6.James Bath — Direct

JAMES BATH: James Bath. Last name is B-A-T-H.

JAMES BATH: I live in Charlestown, Massachusetts.

JAMES BATH: I'm a general practitioner, and I work over in Somerville.

JAMES BATH: Sure. I went to college up in Maine, up in Lewiston, and then I went to medical school at the University of Massachusetts, and did my residency at Tufts Family Medicine Residency.

JAMES BATH: Yup. I work in a group of family physicians over in Somerville, and I'm part of Hallmark Health, which is part of Melrose-Wakefield.

JAMES BATH: Eight years.

JAMES BATH: Yes. That morning me and my wife, we took the day off, which is something we do every year. And we went and we had lunch near the Red Sox game. And after that we walked down to -- we were going to walk down to the marathon. We had some friends who were going to be finishing up the marathon. And we parted ways. She wanted to go home and get some work done, so she hopped on the train, and I kept walking down toward Newbury Street.

JAMES BATH: So I was walking down Newbury Street. And as I said, I was going to go meet some friends. And I got right to the corner of Newbury and Gloucester when I heard a very loud explosion. And at first I didn't know what it was. I thought, you know, it sounded odd that they would be setting a cannon off halfway through the marathon, but that's what I thought it was. And I stood for a moment, and about ten seconds later I heard the second explosion, which was much louder and seemed to be much closer. At that point I looked up Gloucester toward Boylston Street, and I started to see all of the spectators and all of the runners running back in the other direction, starting to come back down Gloucester. And at that point I thought that there might have been some sort of explosion in a restaurant, and so I ran up Gloucester and went over one of the barricades and stood in the middle of the street, just looking down the street to see what I could see. And the first thing that I saw was a gentleman who was coming down the street in clothes tattered. He was a little bit bloody, was in shock. And I stopped him and he stated to me that "All of my friends are dead. I need to get out of here," is what he kept repeating to me. So I just did a quick review of him and found that, thankfully, none of his injuries were life-threatening but he was definitely in shock. So I sat him down, and fortunately a Boston police officer came over and sat down with him, and I proceeded down the street. And I could see the smoke coming out of the front of what is now the Forum restaurant, and just kept running down toward the sidewalk. And right when I was getting up to the area, the Boston police officers were just starting to pull away the barricades so I could get up onto the sidewalk, or right in front of it.

JAMES BATH: Honestly, I don't remember much. I remember, you know, people going by in either direction, but nobody really else on the street. I was pretty much focused on, you know, the smoke that I saw and what I could see, which wasn't too far in the distance. There were a lot of people sort of crowded in one area, but I don't remember anything to either side.

JAMES BATH: Okay. And when I got to the front of the Forum, the thing that struck me first was the unmistakable smell of burning tissue and blood which, you know, going through medical training is something that, you know, you get accustomed to. But it was fairly overwhelming at that point. And I took a quick look onto the sidewalk and it had looked like people had just been dropped like puzzle pieces onto the sidewalk, was sort of my first impression. And there was, you know, a fair amount of blood and there was -- I remember seeing a severed foot was right on the curb in front of me. But this all happened very quickly. And there was a girl lying on the -- against sort of the back fence on the sidewalk who I gravitated to first. I can't remember why but I just did. And so I ran around. So I was on her right. And so it was a young Asian woman and who had been very seriously injured. When I got to her, I kneeled down right at about her thigh. And she was still alive at this point.

JAMES BATH: She was still breathing. She was unconscious but she was breathing. And she was writhing a little bit. You know, she wasn't responding to anybody. And I was trying to ascertain her wounds. And since I was at her leg, and seeing that there were other leg injuries I rolled her right leg toward me. And she essentially had a very deep, long laceration all the way from the pelvis all the way down to about her ankle. So basically her leg had been filleted open down to the bone. And the gentleman who sitting across from me also rolled back her leg, and she had other deep injuries there but not as severe as the right. So he and I proceeded to just try to tourniquet her leg. I used my belt, and he took off his. And we tried to tourniquet her, although at that point I started to realize that there wasn't much blood coming out anymore.

JAMES BATH: So what it means is that, you know, even though this is -- especially up in the upper thigh is where a very large neurovascular bundle lies, you know, femoral artery, femoral vein, that a lot of her blood was now on the sidewalk and not in her. And, you know, as I was there and we were tying her off, I took her pulse at one point. It was very thready, which means that there really wasn't much of a pulse left, and within a minute or two she started agonal breathing.

JAMES BATH: So agonal breathing is the type of breathing someone does when they're in the throes of dying. It's the body's last gasp, essentially, to try to take in air when you know there's really not much else that can be done. And at that point I realized she was dying. You know, she hadn't died yet but she was going to shortly, and so I felt it was best if I go and see if there was anybody else who needed help. She had a lot of people around her who were really chipping in and trying to help. I asked one of the folks at the head of her to start CPR, realizing that that was not going to save her but, you know, hoping I was wrong or holding out some sort of hope. And so I stood up, and that's when I heard someone behind me say that there were people inside. And so I stood up and I turned around, and there was a little fence there. I climbed over it. And when I went into the Forum, I noticed that there was a young woman and a gentleman who were lying on the stairs who were being attended to by some folks as well. And so when I went over there, she was -- they were lying on the stairs, and she was sort of half on top of him. And I quickly realized she had suffered a leg injury. At that point someone had draped something over her foot, but I lifted it up and her foot had been sheered off on the dorsal foot, which is what we consider the top part of the foot through the ankle, and had been cut clean off, but the gentleman she was with had the wherewithal to tourniquet off her leg, and so that saved her from losing more blood than she had already lost at that point. And he -- there was no obvious injury, but then I picked up his feet, and that's when blood started pouring out of his shoes. And so one of the staff members from the Forum was there, and he helped get some napkins for us to start to tie the lower half of his legs off to make sure the bleeding wasn't more serious, and we propped his legs up on a pillow. And a very interesting thing, during that time -- they were both still talking and they were both still in a little bit of shock but chatting. And, you know, it was interesting. He kept saying sorry that he was -- brought her there, and she kept saying it was all right. And it was sort of very interesting little couple banter during the midst of all this.

JAMES BATH: I do, yes.

JAMES BATH: Adrianne Haslet.

JAMES BATH: I stayed with them for a little bit, and then to the best of my recollection I think they had -- another staff member had said there were more people in the restaurant. So I left them and went to check on some other people and then came back and -- until the stretchers came, because at that point in time there was, I think -- there were just not many stretchers to be had at that point. So I waited until they came in. And everything was stable at that point until they had to lift her onto the stretcher, and then that's when the screams of pain started, which were pretty profound. And then we got him onto the stretcher as well. And at that point -- you know, then they were with first responders, so they were secure at that point -- I went outside, and there was a gentleman lying in front of me. He had already been tourniqueted off. I just went down to make sure he was still conscious. He was still littered with, you know, the dust and debris and still in shock himself, but alive. And I did notice that I was standing right next to the little boy who ended up dying, and he had already been covered with a tablecloth. And I went back over to where the Asian -- Lingzi Lu had been lying. And they were still performing CPR, although it was to no avail at that point. I think she had passed at that point. I can't say for sure. And then went into the restaurant next door. Someone had said there was someone in there as well. So we attended to a gentleman who had a large amount of shrapnel injuries to his legs and got him on a stretcher and back out. And he was, fortunately, conscious and lucid. And I went back out to the sidewalk and just helped some folks, you know, get into ambulances and making sure that everything had been attended to. And, you know, when I came out, you know, I was sort of struck by the sort of amount of blood and body parts and everything else that was still littered on the sidewalk. But everyone had pretty much been attended to so there was really not much else for me to do.

JAMES BATH: Certainly there were parts of limbs as far as -- well, I think you asked that. And there was just a lot of burnt clothing and tissue. And, you know, that was really it. The rest was sort of covered up by all the people who were then around.

JAMES BATH: I didn't in particular, but one thing I did see was when -- when I returned to where Lingzi Lu was lying, her purse was there. And I happened to be standing next to one of the EMTs who had the good wherewithal to mention to get it so he could keep it with her so people would know who she was. And as I was going through getting her ID, there was a warm piece of metal in the purse. And so that struck me as something, a piece of debris that I came across when I was helping. And that stayed in her purse and went with her. I'll be honest with you. The rest I'm not really too sure of.

JAMES BATH: I did.

JAMES BATH: I do, yes.

JAMES BATH: Yes.

JAMES BATH: I do. I was wearing a red and gray windbreaker, jeans, baseball hat -- Patriots hat, and a white shirt underneath.

JAMES BATH: Yes.

JAMES BATH: I am.

JAMES BATH: Uh-huh. Correct.

JAMES BATH: Yes.

JAMES BATH: Yes.

JAMES BATH: It does.

JAMES BATH: (Witness complies.)

JAMES BATH: Correct.

JAMES BATH: So this was right after I arrived on the scene. So I'd gone on to -- gone around to the far end, and that's when I -- en route I had noticed, you know, that the -- Lingzi Lu had been lying against the fence, so I could see her from the street. And I was just trying to get around to a point where I could help. There was nobody at that point sitting, you know, sitting around waist height on her on that right side.

JAMES BATH: She's not.

JAMES BATH: Sure. Her head is right here, and then she's extended out this way.

JAMES BATH: I did. To the degree that I knew there were people around her, and there was a gentleman who was also sitting next to me who, you know, was a baldish, stocky fellow. But I can't recognize him because I think he's kneeled down in this.

JAMES BATH: (Witness complies.)

JAMES BATH: Correct.

JAMES BATH: So I'm looking down on her right now, and it's just about before I kneel down, and just knowing that at this point, you know, she is unconscious but breathing, and just starting to get ready to do an assessment.

JAMES BATH: At this point it was shallow and she was writhing a bit, so her breathing was tending to come in -- more gaspy as she was writhing. She had also been vomiting at one point, and so there was some vomitus around her, but it wasn't -- it hadn't gotten to the point where it was agonal breathing at this point.

JAMES BATH: (Witness complies.)

JAMES BATH: Correct.

JAMES BATH: So at this point I didn't feel like I could be any more help to Lingzi Lu, and I'd climbed over the fence that separates the patio from the sidewalk. And at that point I had heard someone say there's people inside, so I was heading into the front.

JAMES BATH: For what I believe was about 30 to 45 minutes.