A woman is comforted by a man near a triage tent set up for the Boston Marathon after explosions went off.
Agencies/Boston
Two people were killed and 23 others injured after two explosions struck the Boston Marathon as runners crossed the finish line yesterday, Boston police said.
Massachusetts General Hospital was treating 19 victims of the explosion in its emergency room but information about their condition was not immediately available, a spokeswoman said.
The Boston police reported the death and injury toll in a statement on Twitter.
Tens of thousands of people packed the streets to watch one of the world’s best known marathons.
Pictures from the scene showed blood stains on the ground and several people knocked down.
Police reported at least one explosion and witnesses said there were two, which hit as spectators were cheering on people finishing the Boston Marathon.
Reporters in the media centre heard two blasts.
“There was an explosion. Police, fire and EMS (emergency medical services) are on the scene, we have no indication of how many people are injured,” a spokeswoman for the Boston Police Department said.
Mike Mitchell of Vancouver, Canada, a runner who had finished the race, said he was looking back at the finish line and saw a “massive explosion.”
Smoke rose 50ft (15m) in the air, Mitchell said. People began running and screaming after hearing the noise, Mitchell said.
“Everybody freaked out,” Mitchell said.
Television images showed ambulances, fire trucks and dozens of police vehicles near the finish line.
Hundreds of thousands of spectators typically line the 26.2 mile (42.19km) race course, with the heaviest crowds near the finish line. The blasts occurred more than five hours after the start of the race, at a time when most top athletes were off the course but slower amateur marathoners were still running.
The transit agency shut down all service to the area, citing police activity.
Ambulances arrived on the scene within minutes and runners and spectators could be seen crying and consoling each other.
President Barack Obama ordered his administration to do whatever is necessary to respond to and investigate blasts, a US official said.
Obama was told of the incident, which caused many injuries, and the White House has been in touch with state and local authorities.
The Boston Marathon has been held on Patriots Day, the third Monday of April, since 1897. The event, which starts in Hopkinton, Massachusetts and ends Boston’s Copley Square, attracts an estimated half million spectators and some 20,000 participants every year.
Earlier yesterday, Ethiopia’s Lelisa Desisa and Kenya’s Rita Jeptoo won the men’s and women’s events, continuing African runners’ dominance in the sport.
Meanwhile, New York police stepped up security around key landmarks in the city yesterday the blasts, a top officer said.
“We’re stepping up security at hotels and other prominent locations in the city through deployment of the NYPD’s critical response vehicles until more about the explosion is learned,” Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne said in a statement.
