Stade de France

Fifteen minutes into the soccer match at Stade de France, there was a blast. Coralie Dantan, 25, looked over at her boyfriend. He told her it was nothing. Firecrackers were common at European soccer games. But these were strange firecrackers, she remembered thinking, how could they blast in the stadium without smoke?

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.