ONE SPLIT SECOND LEADS TO A LIFETIME OF SORROW
One split second leads to a lifetime of sorrow
By MIRIAM LORD
AFTER an outrage of such unspeakable proportions, you focus on the little things.
A handkerchief, twisted and knotted, winding back and forth through an old woman's fingers. A nappy changing table, opened out and filled with cotton wool, bandages and empty syringe boxes. A smiling infant, happy in her father's arms while he waits for news of his missing wife. Lists of names pinned to the wall. Ashtrays full to overflowing and pools of cold coffee. Red, raw eyes. And the ever present sound of people sobbing.
They couldn't even place flowers at the spot where their loved ones had perished. Forensic experts were still sifting the rubble. Someone threaded the summer pink globe of a Hydrangea bloom through a barrier, a long way from the seat of the bomb. Later in the day, a man, so overcome by grief he could scarcely walk without support, laid a small bunch of carnations on the bridge overlooking Dublin street, just past a shop called "Magic Moments''. In the window was a T-shirt overprinted with a family snap of two smiling little boys, about the same age as those who had died. It was too much.
Yesterday in Omagh, the truth was simply too awful to contemplate. But heartbreaking thoughts and bad dreams are the lot of the lucky ones here. The full hellish horror of Saturday's shopping day atrocity was visited on the victims and their families.
One split second of madness;a lifetime of sorrow. So much personal tragedy in one small place.
They came to the local leisure centre for news. There, for too many people, the ordeal was complete. Amid scenes of unbearable grief, the mothers and the fathers, the wives and the husbands, the sisters and the brothers, the sons and the daughters, clung to each other for solace. Hopes, which had been growing ever more feeble as night gave way to day, turned to inexorable despair.
At first, in those early panic-stricken hours, there had been some chance. The lists, written out on yellow sheets of paper and tacked to the wall, became the epicentre of their lives. Those lists, if a name just appeared on a list, well at least ... at least their loved one was alive. What hospital? What hospital? How bad? How bad?
Brain damage, critical condition, reconstructive surgery, lost limbs, badly burned, dental records the language of the intensive care unit became common currency. Each fresh horror was replaced by another, and in front of our eyes, brutalised and grieving human beings struggled to confront the awful truth.
Their private anguish was played out in public, as the world's press moved amongst them, creeping around apologetically with notebooks and tape recorders.
"See that woman over there in the white blouse? Her husband is missing. See those lads? It's their only sister. Did you hear that one family have lost three generations of women?''
Most had the decency and humanity to leave them alone.
"There is no point anyway, they are too shell-shocked to make any sense,'' said one journalist, off to do the rounds of the local churches.
The drill was cruel, but necessary. Relatives had to wait in the hall, while in a corridor behind, officials trawled through files and forms, filling them in as information came from the hospitals.
Then, they would go and ask for more information on the loved one male, female, date of birth, the clothes they were wearing, jewellery, distinguishing features.
It was a slow and painstaking process, but slowly they arrived at identifications. At this point, the family would be called to have their worst fears confirmed.
Then, they would leave for the makeshift morgue with a police officer, a social worker and a priest, if required. It was then you would hear the howls, the keening, and they would return reeling and holding each other for support, oblivious to the media whirl around them.
A middle-aged man emerged, face purple with emotion and he half ran, half staggered to the main entrance. A social worker held him by the arm as he fell against a rubbish bin, shoulders heaving, weeping uncontrollably.
"No, no, no, no, no!'' he screamed, gulping for air.
"Why, for God sake, why? She was only a child.''
Back inside, in an alcove past the ladies' toilets, a grey-haired woman sat alone on a sofa sobbing into a white hanky. What was she? Grandmother, mother, wife? What class of animal had visited this evil upon her?
They were all just ordinary people, living ordinary lives. And here they were now the teenagers, numbed, staring into space, faces streaked with tears.
Little groups of women, waiting for permission to grieve their menfolk. Big strong men, so weak from sorrow that they couldn't stand. And none of them could fathom why. That's all they kept asking themselves, each other and everyone else. Why?
The priests helped as best they could. But they had few answers. Neither did the politicians. An election poster for the SDLP hung on a lamp post outside.
"Now say yes to a future together,'' it read.
Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness arrived anyway.
Just after 2 o'clock, President Mary McAleese came to the centre. She had just visited the scene of the blast and was clearly moved by what she had seen. As she spoke outside, her anger was almost palpable.
The atrocity was "off the Richter scale'' she said, what had happened gave her "a chilling and absolutely terrifying insight'' into the minds of the perpetrators.
When she went in to meet relatives, some of whom were still enduring the dreadful torture of a loved one "still unaccounted for,'' journalists were kept to one side.
Mrs McAleese sat down and talked to a family group of five women. They responded politely, but the glazed expression in their eyes showed that they weren't really taking in the words.
She stopped to talk to a man who just kept shaking his head. The President of the Republic rubbed his shoulder, there was nothing else she could do.
Minutes later a tightly knit group which had been holding vigil all day was summoned into the back room.
At least for them the agony of not knowing was over.
By MIRIAM LORD
AFTER an outrage of such unspeakable proportions, you focus on the little things.
A handkerchief, twisted and knotted, winding back and forth through an old woman's fingers. A nappy changing table, opened out and filled with cotton wool, bandages and empty syringe boxes. A smiling infant, happy in her father's arms while he waits for news of his missing wife. Lists of names pinned to the wall. Ashtrays full to overflowing and pools of cold coffee. Red, raw eyes. And the ever present sound of people sobbing.
They couldn't even place flowers at the spot where their loved ones had perished. Forensic experts were still sifting the rubble. Someone threaded the summer pink globe of a Hydrangea bloom through a barrier, a long way from the seat of the bomb. Later in the day, a man, so overcome by grief he could scarcely walk without support, laid a small bunch of carnations on the bridge overlooking Dublin street, just past a shop called "Magic Moments''. In the window was a T-shirt overprinted with a family snap of two smiling little boys, about the same age as those who had died. It was too much.
Yesterday in Omagh, the truth was simply too awful to contemplate. But heartbreaking thoughts and bad dreams are the lot of the lucky ones here. The full hellish horror of Saturday's shopping day atrocity was visited on the victims and their families.
One split second of madness;a lifetime of sorrow. So much personal tragedy in one small place.
They came to the local leisure centre for news. There, for too many people, the ordeal was complete. Amid scenes of unbearable grief, the mothers and the fathers, the wives and the husbands, the sisters and the brothers, the sons and the daughters, clung to each other for solace. Hopes, which had been growing ever more feeble as night gave way to day, turned to inexorable despair.
At first, in those early panic-stricken hours, there had been some chance. The lists, written out on yellow sheets of paper and tacked to the wall, became the epicentre of their lives. Those lists, if a name just appeared on a list, well at least ... at least their loved one was alive. What hospital? What hospital? How bad? How bad?
Brain damage, critical condition, reconstructive surgery, lost limbs, badly burned, dental records the language of the intensive care unit became common currency. Each fresh horror was replaced by another, and in front of our eyes, brutalised and grieving human beings struggled to confront the awful truth.
Their private anguish was played out in public, as the world's press moved amongst them, creeping around apologetically with notebooks and tape recorders.
"See that woman over there in the white blouse? Her husband is missing. See those lads? It's their only sister. Did you hear that one family have lost three generations of women?''
Most had the decency and humanity to leave them alone.
"There is no point anyway, they are too shell-shocked to make any sense,'' said one journalist, off to do the rounds of the local churches.
The drill was cruel, but necessary. Relatives had to wait in the hall, while in a corridor behind, officials trawled through files and forms, filling them in as information came from the hospitals.
Then, they would go and ask for more information on the loved one male, female, date of birth, the clothes they were wearing, jewellery, distinguishing features.
It was a slow and painstaking process, but slowly they arrived at identifications. At this point, the family would be called to have their worst fears confirmed.
Then, they would leave for the makeshift morgue with a police officer, a social worker and a priest, if required. It was then you would hear the howls, the keening, and they would return reeling and holding each other for support, oblivious to the media whirl around them.
A middle-aged man emerged, face purple with emotion and he half ran, half staggered to the main entrance. A social worker held him by the arm as he fell against a rubbish bin, shoulders heaving, weeping uncontrollably.
"No, no, no, no, no!'' he screamed, gulping for air.
"Why, for God sake, why? She was only a child.''
Back inside, in an alcove past the ladies' toilets, a grey-haired woman sat alone on a sofa sobbing into a white hanky. What was she? Grandmother, mother, wife? What class of animal had visited this evil upon her?
They were all just ordinary people, living ordinary lives. And here they were now the teenagers, numbed, staring into space, faces streaked with tears.
Little groups of women, waiting for permission to grieve their menfolk. Big strong men, so weak from sorrow that they couldn't stand. And none of them could fathom why. That's all they kept asking themselves, each other and everyone else. Why?
The priests helped as best they could. But they had few answers. Neither did the politicians. An election poster for the SDLP hung on a lamp post outside.
"Now say yes to a future together,'' it read.
Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness arrived anyway.
Just after 2 o'clock, President Mary McAleese came to the centre. She had just visited the scene of the blast and was clearly moved by what she had seen. As she spoke outside, her anger was almost palpable.
The atrocity was "off the Richter scale'' she said, what had happened gave her "a chilling and absolutely terrifying insight'' into the minds of the perpetrators.
When she went in to meet relatives, some of whom were still enduring the dreadful torture of a loved one "still unaccounted for,'' journalists were kept to one side.
Mrs McAleese sat down and talked to a family group of five women. They responded politely, but the glazed expression in their eyes showed that they weren't really taking in the words.
She stopped to talk to a man who just kept shaking his head. The President of the Republic rubbed his shoulder, there was nothing else she could do.
Minutes later a tightly knit group which had been holding vigil all day was summoned into the back room.
At least for them the agony of not knowing was over.
Further Information
Publisher: IRISH INDEPENDENT
Ref: II/011
Published Date: 17-Aug-98
Related Images
There have been no images archived for this article.