A bombing in my home city
When I woke up, I saw a bit of news on my Twitter feed about an explosive device that was found at Ploschad' Vostaniya station, one of the busiest stations in St. Petersburg subway. It was afternoon rush hour in my home city, and I remember thinking that I was glad it ended well.
It wasn't until I showered, had breakfast and checked my feed again that I realized the full extent of what was happening. That there was another bomb that did explode on the southbound Line 2 train as it traveling between Sennaya Ploschad' and Technologichestiy Institut stations - two major transfer stations. Nine people died on the spot, and two more succumbed to their injuries in the hospital. 45 people were injured.
As anyone who followed this LJ for a while knows, I have been fascinated with my home city's subway since I was a little kid. And that particular segment was special. I can't even begin to count all the times I and some family member of mine took Nevska-Vasilyeostrovskaya line to Gostinnyi Dvor, transferred to Moskovsko-Petrogradskaya line, transferred to Kirovsko-Vyborskaya line at Technologicheskiy Insitut and keep going south to take a train to the suburbs at Baltiyskiy train terminal, or to go to school, or to visit one of my grandfathers. It's a trip I can recreate from memory.
(And yes, I deliberately used the old-school names for the lines. They got renamed to "Line [number]" for a good reason - it's easier to remember and easier to pronounce if you are not a Russian speaker - but to me, they will always be [fill in line name])
It happened in my home city, so it was going to affect me regardless of details, but this just made it worse.
I suppose we'll know more tomorrow, Russia time (so around midnight central time). A terrorist attack seems most likely - some group from Caucasus Mountains, Daesh or some combination of both. It seemed like they were placed where they could do significant damage and disrupt two of the city's busiest lines for hours. And the fact that President Putin just happened to be in the city at the time may or may not have been a coincidence. But we'll see.
All and all - on one hand, only 11 people died. Given how crowded St. Petersburg subway gets, this could have been much worse. On the other hand, this is cold comfort to families that lost their loved ones. So I'm taking a moment to bow my real and virtual head to honor them.
And... I guess one thing that kept bugging me is that, while BBC News had the bombing on the front page, when I turned on the TV, the morning news kind of glossed over it. Aside from brief mentions and occasional updates, it was just like any other day. Which isn't different from how tragedies in foreign countries are usually covered on American television.
but it is different when it's your country, your city that they're not talking about.
It wasn't until I showered, had breakfast and checked my feed again that I realized the full extent of what was happening. That there was another bomb that did explode on the southbound Line 2 train as it traveling between Sennaya Ploschad' and Technologichestiy Institut stations - two major transfer stations. Nine people died on the spot, and two more succumbed to their injuries in the hospital. 45 people were injured.
As anyone who followed this LJ for a while knows, I have been fascinated with my home city's subway since I was a little kid. And that particular segment was special. I can't even begin to count all the times I and some family member of mine took Nevska-Vasilyeostrovskaya line to Gostinnyi Dvor, transferred to Moskovsko-Petrogradskaya line, transferred to Kirovsko-Vyborskaya line at Technologicheskiy Insitut and keep going south to take a train to the suburbs at Baltiyskiy train terminal, or to go to school, or to visit one of my grandfathers. It's a trip I can recreate from memory.
(And yes, I deliberately used the old-school names for the lines. They got renamed to "Line [number]" for a good reason - it's easier to remember and easier to pronounce if you are not a Russian speaker - but to me, they will always be [fill in line name])
It happened in my home city, so it was going to affect me regardless of details, but this just made it worse.
I suppose we'll know more tomorrow, Russia time (so around midnight central time). A terrorist attack seems most likely - some group from Caucasus Mountains, Daesh or some combination of both. It seemed like they were placed where they could do significant damage and disrupt two of the city's busiest lines for hours. And the fact that President Putin just happened to be in the city at the time may or may not have been a coincidence. But we'll see.
All and all - on one hand, only 11 people died. Given how crowded St. Petersburg subway gets, this could have been much worse. On the other hand, this is cold comfort to families that lost their loved ones. So I'm taking a moment to bow my real and virtual head to honor them.
And... I guess one thing that kept bugging me is that, while BBC News had the bombing on the front page, when I turned on the TV, the morning news kind of glossed over it. Aside from brief mentions and occasional updates, it was just like any other day. Which isn't different from how tragedies in foreign countries are usually covered on American television.
but it is different when it's your country, your city that they're not talking about.