Remote Life

Bourbon Street has reopened one day after a deadly terror attack in New Orleans. The Federal Bureau of Investigation clarified on Thursday that 14 people were hit and killed by a truck in the early hours of the New Year.FBI officials said the suspected driver has also died.He was identified as 42-year-old Army veteran Shamsud-Din Jabbar.It is believed that he acted alone and was 100% inspired by ISIS terrorists, as an ISIS flag was recovered from the back of the truck used in the attack.FBI officials said videos show him planting explosive devices in the area, before changing clothes. NewsCenter 5 spoke with a Massachusetts couple who was in New Orleans to celebrate the new year, but decided to call it a night before the attack.Luisa and Dan LaCorazza were staying in a hotel on Bourbon Street when Dan said they called it an early night after Luisa fell asleep.”I think she saved us,” Dan said. “If she wanted to go out and choral till 3 a.m., that is the street we would have been on.”Memories from their three-day New Orleans trip for Luisa’s 30th birthday and New Year’s Eve festivities quickly turned horrifying.The attack, the mass killing, occurred just outside their Astor Crowne Plaza hotel room.”It hits me hard because it could have been any one of us,” Luisa said. “Right where he drove into Bourbon Street was right where our hotel door was. We walked out of the hotel that morning and it was quiet a heaviness around and lots of crime scene tape.”The LaCorazzas described feeling shock the next morning as they walked to breakfast.”Now we are hearing there was IEDs (improvised explosive devices) placed around and I guess we were walking right by those,” Dan said.The LaCorazzas said New Year’s Eve lunch is where they ended their day, for a reason no one could have planned.”We over-ate, so we went back to the hotel to take a quick nap before we were going to go out and have fun and I ended up not waking up, so we all ended up staying in,” Luisa said.However, the LaCorazzas said they are now grateful to have made that decision.”We kind of just missed it, right outside our door,” Dan said.Dan told NewsCenter 5 that he was among the first on the scene during the deadly 2018 Merrimack Valley gas explosions while working for a gas company.He said some of that post-traumatic training is helping him process what he witnessed in New Orleans.However, the LaCorazzas said they both plan to return to New Orleans again in the future, which they called a “great city”.