the building was fine. My third thought was: although I’m not in immediate danger, am I likely to be in danger as time passes? The fact that I felt the impact of the explosion indicated it could not be more than a few buildings down from me. My immediate instinct was that this was probably a gas explosion. In 2015, I lived two blocks down from the gas explosion on 2nd Ave. That explosion resulted in a fire that spread to multiple buildings, which led me to believe that although my building was currently safe, it may not remain so. In the likelihood of fire spreading to my building, I should evacuate immediately. This entire stream of thought happened in the time frame of about 30 seconds to 1 minute.
Once my decision to leave was made, I grabbed my phone, and my purse, which had my keys and cards in it, and I slipped on some sandals. When I exited to my hallway, a tenant down the hall had opened her door, and asked me what happened. I told her I had no idea, but I was going outside to find out. Her dog ran out of her apartment, and up to me, but the tenant abruptly ushered her dog back with her into her room, and she shut the door. I remember thinking that staying inside was not the smartest move, but I did not think this strongly enough to force that girl to leave the building, and she probably didn’t want to risk the dog getting loose outside anyway. I was still operating under the assumption that my building had the potential to catch on fire, so I opted to take the stairs as opposed to the elevator, and I climbed down 7 flights of stairs.
On my way down, I bumped into a couple that was also heading outside. Whenever something scary occurs, the camaraderie between strangers is instantaneous. They told me that they saw an explosion, and a car swerve. On the walk down, we began debating what could have caused the explosion, but once we got to the lobby, we suddenly went quiet, and the severity of the situation hit us all like bricks. The glass from the windows in our lobby had shattered, strewn all over the lobby floor, and a fire engine was pulling up outside. The sight of the glass verified that the explosion was powerful and lethal, and whatever had happened, it was incredibly close.
Shards of glass crushed under my shoes as I made my way to the pavement, and I joined a small crowd that had already formed outside of my building. There was debris completely covering the street, all the way down to the end of the block. Right by my feet, there was a dumpster that had been crushed by the impact of the explosion. This is the same dumpster that you have seen in all of the news articles about the explosion. Nobody knew what was going on, but somebody believed that there was a gas explosion in the Macaroon shop. As this was the only explanation anyone had offered, I was content to believe that this theory may be correct. While everybody got out their phones, and began filming and taking pictures, I just observed the scene, trying to work out what had happened, and if anybody was hurt. What confused me was that although there had been a tiny bit of smoke, I could see no fire. If there was a gas explosion, why was there no fire? When the firemen exited their trucks and took their long water hose over to the location of the explosion, they walked calmly and slowly, leading me to believe that perhaps the situation wasn’t as bad as the broken glass and debris indicated, and hopefully the immediate danger was over.
Policemen ushered everybody off the road, and into the sidewalk, and they began taping off the street. Then people were told to evacuate the block. A tenant asked if it was safe for us to go back into our apartments, and when the officials said yes, we all shuffled back upstairs. On my way back home, I sent this text to my parents: “Just so you know, there was an explosion right by me. I think everything is okay, but give me a call if you can”.
Whenever your life is in danger, no matter what age you are, the biological instinct is to turn to your mummy and daddy for comfort and reassurance. When I returned to my room, all I wanted to do was call my parents. They live in England, so the time difference meant that it was almost 2am, and they were in bed asleep. Regardless of this, I tried FaceTiming my mum four times, and my sister twice. When neither of them answered, I debated what to do. Should I let them sleep, or should I pay a hefty price for an international call, and hope I wake them up. I dialed the number of my parents’ landline in England, and within 5 seconds, my father picked up. I remember this conversation distinctly. My dad’s voice was groggy from just waking up. He said: “Hello?” I said: “Hey daddy, can you FaceTime me?” He said: “Is this Sarah?” I replied: “Yes”, and he said: “Hold on, we’ll call you right back”. Although the conversation seemed menial, none of those words are actually what either of us heard; our tones said everything. My tone said: “Dad, something really bad has happened”, and his said: “I can tell this serious, hold on, we’re here for you”.
When my parents FaceTimed me, they were both sitting in the living room in dressing gowns, looking terrified. The explosion had not hit the news yet, so for all they knew, anything could have happened. All they knew for sure was that, for me to call them at this time, it had to be something terrible. I promptly filled them in on what I knew so far, and we spent the next hour scouring the Internet and news, trying to piece together what had happened. At first there were only tweets, but then official reports came in, shortly followed by news articles, and then the TV news.
When it was revealed that the explosion happened outside in the street, it made sense why there wasn’t fire coming from the buildings. We saw the word IED, and after I looked up what it meant, a scary revelation dawned on us. Whatever that explosion was, it was intentional. When the picture of the beat up dumpster from outside my building emerged, and people theorized that a bomb was placed inside it, the event took a very sinister turn. It is a chilling feeling knowing I was that close to a deadly device.
My apartment has windows and a balcony that look out onto the street, so I opened my blinds, and continued to survey what was going on. I tried to show my parents through FaceTime, although it was too dark for them to see the street, so eventually they just had to rely on my play-by-play. I saw the firemen amble back to their trucks. I saw the police and their sniffer dogs searching for more bombs. I watched those dogs the entire time, and there was one spot where a dog paid particular attention to, which made me fear they had found a second bomb. When they finally moved on from that area, my fear subsided. A while later, I saw two NYPD officers, and a detective conversing, and then they began running towards the rubble. This was the only time I truly panicked: the officials had been remarkably calm the entire time, and this was the only time I witnessed true urgency and danger after the explosion. I don’t know what they were running towards, or why, but nothing related to this event ended up in the news, so it can’t have been that bad. I saw a seemingly important man walk by in a suit, who turned out to be the major. I saw the FBI arrive at the scene, and then I stopped looking out the window, and continued searching for news on the Internet with my parents.
At about 10pm, it was clear that the worst was over, so my parents and I decided to go to bed. I informed friends and family that I was safe through social media and text, and then I got into bed, and read for a bit. I wanted to keep an ear out in case anything else happened. At about 11:50pm, I got a text from a friend saying: “Did another go off??!??” I started to get scared; I hadn’t heard anything, but it was very plausible there were more bombs in the area. She told me they had found another bomb, and I was terrified it was on my street, and there may even be more. When I looked it up, I found only one article, and it said they found another device on 27th street. At about 12am, an alert was sent to my phone to avoid 27th street. When I received no more immediate alerts about anything on my street, I finally allowed myself to sleep.
The following days the street remained sectioned off, however the road was packed with police and investigators. As pedestrians were not allowed in or out of the street, I remained cooped up in my apartment for the next couple days. Early on Sunday, the police detained a white van, and took in five people. On Sunday evening, an alert was sent to my phone about a suspect on the loose. By Monday, this man was caught, and was considered responsible for the Jersey, Chelsea, and train bombs. This same day, residents were allowed back into their apartments, but when my friend came to visit, I had to come out to the end of the block, and escort her in to my place. By Tuesday, 23rd Street was reopened, and cars and pedestrians travelled through the street again, as if nothing had changed.
People continue to ask how I am doing, and my response is, I’m doing okay, because I really am fine. The best way I can describe my emotional state is somewhat numb, with emotional undertones of relief, wariness, and reflection. I feel no more in danger than I usually would in New York. I was unharmed, no one was killed, and my apartment is fine. In hindsight, the bomb had very little impact on me whatsoever, other than the fact it wounded or inconvenienced a number of people on my street.
Selfishly, there are a number of things that I am grateful for. I’m glad that I went shopping Saturday morning, so I had luckily stocked up on food before the explosion occurred. I’m lucky that I was in my apartment, as I would have not been allowed to return until Monday otherwise. I’m lucky that I was not walking past where the explosion occurred at 8:30pm, as I walk past that location almost every day. I’m lucky that I was not walking into my building at the time the glass shattered, as that glass would very likely have ended up slicing me. I’m lucky the explosion didn’t damage my apartment, and I’m lucky the explosion didn’t happen closer to my apartment.
Then there are the more important things to be grateful for. Thank goodness the bomb was placed under the metal dumpster, so it could reduce the extent of the impact of the blast. Thank goodness the second bomb was found before it detonated. Thank goodness two men were trying to find something valuable in the trash, and they came across the five bombs by the train. Thank goodness that bomb exploded on a robot, not those two men. Thank goodness the police were able to find CCTV footage of the person responsible for these monstrosities. Thank goodness the police found fingerprints of that person on the lethal device. Thank goodness they found the man responsible, and detained him. And most importantly, through all of these horrible events, thank goodness no one was killed.
Considering the awful acts those bombs were intended for, the bombs caused very little long-lasting damage. The perpetrator will spend a lifetime in prison, assured in the knowledge that he failed epically in his efforts. In fact, this man is so pathetic; he is no even worth naming.
The ‘who, where, when, and what’, concerning these explosions have been answered, but I am still left with the why? Why did this man target 131 West 23rd Street? Did he merely see the dumpster and jump on the opportunity, or was this location planned for a long time? This is not a busy area, luckily, for if there were more people walking by, there likely would have been casualties. All of the areas the bombs were placed were so random, that I am led to believe that perhaps they were the practice rounds for something bigger. Although I deeply hope this is not the case, and I trust the police force to thwart this if it is, it is extremely important that we keep a watchful eye out on those around us. We are never alone in New York, and this can be a good thing, or a bad thing, but if someone makes you feel uncomfortable, please report it to the police. Whether it is a family member, a friend, or a stranger. It may be nothing, but it may be everything. There were warning signs with the person responsible for these bombs, and they were ignored. Don’t let it happen again.