Boston bombing survivor killed in Dubai car crash
A woman who survived the Boston Marathon bombing in April 2013 and was seen being carried away from the site by a firefighter in an iconic photograph was killed in a car crash, Northeastern University said in a statement.
Local Boston news website MyFoxBoston said the crash occurred in Dubai.
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“Northeastern University has confirmed that two undergraduate students have been tragically killed in a car accident overseas,” the university said. “Our hearts go out to the family and friends of Victoria McGrath and Priscilla Perez Torres in this extremely difficult time.”
The two women were on a personal trip, the Boston Globe reported, not a school-sponsored study program.
Victoria McGrath was 20 years old when two bombs ripped through a crowd of spectators gathered at the marathon's finish line three years ago, killing three and injuring 264.
She credited a man named "Tyler" with saving her life that day, who had kept her calm in the hectic moments following the blast. That sparked a countrywide search for the man, Sgt. Tyler Dodd, and eventually culminated in an emotional reunion between the survivor and the first responders who saved her.
An iconic photograph showed an injured McGrath being carried away from the blasts by Boston fireman Jim Plourde, just one of the many acts of heroism that took place that day.
“I thought I was going to lose all my blood and die right there,” McGrath told NBC News of the experience at the time.
“She was a brave girl. She wasn’t crying on scene,” Plourde said. But “she was scared.”
McGrath, who suffered nerve injuries to her leg but was well on the road to recovery when she last spoke to the press, said of Dodd: “He just kind of showed up in my vision path when I was looking up ’cause I wouldn’t listen to anyone else. I needed him to be there. He was the only person that would make me feel strong again.”
“Our hearts ache for the family and friends of our former patient Victoria McGrath," Tufts Medical Center said in a statement provided to the Globe. "She made a lasting impact on those who knew her."
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