Today is the anniversary date of the Oklahoma City Murrah Building bombing.

I've lived here for many years but was out of town when it happened. I woke up in my Fort Wayne Indiana hotel room and turned the tv on. Still a bit groggy, I couldn't figure out at first why my familiar OKC local tv news broadcasters were on Fort Wayne stations.

If you're ever in OKC you should tour the Memorial. Maybe it's just me but every time I get close to the site I feel a very strong vibe. It's hard to describe but I feel it.

Love your family and friends, take care of each other, be ever vigilant, always be aware that Evil does indeed exist, fight for goodness and rightneous.

I have toured it, Gene, and it's certainly a spiritual place. It's worth the effort to see it if you're near OKC at all.

I was standing in my high school classroom, in between classes and one of my students came rushing in "did you hear they blew up a building in Oklahoma City!!" I lived in Waxahachie, Texas at the time, just south of Dallas. I can remember it like it was yesterday.



Todays memorial Service:

Just goes to show that someone with evil intent and a little imagination can do a lot of damage without using a gun.
Hard to believe that was 23 years ago already. The babies in the daycare center there that survived are adults now.

For all our SF LEOs: McVeigh was caught (although who he was was not learned until later) out of a traffic stop for a tag violation.
You never know what you will find during a traffic stop, no matter how mundane it starts out.
A cowardly, callous and brutal act.

Read the FEMA Report on the building devastation- Very enlightening.

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
For all our SF LEOs: McVeigh was caught (although who he was was not learned until later) out of a traffic stop for a tag violation.
You never know what you will find during a traffic stop, no matter mundane it starts out.
A cowardly, callous and brutal act.

Yes indeed. I watched one of the online specials about the bombing a couple of weeks ago while killing time on a travel job.

Found it interesting that while it took him weeks to get all the materials, he and Nichols built the bomb in an afternoon (day before the bombing I think - they built it off the beaten path in a park).

Evil finds a way, unfortunately.

That was a truly evil event. It has led to some changes in design of Federal buildings, but, as a structural engineer, I sometimes wonder about the effectiveness. If the bomb is really big enough...

In this case, the planners decided to make their attack to commemorate the anniversary of the end of the seige of the Branch Davidian Compound (April 19, 1993, 25 years ago today) and the start of hostilities in the American Revolution at Lexington and Concord (April 19, 1775). If they thought their evil actions would lead to a new revolution, they were badly mistaken. Like after September 11, when Americans are attacked, we tend to pull together, even if it's only for a little while.

I remember it well.

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
For all our SF LEOs: McVeigh was caught (although who he was was not learned until later) out of a traffic stop for a tag violation.
You never know what you will find during a traffic stop, no matter how mundane it starts out.
A cowardly, callous and brutal act.

IMO the most important part of any PD is the patrol Officer.

Wow, has it been 23 years, already. Seems like just yesterday.

So what has happened to McVeigh all these years later?

quote:

Originally posted by rpm2010:
So what has happened to McVeigh all these years later?

Rotting in the ground. He was executed in 2001.

It was actually 171 dead as three of the female victims were pregnant. This was one of the formative events as I grew up.

Oklahoma City Memorial


I can highly recommend the Ranger talk if you visit. There's a museum as well that had been struck by parts of the truck.

Terrible tragedy.

The OKC bombing showed me what lunatics are capable of with commonly used products for the most part.

I visited the memorial and musuem for the first time last month. Very powerful. I was 14 when it happened and remembered seeing it in the news vividly. Having kids in daycare now puts things in a different perspective.

Yes, it was a horrible day. And should be remembered to keep the memory of those lost that day alive in our hearts and minds. The ones that don't deserve to be remembered are the evil cowards that that did this.

The photo of the firefighter carrying Baylee Almon is something I will never forget. She had just celebrated her 1st birthday the day before. My own daughter, our first child, was having her first birthday five days later

From what I remember, he was pulled over because the blast caused his rear license plate to fall off. Coincidence or ...