One Boston Day Date in the current year: April 15, 2024

The Boston marathon is one of the world’s oldest and most prestigious annual marathon races. It has been held on the third Monday of April since 1897, with a few exceptions. Unfortunately, the marathon is widely known not only due to its long history, but also because of the 2013 bombing that killed 3 people and injured over 260 others.

The explosions occurred near the finish line of the marathon, which was located on Boylston Street near Copley Square. The first bomb detonated 4 hours 9 minutes and 43 seconds after the third wave of participants started running. The winning runner had crossed the finish line nearly three hours before the explosion, but over 5,700 runners were yet to finish. The second bomb exploded 14 seconds after the first one, one block farther west. Both explosions occurred in the spectator area.

Luckily, there were medical personnel and rescue workers on site, who gave aid immediately. In addition, police, fire and medical units were dispatched to handle the situation. 3 civilians, including an 8-year-old boy, were killed and over 260 were injured by the explosion; over a dozen injured suffered traumatic amputations or required amputations due to severe trauma.

None of the terrorist groups claimed responsibility for the bombing. On April 18, the FIB released security camera images of two suspects, who turned out to be Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, two brothers whose family had immigrated to the US from Kyrgyzstan seeking political asylum. According to the FBI, the Tsarnaev brothers were motivated by extremist Islamist beliefs, but they didn’t belong to any terrorist groups.

On April 19, Tamerlan Tsarnaev was shot dead by the police during his arrest, and Dzokhar was wounded before being taken into custody. He was arraigned on 30 charges in July 2013, and the trial began in March 2015. On April 8, 2015, a week before the second anniversary of the bombing, Tsarnaev was found guilty on all 30 counts. During the sentencing phase of the trial, the jury recommended that Tsarnaev be sentenced to death. On June 24, 2015, the judge handed down the death sentence.

On the second anniversary of the bombing, Mayor Marty Walsh declared April 15 One Boston Day. It is an official annual holiday dedicated to helping others out and conducting random acting of kindness, such as donating blood, donating clothes and shoes to homeless shelters, donating food to food banks, donating money to charities, etc.