The Seahawks won the Super Bowl and Seattle had to have a huge parade.
The Seattle Seahawks won 29 points to the New England Patriots’ score of 13; A historic win for Seattle sports fans.
Seattle City Councilman, Rob Saka, over social media, announced the road the parade route would take: 4th Avenue, from Lumen Field to Seattle Center. And the day it took place, Wednesday, was also announced then. More details emerged as Wednesday drew closer.
Early Wednesday morning, the first of the fans started flocking to 4th Avenue. At around 7 a.m. Lynwood City Center Station’s parking garage was packed. By 8:22 a.m., Mountlake Terrace Station train cars were all filled up. By 9:28 a.m., the train cars were more packed than I had ever seen them and I have been on the light rail during many busy periods.
The mood was jolly, continuing from the light rail ride to Westlake Center and not stopping until we exited at Shoreline South Station after the parade.
Most of the crowd seemed sober but celebratory. One exception was a woman who stumbled up to me with an open Buzzball. She said she was “just a little [drunk]” to me, before once again stumbling through the crowd.
The Parade Begins
Everyone in the crowd was expecting the parade to begin by 10:30 a.m. but it began at 11:30. Around 12:10 p.m., the parade reached Westlake Center.
With hours of anticipation, the crowd exploded in excitement and noise when the first vehicle passed us. From there fans and prominent figures and, finally, the Seahawks star players passed us in open-top buses. The Seahawks Dancers, the Seahawks cheerleaders, were at the beginning of the parade followed by Blitz, the Seahawks mascot.
The crowd’s noise peaked when Julian Love, the Seahawk’s Safety, lifted the Lombardi trophy for the crowd to see. The Vince Lombardi Trophy is the trophy awarded to the winner of the Super Bowl.
Throughout the screaming, cheering, waving, and phone-waving at the parade’s stars, nobody was distracted by any potential threats other than the police and security scattered throughout the parade. The police officers weren’t on the rooftops watching out for the crowd’s safety when I arrived at 10 a.m. but by the time the parade reached us, the police officers and other security were on every accessible balcony around us.
The Aftermath
The journey home wasn’t as smooth as the journey to the parade. Westlake, Pioneer, and International District Station were unusually packed with lines extending beyond the escalator down to the platform. Capitol Hill station was likely close to as busy.
My staff photographer, Bryce Moerti, and I walked to all three light rail stations until we gave up and called an Uber to avoid the long lines. After having our driver reassigned once, because the first driver couldn’t drive through the blockades, we caught a 15-minute Uber ride down to a nearly-empty SODO station.
As our train was pulling into Shoreline South Station, I asked a fellow fan where he got the football in his hand. He said Seahawks Wide Receiver, Jaxon Smith Njigba or JSN, had tossed it to him during the parade. He showed me the video of the football being tossed to him. He was so protective of it because JSN, a fan-favorite, had tossed it to him. When JSN motioned to toss it back to him, he refused in fear of losing a historical artifact he now owned. He said his signature is instead the video of the football being tossed to him and there is “no way” he is giving the football away.
The parade through Westlake Center had ended by 1 p.m. but it took until 3:30 for us to take the light rail and 333 bus back to Shoreline College. That’s over 3 times the usual commute home.
It’s surprising that more rumors didn’t circulate about would‑be attackers targeting parade‑goers or even Seahawks players, considering it was “the biggest day in our region’s transit history”, as CEO of Sound Transit, Dow Constantine, said on social media. One rumor did fly around that I was told: People think there was a bomb on the light rail.
Long after the last fans had left 4th Avenue, around 5 p.m., a false bomb threat was called in at Lynnwood City Center Station, according to KING-5. The station was promptly closed. King County Sheriff’s Office K-9 bomb detection unit inspected the suspected bomb and confirmed it was not one. The station reopened by 6 p.m.
I traveled back into Seattle around sunset and Seattle was quiet again. By nighttime, Sound Transit went back to their usual traffic levels and people in Seahawks jerseys had nearly disappeared from sight. Don’t be misled; Seattle isn’t forgetting this win anytime soon.
