Boom is not a noise you associate with Starbucks

Alan Schwarz has an article in The New York Times about the real deal:

Awakened residents thought it was a gas explosion, maybe a sonic boom. Others figured an espresso machine inside the Starbucks had blown up. One woman, walking by the dozens of official-looking law enforcement folks inside the crime-scene tape, explained to her young daughter how similar shows like “C.S.I.” are filmed before realizing the asphalt was no stage.
“This is the real deal?” she said with a gasp. “I’m explaining it like it was a movie.” She grabbed her daughter’s hand and hurried away. The growing realization that the commotion at 92nd Street and Third Avenue on Monday morning derived from a small explosive device rather than a script left nearby residents stunned, curious and ultimately frightened.
“I didn’t think things like this happened in our neighborhood,” said Chris Chong, who was walking from his home on 90th and York to brunch with his wife and toddler. “I work close to Grand Central Station and the U.N. over there, so they are always vigilant about things going on. But I never thought something like this could happen on the Upper East Side. So it’s a little disturbing to have it so close to home. This is really scary, actually.”
The explosion, which took place a little before 3:30 a.m. when most residents were asleep, shattered two windows in the Starbucks and splintered a wooden bench outside the coffee shop. There were no reported injuries or arrests, police said.
As law-enforcement personnel— some wearing white suits with similarly white protective footwear— combed the streets for evidence and commemorated pieces of it with yellow number placards, passersby pulled out camera phones to take pictures and send to friends and family.
Some noted how much it looked like television, while others experienced an odd collision between fiction and fact.
“It sounded like a bomb, to the extent that I know what a bomb sounds like,” said Casey Mallinckrodt, who was awakened with her family in their apartment one block north on 93rd Street. “It’s confusing. Obviously we don’t live in a bomb-riddled city most of the time. And bombing a Starbucks doesn’t seem like a terrifically pointed act of terrorism towards a community. It seems as though it might be a statement towards Starbucks.”
With such focus on the neighborhood’s primary coffee joint, nearby businesses did not appear affected by the commotion. Two shops down, Effy’s Café was doing brisk business— with the prime seats outside and facing the action. The nearest Starbucks, on Lexington and 87th Street, appeared as busy as usual, with any apprehensive customers replaced with those who had been displaced by the crime scene.