Eight runners from Bloomington who were participating in today's Boston Marathon are fine after two bombs went off near the finish line.
Seven of the runners finished the race before the explosion and the remaining runner, Sharon Larason was within a half mile of the finish line when the bombs went off. According to Larason's husband who WFIU/WTIU reached by phone, she is fine.
Stephanie Bartley, a part owner of the Indiana Running Company was among those from Bloomington who completed the race.
All six runners from the Club Kokomo Roadrunners are safe, according to club President Patty Weitzel. Three runners from Terre Haute also finished before the explosion.
A total of 283 runners from Indiana were registered for the marathon.
Hoosiers' First-Hand Accounts
It was Bloomington resident Rachel Noirot's first time running Boston. She had finished and was changing when she heard the explosion.
"Everyone said it sounded like something fell," she says. "I thought it was something like a sign or a bleacher or something or thunder. Actually the first thing I thought of was it sounded like thunder.That's exactly what it sounded like but then I was like it's sunny out."
After hearing the explosion Noriot went back towards the finish line but officials were clearing the streets and fire trucks were coming through. Noirot and some other members of the Bloomington Area Runner's Association went to a restaurant a couple of blocks away where they learned what was happening.
Indianapolis resident Meggie Dials, who had been at the scene watching her husband Joshua Dials about an hour and a half before the explosion, says she was "shocked" when she heard the news from her hotel room.
"I look at that area and that was the area I was at all day today," she says. "Plus we walked that area for the past two days. I just thought a lot about the people I stood with all morning, knowing that I left them once I saw my husband and I don't know if they're OK."
Chris Muir was about a mile from the blast site, on his way to a local pub with his fiancée and a group of family and friends, having finished the race about an hour beforehand. It was the first time he had run the Boston Marathon, but he says Monday's events give him a little pause about next year's event.
"You know, I already qualified for next year and I thought about signing up and I'm still thinking I probably will, just pending what they find out about the investigation," he says. "I can't imagine it's the type of thing that's going to happen here again, but it's going to be different."
Muir described the mood in Boston as "somber."
Sara Wittmeyer, Stan Jastrzebski and Gretchen Frazee contributed to this report.
