Hil K<\/p>\n
Hi everyone – sorry it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s taken me so long to put up pictures, but we have been so busy moving and we jut got our internet up in the new house.<\/p>\n
Anyway, the riot was so crazy. I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t really think we expected Umass to win the national title, we were the #3 team and Appalacian State was #1, but because of the riots following the Red Sox victory in 2004 there seemed to be a general concensus that current students wanted to do something even bigger. The riots took place in my section of campus, Southwest, where the towers are that house about half of all students who live oncampus – about 5,000 students. All during the day of the game there were extra police patrolling the campus and they even installed \u00e2\u20ac\u0153riot lights\u00e2\u20ac\u009d on the sides of the towers. which made it super bright at night.<\/p>\n
When the game was over at 11:30 we looked out our window and saw people pouring out of the dorms into the quads below. It really didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t seem to matter that we had lost. I went outside with my friends, but we stayed around the edges of the crowd, not wanting to get crushed in the big moshes. In the beginning of the riots people were cheering \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Go Umass!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and it was as positive at atmosphere as a riot can be. Then, things started to go downhill.<\/p>\n
The cops showed up around 11:45 in full swat gear. Nobody was really out of control at this point, but the police immediately began going to extreme measures to try to get everyone to leave. They started setting off flash bombs, which are so loud they make the whole ground shake and are so bright if you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re close to them you can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t see anything for a few seconds. They launched tear gas cans into the middle of the crowd, which sting your throat, lungs, and eyes and make you cough uncontrollably. Then, they started shooting rubber pellets out of what looked like paintball guns. Some of my friends got hit with those and they leave big bruises and really hurt. I managed to escape unscathed by those, but I inhaled a good amount of tear gas.<\/p>\n
The riot then turned into an anti-police rally. Not that I am saying I support what my classmates were doing when they were lighting trees on fire, throwing rocks through windows, and throwing trashcans at the police, but i think the police responded inappropriately. They were shooting innocent onlookers and being overly-forceful. If they hadn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t been so harsh right off the bat, the students wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have responded in such a way and the whole situation wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have escalated so much.<\/p>\n
It took the cops until 1:30am to dispurse the crowds. There were campus police, Amherst police, police on horseback, and state troopers called in to assist.<\/p>\n
It was quite an experience to be a part of. My friends and I stayed right near the door of our building so we weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t in too much danger of being shot at. I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have my camera so I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have pictures, but there are many vidoes on UTube by students who were there.<\/p>\n
This one <\/a> I found is from the local news channel. Click on the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Watch the Video\u00e2\u20ac\u009d link below the article. <\/p>\n This one <\/a> was taken in front of my dining commons looking at my building. In the upper right-hand corner is my buliding. We were standing behind those bushes.<\/p>\n Here<\/a> is the view from the tower next to mine.<\/p>\n Crazy, huh?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Hil K Hi everyone – sorry it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s taken me so long to put up pictures, but we have been so busy moving and we jut got our internet up in the new house. Anyway, the riot was so crazy. I … Continue reading