What’s happening in Boston? It began with the beginning of a sea of Tweets and only later spilled over onto the cable networks. The local TV station was also way ahead of the national cable networks. Gunfire, explosions heard in Watertown. MIT officer fatally shot on campus. 7NEWS is live on the scene with exclusive video. The seeming catalyst for the night of massive police action leading to photos of a young man with brown hair down on the ground after a police chase: a shooting at MIT. New Tweets say the man arrested was not a suspect. The Atlantic Wire has a good summary:
MIT issued an emergency alert at 10:48 on Thursday night reporting shots fired on the university campus. MIT’s school newspaper, The Tech, reports, “Shots fired near 32 Vassar St (Stata Center), police officer down. Please stay inside.” That report is backed up by CBS News’s Bonney Kapp who reports hearing “officer down” on the police scanner just before the MIT alert went out. The Tech followed up a few minutes later, reporting that the injured officer was a member of the MIT campus police and was taken to Mass. General Hospital. According to the Massachusetts State Police, the officer died from his wounds just before midnight.
Not long after midnight, there were reports of a car jacking at a gas station on Memorial Drive. The suspects took a Mercedes SUV. Minutes later there were shots fired in Watertown. Then an officer said “they have explosives and grenades.” After the exchange of fire, police scanners reported an officer down. The chase continued and there were reports of automatic gunfire and explosives being thrown out of a car. Minutes later police took one suspect into custody, and the other fled.
Mail Online also has an excellent summary that is being updated constantly. Here’s part of it:
Police dramatically arrested a suspect at gunpoint after multiple shots and explosions were heard in the Boston suburb of Watertown this morning – hours after a MIT campus police officer was shot dead late on Thursday night.
Police are urging everyone to stay inside of their homes. The area is considered extremely dangerous.
Law enforcement are reportedly searching for a black 2013 black Mercedes vehicle which a suspect is driving.
Initial reports suggest that one suspect is in custody and a police officer has been injured.
Earlier – Cambridge police and the Middlesex District Attorney’s office confirmed an officer was shot dead responding to a report of a disturbance when he was fired upon multiple times.
He later died at a hospital. His name was not immediately released.
State police spokesman Dave Procopio says the shooting took place about 10:30 p.m. outside an MIT building.
Procopio says authorities are searching for a suspect or suspects. No arrests have been made.
Go to the link to read the latest from Mailonline.
LIVE STREAMING COVERAGE: WHDH TV Boston is HERE. Gunfire, explosions heard in Watertown. MIT officer fatally shot on campus. 7NEWS is live on the scene with exclusive video. reporters say what seems unusual is how federal authorities are moving in and taking over on an event that at face value is related to the MTV shooting. This is the TV channel’s headline on top: “Gunfire, explosions heard in Watertown. MIT officer fatally shot on campus. 7NEWS is live on the scene with exclusive video.”
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.