Oklahoma City Bombing — The FBI Bomb Technician Who Was There | Part 1
April 19, 1995. FBI bomb tech Barry Black had 53 weeks on the job when the Oklahoma City bombing killed 168. His wife had just left the building.
He was seven miles from downtown, sitting in an unmarked Oldsmobile on a white collar arrest, when he felt the detonation — 3.2 on the Richter scale, felt 60 miles away in Stillwater. He was one of two FBI bomb technicians in the entire state of Oklahoma. He drove toward the building with a small kit bag in the trunk and no idea whether he was looking at a plane crash, a gas main, or a bomb. His wife was a federal officer who worked in the Murrah Building. She walked out at nine o'clock, two minutes before the blast. He would not learn she was alive for ninety minutes. The payroll clerks he handed his check to every other Thursday were all killed. Craig Floyd reads the names of the eight federal agents who died, each of them added to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial. Then comes the break in the case: a 300-pound truck axle lying in the street, and a reserve deputy who spits on his finger, wipes away the grease, and uncovers a confidential vehicle identification number. Part 2 follows that number to Junction City, Kansas — and to a traffic stop ninety miles north of town for a missing plate.
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🔗 Part 2: COMING SOON!
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Timestamps:
0:00 — "Every other Thursday I was in that building"
2:14 — Fifty-three weeks a bomb tech when the call came
4:30 — The names of the eight federal agents who died
7:07 — Why McVeigh chose the Alfred P. Murrah building
10:19 — Ninety minutes without knowing if his wife survived
13:28 — A 300-pound axle and a serial number under the grease
17:25 — Burning time fuse: how he lit it and walked away
21:07 — From accounting degree to master bomb technician
Keywords:
Barry Black, Murrah Federal Building, April 19 1995, Timothy McVeigh, Terry Nichols, FBI evidence response team, post blast investigation, vehicle borne IED, ANFO, ammonium nitrate, Ryder truck, confidential VIN, FBI SWAT sniper, Branch Davidian, hazardous devices school, bomb technician interview, domestic terrorism history, National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial, Heroes Behind the Badge, Citizens Behind the Badge
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