People of Oklahoma City forever changed by bombing

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OKLAHOMA CITY, United States (AFP) - Amid the crowds gathering outside the Oklahoma City National Memorial, one woman sat alone.

Mary Adkins had a teddy bear on her knees. She had brought it in case one of the bronze chairs memorializing the 168 victims sat empty on the 10th anniversary of the worst domestic terrorist attack the United States has seen. But every chair was filled. Nobody was forgotten.

More than one in every three people in this city of 500,000 knew someone who died or was injured in the blast. Adkins didn't, though both her husband and mother-in-law were supposed to be in the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building the morning of the attack.

"We feel like our family was very, very lucky," she said.

The Luster family was not so lucky. Aurelia and Robert Luster left behind six children aged six to 22 when they were killed while taking care of a problem with their Social Security.

Their son, Robert, had been working at an oil field 20 miles (30 kilometers) north of the city when he heard the echo of the explosion that ripped apart the building. It was an hour and a half before he found out his parents were in the building.

"Being the oldest and having the burden laying on my shoulders, I didn't know what to do," he said. Luster described the days following the attack as "madness." Reporters swarmed the home. FBI agents came looking for hair to use as a DNA sample. And it was days before his parents were identified.

Until Tuesday, Luster had never visited the site.

"There are too many hard memories to come back here," he said as he sat by the reflective pool at the memorial. "I wanted to remember them the way they were."

But he was glad that he brought his siblings to the remembrance ceremony, where Vice President Dick Cheney and Bill Clinton, who was US president at the time of the attack, spoke of courage, community and triumph over evil.

"Our nation and much of the world looked on as emergency teams and recovery workers ignored their own grief and labored into the night. Volunteers assembled by the thousands. Citizens of all ages stood in line for six hours to give blood," Cheney said.

"Your strength was challenged and you held firm."

Mike Roberts can still remember the joy he felt when he rescued a woman buried in the rubble that day. Her name was Anna Perry, and he spotted her hand reaching out for help.

It was a bright moment in a day marked by pain: the pain in his leg, which had been injured in the rescue efforts. The pain on the faces of those he saw running from the building, bodies bleeding from the flying glass. The pain he felt as he held the hand of another woman as her life slipped away.

"You talk about terror, that was...," the retired firefighter said, looking at the ground for a moment. "Nothing has impacted my life more than this. I thought I was a big, tough guy. That all went away."

Timothy McVeigh was executed for the attack at a federal prison in Indiana in 2001, while his convicted accomplice, Terry Nichols, was sentenced to life in prison without parole last year.

During his time on death row, McVeigh, a Gulf War veteran, spoke openly of his part in the bombing and the anti-government hatred that motivated him.

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