10.Colton Kilgore — Direct

COLTON KILGORE: My name is Colton Kilgore, and my last name is spelled K-I-L-G-O-R-E.

COLTON KILGORE: Asheville, North Carolina.

COLTON KILGORE: I've lived there for four years.

COLTON KILGORE: I live there with my wife and my eight-month-old daughter.

COLTON KILGORE: I am.

COLTON KILGORE: Well, I, for the last four years, have been self-employed as a mobile auto detailer, and I'm currently transitioning into a technical director in a new job for a traveling sort of Broadway-style production.

COLTON KILGORE: They entail running sound, lighting, producing videos, just to name the main ones.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes, I have a bachelor's degree in the electronic media communications, and I've been into video production/photography since high school just as a hobby.

COLTON KILGORE: Kimberly Kilgore.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes. My mother-in-law is Mona DiMartino, my father-in-law is David DiMartino, and Mona is -- she was running the marathon, and that's why we were there that day.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes, that's correct.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes, she has one sister named Gina.

COLTON KILGORE: In our family group there was David and Mona, my wife, her sister Gina, her brother Peter, Peter's girlfriend at the time, Rebekah and her son Noah, as well as Kimberly's Aunt Paula.

COLTON KILGORE: Rebekah's son Noah.

COLTON KILGORE: He was five.

COLTON KILGORE: We did. We came a couple of days before and spent a weekend just kind of doing touristy things: Going to Quincy Market and Faneuil Hall, went to a Red Sox game the day before and -- yeah, this was my first time here.

COLTON KILGORE: Yeah, we were staying in a hotel outside the city. I don't remember exactly where. But we kind of slept in a little bit. My mother-in-law got dropped off at the start, and her heat wasn't starting till later so we just spent the morning kind of watching TV. And left late morning, hopped on the T, and we rode -- we got off at about the 16-mile mark in the marathon to watch Mona run by. And, yeah, we hung out there until we saw her run by, and from that point we headed downtown to watch the finish.

COLTON KILGORE: No, not at all.

COLTON KILGORE: Yeah, somewhat.

COLTON KILGORE: Because I ran the marathon in 2014.

COLTON KILGORE: We went -- I believe we took the T down to the Arlington stop just past Copley because we didn't want to get off right at Copley, so we could spend a little more time walking to the finish line. And we met up with one of my father-in-law's friends, Mike. And he kind of led us down different streets. I remember walking up Newbury Street before cutting across to Boylston right where the finish line where the photo bridge is.

COLTON KILGORE: The group that I named earlier was -- so David was there; Kimberly, my wife; Peter; Gina; Rebekah; Noah; Paula; and Mike, the friend.

COLTON KILGORE: I did.

COLTON KILGORE: A Canon 7D.

COLTON KILGORE: I did. I was taking photos and video, because I do both, and I had taken pictures of Mona running by at the 16-mile mark, and had kind of just been snapping shots here and there of the crowd and runners and just the general goings-on.

COLTON KILGORE: They were a lot of fun. There was just a general sort of party atmosphere. And, you know, I've been to parades and events before but nothing quite like the Boston Marathon. And really, I had no idea going into it that it would be such a huge deal. But everyone was having a great time, the weather was pretty nice. It was sunny but a little chilly so we had jackets on. And, yeah, everybody was having a great time.

COLTON KILGORE: Yeah. So we had stopped at the photo bridge, and my father-in-law, David, decided to stay there so that he could get a picture of Mona crossing the finish line with the clock, and the rest of our group pushed forward because we wanted to kind of be more the direction the runners were coming from so that I could get photos and video of Mona as she ran by. So we -- our whole group except for David pushed forward until we were standing kind of directly in front of LensCrafters.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes, I have.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes.

COLTON KILGORE: I do.

COLTON KILGORE: My voice is and my feet are. My shoes you can see.

COLTON KILGORE: Yeah. So this video is one that I shot just as random runners were coming by. I was switching between photos and video, and this kind of just shows where we were standing and kind of what the atmosphere was like.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes.

COLTON KILGORE: It's just general. I think you may have been able to see the top of someone's head but nothing that you would be able to recognize them from.

COLTON KILGORE: After I shot that video, I took a couple of photos. And the last photo I snapped, it must have been right after I took the picture, was when I was blown through the air. And there's a deafening explosion. I remember just kind of seeing faces and bodies tumbling through the air. And I hit the ground and had no idea what was going on, had several thoughts go through my mind, like what happened. Was there a celebratory canon that went off or a fireworks display that went bad. But as I was sitting up my brain kind of was in a haze and I couldn't hear out of my left ear and there was just screaming. And I realized, no, this was something much worse than that, and it must have been a bomb. And as this was all happening I -- my camera is on a strap on me, and I just hit "record" and continued recording video as I got up and found my wife, made sure she was okay, and then tended to all of our family members who were severely injured.

COLTON KILGORE: I hit "record" because it is just a reflex to me. It becomes second nature. When I have my camera and something is happening, I want to document it. And, yeah, it's just I -- I've done that for years and years.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes.

COLTON KILGORE: In this video you are going to see a lot of chaos and a lot of people on the ground. There is smoke, there's shrapnel on the sidewalk that's smoking, there are people who are injured. And I believe in this video you will see Rebekah's leg injury. And, yeah, that's --

COLTON KILGORE: Yes, it perforated my eardrum and -- yeah, it affected my hearing. I couldn't hear for about a month after that.

COLTON KILGORE: I could -- yeah, I could hear -- my right ear was fine but I had ringing in this ear, but I could hear muffled sounds and the screaming. And at one point I remember hearing the second blast and people commenting on it but having no idea what that meant because I was trying to stay focused on where I was.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes. The smell of smoke, kind of gunpowdery, blood, flesh. Just acrid, disgusting.

COLTON KILGORE: On the ground I remember seeing just chunks of metal, sort of like ball-bearings, BBs. At one point I was sitting -- because I was -- my sister-in-law, Gina, had -- she had had an artery and nerve severed in her right leg, and so she was laying there. And I had her lay back in my lap, and as I sat, I sat on something that burned me, and I realized that everybody laying there was just laying on this burning metal shards of stuff and glass and all kinds of just random stuff.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes; that's Noah.

COLTON KILGORE: At this moment Noah is screaming and everyone around us is trying to figure out what happened. And there's yelling, there's crying. Noah had a shrapnel wound in his leg and so he was -- you know, as a five-year-old boy, obviously, like the rest of us, was terrified but didn't know where his mom was, didn't know what was happening. At the same time my wife, Kimberly, is standing up, going to take her jacket off and wrap it around her sister's leg as a tourniquet. And this is her Aunt Paula you see right here with the phone in her back pocket, and she's also doing the same.

COLTON KILGORE: Uh-huh.

COLTON KILGORE: It was on the ground. At one point I set it on the ground while I stood up to find my wife, make sure she was okay. And as things were happening -- and it was just general chaos -- I kind of shifted the camera at one point and I moved it over here on the ground, put it back over my shoulder on the strap at one point later on.

COLTON KILGORE: Maybe not those specifically but other items like it.

COLTON KILGORE: No.

COLTON KILGORE: I had set it down on the ground.

COLTON KILGORE: Some piece of burning material.

COLTON KILGORE: That is my sister-in-law Gina's leg, and that's blood you see flowing on the sidewalk that most likely came from her severed artery.

COLTON KILGORE: On this clip it's more of the same but by this point first responders had come in and I've -- I was a Boy Scout growing up and have basic first aid knowledge, but the one thing I do know is when people who know more than I do are on the scene, to not get in their way. So I was just trying to be there and comfort Gina and also listen to what the first responders were telling me to do. And during that time, like I said before, having a camera in front of me is something that's kind of second nature and it was something I knew how to do, so I just was pointing my camera around.

COLTON KILGORE: I believe that is Karen Rand.

COLTON KILGORE: That is my sister-in-law, Gina DiMartino.

COLTON KILGORE: Right here -- she is in shock. We -- my wife had tied her jacket around Gina's leg, and I went over and at one point I leaned her back into my lap to try to just comfort her and to tell her to keep breathing, keep breathing, while first responders came over and checked out her leg and eventually asked if I had a belt on, and I gave them my belt, which they used as a tourniquet on her.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes. That's my brother-in-law, Peter DiMartino.

COLTON KILGORE: The arm that's holding his head in the pink shirt there, that's my wife Kimberly.

COLTON KILGORE: I didn't see the face in that shot but I know that on the other side of Peter was Rebekah.

COLTON KILGORE: At the time, yes.

COLTON KILGORE: That was Noah.

COLTON KILGORE: This is Rebekah's leg.

COLTON KILGORE: Well, like I said earlier, I was sitting there, and as you could see, there were first responders who were kind of instructing me what to do and I was waiting to be told if I should stand up or if I should help with something. And Kimberly was sitting there between Peter and Rebekah and pointed at Rebekah's leg, and so I just swung my camera that way.

COLTON KILGORE: Oh, I remember seeing her leg, it was right next to me, and thinking there is no way she's going to keep that foot.

COLTON KILGORE: It was so severely damaged that -- I mean, bones were sticking out of it. I've never seen anything like that before. And, you know, just the -- just realizing like it's -- it would be impossible for a doctor to save that.

COLTON KILGORE: That was my wife Kimberly.

COLTON KILGORE: She said, "Stay with Gina" so that Gina would have someone with her to get her into an ambulance, and Kimberly ended up staying with Rebekah, and Paul ended up staying with Noah until he got to the hospital. So I stayed with Gina. And I don't know if you see it in the video, in a second I was asked to stand up and step out of the way, which I did, but I waited until Gina was pulled out and put into a wheelchair, and we then walked down Boylston Street away from the finish line and eventually got her into an ambulance.

COLTON KILGORE: At this point I had stepped back because one of the first responders asked me to step and just wait until they could get Gina out. So I stood back. And I was standing there, half in shock myself, I just was kind of pointing my camera around, and a police officer came up to me and told me to stop and pushed me out of the way, at which point I said, "I was just in that. Can you look at me and make sure I'm okay?" because my jeans had been blown apart and my legs had cuts and burns on them and I could barely hear out of this ear. And so I was trying to explain to him that I was in that and I was waiting for my family to get taken out so I could stay with them.

COLTON KILGORE: I tried to. When I realized that my jeans had been blown apart, kind of from the knee down, I looked at the -- the seam on my jean had kind of come like this, and I tried ripping it but I didn't have anything to cut it with, so I grabbed a random person, I don't remember if it was a police officer or someone working at the marathon, and they had either a knife or scissors and they cut it and they took it and I hope used it as a tourniquet. But that was definitely my intention when I was ripping my jeans.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes.

COLTON KILGORE: The -- so we walked down Boylston Street, probably past the second bomb site -- I just remember walking for a very long time -- until we got to the point where ambulances were being pulled in. At that point I helped pick Gina up out of the wheelchair, put her on a stretcher, and they loaded her into the ambulance. And I tried to get in with her but they wouldn't let me because there was another person in there who had lost a leg. So I quickly wrote down the ambulance company and the number that the ambulance had written on the side of it because I didn't know if I would be able to track Gina down. So her ambulance left, and then some EMTs had me lay down and they cut my jeans open further to make sure that I didn't have any injuries that I didn't know about. And after that, I climbed into an ambulance with two other people and they drove us to Massachusetts General Hospital.

COLTON KILGORE: I do.

COLTON KILGORE: Right there.

COLTON KILGORE: Yes. So there's a pink shirt to my left, a pink kind of plaid shirt. That's my wife. And then -- can I touch the screen again to show you?

COLTON KILGORE: Right here is Gina, and over here is my father-in-law's friend Mike. And I don't think you can see him, but Peter is in here somewhere, probably blocked by one of our bodies.

COLTON KILGORE: It's hard to tell. And I've tried to figure it out myself just from looking at different photos and video, but I was definitely knocked off my feet in this direction and probably a couple of feet away from where I was standing when the bomb went off.

COLTON KILGORE: When I got to the hospital, they made me sit in a wheelchair and they pushed me into the ER. And I was just taken in to get looked at. And a doctor came in and checked out my ear and told me that it was perforated. And they examined -- I had very minor burns on the side of my arm and my leg had lots of cuts and scrapes, and they pretty much told me, "You're going to be okay. We can keep you here longer if you want to, you know, clean your wounds, but if you need to get out of here quickly to find family, you can clean them yourself later on in the shower" or something. And I said, "Yes, please, just let me go." And while I was sitting in there waiting for the doctor to see me, I was texting my wife, Kimberly, who I had no idea where she was, finally found out she was at Beth Israel with Rebekah, and she was trying to piece together where the whole family was. So we found where everyone was except for my father-in-law whose phone had died, and at that point we didn't know where he was or if he was alive or injured or anything like that. So after they let me leave, I went to the desk and I asked them to look up in their database if anyone with the last name "DiMartino" was there, and they found Peter and they told me he was about to go in for -- I believe it was a CAT scan. And so they took me to him as he was being wheeled through the halls and I told him, "Hey, I'm here, man. I'll be here waiting when you get out." And they took him in behind the doors, and while I was standing in the hallway waiting for that scan to be finished, that's when my father-in-law, David, came walking around the corner. And he had walked to the hospital from the finish line with a dead cell phone.

COLTON KILGORE: Yeah. So Peter had a 90 percent tear of his Achilles tendon in addition to other burns on his back and legs, lots of shrapnel embedded in his legs.

COLTON KILGORE: Gina had a severed artery and nerve in her right lower leg.

COLTON KILGORE: I went home about two weeks after the bombing happened. We stayed in Boston to give support to our family who were all in the hospital, but after about two weeks of that, it was time for us to leave. And I -- being self-employed at the time, I had no one to work for me and had no way of supporting my family if I didn't go home. So my wife and I left, it was either the last week of April or first week of May, and went back home to North Carolina.