Ut Humiliter Opinor

We were out the OU-Kansas State game Saturday evening. During the game, a student - Joel “Joe” Hinrichs - sat down on a bench near the stadium and killed himself with some sort of homemade bomb. The explosion took place almost directly west of the stadium on the South Oval of the campus near the Microbiology building. The University of Oklahoma did an outstanding job of keeping things under control. No panic ensued. In fact, no one really knew what was going on, and the game continued.

During the second quarter, we heard the explosion. Deeper and louder than thunder, everyone knew there was something happening, but we couldn’t tell from the stands. The explosion was loud enough to hear and feel, but not something that shook people from their seats or made anyone nervous.

Let me add here that OU has an evacuation plan for the stadium that they announced before the start of each game. Had they felt the need to evacuate, most of the patrons should have known their route.

During the third quarter the announcer came on and requested that all bus drivers on the South Oval should report immediately. It was odd, but still, the game continued.

During the fourth quarter the announcer came on again and informed everyone that they could not go west of the stadium from Lindsey Street to the campus library. That covers a good chunk of the south side of the main campus. At that point, people became concerned. Someone next to us let us know about a “suicide bomber” near the Microbiology building but that no one was injured. I started tuning into to my radio to get more information. As you would expect the initial reports ended up being different from reality.

Initially we heard that a second device was found nearby and exploded. Also, that a parking garage on the northwest side of campus was restricted.

As the game concluded, we stayed in the stadium for a while. You could see from the stands that foot and car traffic was already at a standstill. I saw little reason to rush out with a crowd of people into an unknown situation. An empty stadium seemed safer. We stayed for at least a half hour after the final gun and the crowds were noticably thinner. No new information was coming out beyond what we had heard in the first few minutes, so we walked across campus to our car and drove off.

It turns out that the second “device” was just a suspicious backpack detonated per police procedure. The parking garage that is adjacent to the stadium was searched, but the northwest parking garage was never an issue, apparently.

Reading today’s media reports, Michelle Malkin and Flopping Aces, Joe appeared to be a disturbed young man. I really hope that’s all there is to this. Powerline is linking to a site that claims Islamic literature was found in his apartment.

From afar, my gut feeling (and fervent hope) is that Joe was a lost young man with an unfortunate flair for the dramatic. My thoughts and prayers are with his family right now. His father gave a brief interview to the Daily Oklahoman:

“I don’t want him defined by whatever limitations led him to this,” said Joel H. Hinrichs Jr. of Colorado Springs. “He was quite introverted. He was a very quiet, introverted, intelligent young man. I can’t approximate what led him to make such a final decision.”