Quick Thinking Averted Massacre at Paris Attacks Stadium

Clearly, the casualty count of just one bystander killed and several dozen injured in three explosions outside the Stade de France could have been far worse.
Quick Thinking Averted Massacre at Paris Attacks Stadium
A candle burns during a vigil in Aotea Square to remember victims of the Paris attacks in Auckland, New Zealand, on Nov. 14, 2015. Hannah Peters/Getty Images
The Associated Press
Updated:

SAINT-DENIS, France—The suicide bombers’ remains, clingy flecks of flesh spread in a 10-meter (11-yard) radius around where they exploded, were flushed down the drains of the city they sought to terrorize, washed away by municipal workers with detergent sprays and power hoses.

All that’s left of them now are questions.

Their explosive belts, packed with shrapnel that shattered windows and lodged in walls, were designed to kill and maim.

Yet instead of detonating inside the national stadium packed with 79,000 people watching France beat Germany at soccer, they detonated on less crowded streets outside, during the match, including one in a lonely dead end street 500 meters (546 yards) away.

Clearly, the casualty count of just one bystander killed and several dozen injured in three explosions outside the Stade de France could have been far worse.

An aerial view of the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, near Paris, on Oc. 15, 2008. (Joel Saget/AFP/Getty Images)
An aerial view of the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, near Paris, on Oc. 15, 2008. Joel Saget/AFP/Getty Images