KMXT 100.1 FM Public Radio in Kodiak, Alaska
A Kodiak resident who ran the Boston Marathon today is safe and uninjured after twin explosions occurred near the finish line just before 3 p.m. EDT (11 a.m. ADT). Howard Valley, 64, finished his race roughly 40 minutes before the blasts and said he was walking away from the area when he heard the commotion.
— (Boston Runner 1 :36 “I must have been about two blocks away when the explosions occurred. I heard two of them. It was very loud explosions. It wasn’t like a propane tank or anything that go off here in Kodiak sometimes, or anything else; it was quite obviously a large explosion of some type. But I didn’t know what it was until about maybe a half an hour later when I got inside a hotel and was watching the TV. And of course before that I saw all the ambulance heading in so I knew there was an explosion of some kind.”)
Valley has safely returned to the bed and breakfast he is staying at in Newton, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston. He said it took him about four hours to get out of the city and had to use alternate train and bus routes because transportation was shut down near the race course.
Valley finished his race in about 3 hours and 42 minutes. It was his third marathon and he said it started out as a perfect day.
— (Boston Runner 2 :22 “The running weather and everything was great, and everything was going, seemed perfect today, until that occurred. Then it was just, shutting down cell service and confusing the train system for transportation and blocking off streets. So they were just scurrying to find out what was going on as well.”)
Valley is scheduled to leave Boston on Thursday, and said he hasn’t received word on whether or not air traffic has been affected by today’s events.
KMXT has also received word that Coast Guardsman, Matthew Breckel, once stationed in Kodiak was in the race and is OK as well.
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