Trauma of marathon bombing remains
EMT tended to victims 11 years ago in Boston
WORCESTER, Mass. – Chareese Allen was scared, so she picked up the phone and called her mother.
“I told her I didn’t know if I was going to make it out alive today,” Allen said.
That gut-wrenching conversation happened 11 years ago, April 15, 2013, the day of the Boston Marathon bombings that killed three people and injured 260.
Allen worked as a Boston EMT that day. Her training prepared her for emergencies, and this was the real deal.
“I feel the tears,” said Allen, reflecting on that experience while taking a break from her current job as a doctor of nursing practice at Family Health Center in Worcester.
Allen, who lives in Worcester, knows Marathon Day is around the corner. She explained that every time she talks about the bombings, she can feel the tears welling up. She held them in check and noted she likely suffers from posttraumatic stress disorder.
“It’s very emotional,” and Allen said she handles it by putting her feelings into compartments that can be locked up. “I shut it away.”
The stories of the lives lost that day, of the injured, and the manhunt for the Tsarnaev brothers is well-documented. However, Allen believes there are many untold stories, especially of the heroic acts performed by emergency responders who simply did their jobs in the toughest of circumstances.
Allen falls into that category.
She went to work on Patriot’s Day in 2013 assuming it would be just another race, with tens of thousands of runners powering through the 26.2-mile trek from Hopkinton to Boston. Her EMT truck was assigned to Boston College, located along the marathon route, and everything was going as planned.
Then a message came over the emergency radio channel that said an explosion happened near the finish line. Allen brushed it off as a manhole cover. She lived in Boston at the time and knew those covers frequently exploded due to utility issues.
Minutes later, a second radio message from a screaming dispatcher gave the heart-stopping news – a second explosion. That’s when Allen called her mother and then stepped on the gas to get to the finish line as fast as possible.
As her truck snaked up to the triage tent that tended to the injured at Copley Square, a police officer told Allen that authorities had found a third device and planned to detonate it. Up to that moment, two bombs had exploded, causing carnage. Moments later, Allen said, she heard the third blast.
“It scared me half to death,” she said. “People were screaming and running.”
EMTs must keep their cool during moments of rampant chaos, and Allen kept hers. She transported a bleeding man with shrapnel wounds to Brigham and Women’s Hospital. The man was frantic, wanting to know if his wife was OK. Allen never did know what happened to her but was certain the man she took to the hospital had injuries that weren’t life-threatening.
Doctors and nurses then asked Allen if she was OK, and she thought she was until another radio message came in. This one told everyone to stay away from the marathon staging area due to safety concerns.
“I burst into tears,” said Allen, who took nearly an hour to compose herself. Her next job was to fulfill a tough assignment for all Boston EMTs that day – return their trucks to the marathon finish line. Again, she wondered, “Am I going to die today?”
Allen and Greater Boston weren’t out of the woods. Authorities put the area in lockdown for several days, hunting for the perpetrators and zeroing in on the Tsarnaev brothers.
Tamerlan Tsarnaev died in a shootout with police. The autopsy indicated blunt force trauma, with reports he was run over by a car driven by his brother, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who fled the scene.
As for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, he’s in a Colorado jail. His defense team is seeking a retrial to challenge his death sentence, claiming two of the jurors were biased and shouldn’t have been impaneled. Whether Tsarnaev’s fate is the death penalty or life in prison, Allen said, “He murdered people. I have no sympathy.”
A “military brat” is how Allen described her formative years. Growing up in a military family, she moved around a lot. That lifestyle can build resilience, and Allen displays a serious, straightforward personality.
But she’s not immune to emotional aftershocks. It appears the marathon bombings left scars. Maybe not deep ones, but they seem to be there.
One the one hand, Allen said she has “made peace” with what happened 11 years ago. “I’ve put it to rest.”
She also said, “It makes you feel vulnerable. You never know.”
That comment segued Allen into what she called her “weird luck.” She was in New York City years ago to attend a Michael Jackson concert at Madison Square Garden. The show was held Sept. 10, 2001, the day before the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Allen noted that when she visited New York City in those days, she usually booked a few nights at a hotel in Lower Manhattan, near the World Trade Center. But on this trip, she wanted to get back to Boston quickly, so she flew out early on the morning of Sept. 11.
The fate in that decision isn’t lost on her.
“I was in New York City flying into Boston, while the (hijackers) flew out of Logan,” she said.
Later that morning, Allen watched the horror unfold on TV.
“I have weird luck,” said Allen, “but I will take it.”
Allen has the day off Monday, but don’t expect to see her standing along the marathon course, cheering on the runners in this year’s 128th edition, or watching the race on TV.
“I can’t remember the last time I watched the marathon,” she said.
Maybe she’ll give her 85-year-old mother, Joan, who lives in Florida, a call. You can bet it will be more pleasant than the alarming conversation they had 11 years ago.
Meanwhile, Allen remains proud of her work that day and the sacrifices made by her fellow emergency responders.
“We got everyone who needed to get to the hospital to a hospital within 18 minutes,” Allen said. “We were a welloiled machine.”