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April 5, 1996 - Bill Cooper
57:56
OKC - Day One – Chapter 13
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Yes, I'm William Cooper.
I'm not Brother Scare or any of those other people that you heard trying to sneak in here.
Actually, I think whoever's working the board at WWCR tonight has been chewing on a little LSD, probably.
Just joking, folks.
I don't know what the problem was, but they were trying to get everybody in here but us.
No queue tonight.
The queue is supposed to be the station identification.
Are you listening, WWCR?
The cue is supposed to be the station identification, not Brother Stare, and not whoever those other people were, the Liberty News Hour, or whatever it was.
So, since we're paying good money for our airtime, I would appreciate a little more attention to duty.
Thank you very much.
Ladies and gentlemen, I'm extremely...exactly one minute before we went on the air.
The printer completed printing out the end of Volume 1 of the 15 chapters, which cover only April the 19th.
The bombing of the Oklahoma City Mira Federal Building.
I haven't had a chance to read any of this.
It's an extremely emotional thing for me.
We have been working on this for a long, long time.
Our Oklahoma City Station Chief—actually, she's the Station Chief for four states—has put her heart and soul into this.
The entire investigative abilities of the intelligence service and the people that work for her have contributed to this.
We have all been waiting with bated breath for it to be completed.
I want to sincerely congratulate all of the personnel who work under her command and who have devoted their time and attention to
The honest search for the truth, who have exhibited tremendous investigative and research skills and have not bit into any of the deceptions or the lies or the... You'll have to forgive me, folks.
It's sort of a... I don't know how to explain how I feel.
I'm sure that Ms.
Moore feels probably much more about this than I do.
But it is a completion of sorts.
It is the only Thorough, and I mean thorough investigation that has been conducted by anyone of that day that is willing to tell the truth about it.
Nothing is printed in this book that is not documented, sourced, and can be proven.
Not just from one source, but from many.
And the findings of the research That will absolutely astound you.
I want to present some of this to you tonight, and while the initial lead-in is playing, I'm going to try to find something to give you.
I'm not going to give you much, because I can't, and this will be on its way to be edited and then typeset, and we expect the books to be rolling off the presses probably Within two to three months.
So, hold your breath, cross your fingers, say a prayer, and make sure that you get your hands on a coffin.
Because, ladies and gentlemen, this is dynamite.
And I mean dynamite.
Remember, this is 15 long chapters that cover only April the 19th and no more.
Subsequent volumes will cover the results of our investigation after that fateful day.
Tomorrow all the things were gone, I worked for all my life, and I had to start again.
It's just my children and my wife.
It's like my lucky star to be living here today.
But the flag still stands for freedom, and they can't take that away.
And I'm proud to be an American, where we leave now, oh, I'm free.
And I won't forget the men who died, who saved that fight through me.
And I'm not in danger, but next to you, Mr. Dirk, you stay.
But there ain't no doubt I love this land, and God bless the USA.
From the lakes of Minnesota, to the hills of Tennessee, across the range of the United Nations.
From Kansas City down to Houston, and New York, you and me.
We're the pride in every American heart, anytime we stand and sing.
That's about it.
She's an American.
Where is she?
I know I'm dreaming.
And I don't want to forget the man who died.
Who gave me life.
Who gave me a life.
And I'm next to you.
And you can't hurt me today.
But there's no doubt.
I've got to say.
God never loved you and me.
I've found the truth that I've ever had, when it takes time to run away.
But the truth that I've ever had, when it takes time to run away.
Well I'm so excited about this, my mouth is dry.
No matter how much water I drink, I can't get it back in the proper way it's supposed to be.
Michelle, if you're listening, the last half of installment one did not come through.
The rest of it, as far as I can determine, is here.
So if while I'm doing this broadcast you could resend the break installment one into two parts and just send the last half, I would appreciate that.
But don't do it until after the broadcast because as you know, well yeah, you can go ahead and send it on the internet and after the broadcast I'll bring it down.
So, thank you very much.
This work is incredible, ladies and gentlemen.
I am so extremely proud to have been in a position to be able to put together an organization of such wonderful, fine people and to have been able to encourage them and train them and bring them to a level where they were able to accomplish
What we have accomplished and what has gone into this book.
Major Moore, obviously, deserves much of the credit.
In fact, I would say most of the credit.
For she was the principal investigator on the scene, and, of course, the commanding officer of the intelligence service, and the four states surrounding and including Oklahoma, three states surrounding and including the state of Oklahoma. three states surrounding and including the state of Oklahoma.
So, and I have to tell you, quite honestly, she was unsure of her capabilities to write this book, to take all of the findings of the investigation and put them together and write this book.
And for quite a while, vacillated, and finally, quite frankly, I ordered her to write this book.
And in our organization, our people follow orders.
and And I know that she is happy that I did, because she has discovered that she is capable beyond what she ever thought that she was capable of.
And she has produced, truly, a monumental work, which I know will become An American classic, with no doubt in my mind.
I cannot read any portion of this that tears do not come to my eyes.
And I'm no pansy, folks.
I'm not an easy person to work for.
I am demanding Extremely demanding.
And anyone who has ever worked with me or for me knows that.
I do not accept excuses ever.
I only have one rule that I live by and I expect anyone in contact with me or who works with me or for me to live by that same rule.
And very simply it is, trust in God and just do it.
after first determining that it is the right thing to do.
Work with us never stops.
Never stops.
And the day that it does is the day that we lose the battle.
And that's why I demand so much of all of you.
I will not accept laziness.
I will not accept stupidity.
I will not accept ignorance.
I will not accept all of the excuses that people have been rendering up for all of the years.
Because you see, at one time in my life, I lived those excuses.
I was a sheeple.
I was firmly entrenched in the establishment version of everything, reared in a military family.
At one time, I was career military.
I was a member of the Office of Naval Intelligence, served on the briefing team for the Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific Fleet.
I was a patrol boat captain on a river in Vietnam.
And I've learned from all of those experiences that we can never allow that to happen again.
And because I am demanding, and because the people under me understand the situation that we are in, and they also are demanding upon their people, and upon their families, we are able to produce much more than anyone in an investigative capacity in this country has ever produced.
And we will continue, because that is our job.
That is the task that we have been assigned.
And sometimes, I know, because I feel it also, our people feel overly burdened
I know that they feel, that they work, unnoticed, unknown, unnamed, unrewarded. unnamed, unrewarded.
They know that our ability to produce information may be the hinge upon which the door is opened, may be the difference between defeat and victory.
But I know that someday, when it is no longer necessary that they work at and produce unknown and unnamed and unrewarded, they will be brought out into public view.
And if I'm still around, I will make sure that the world knows what they did, and that they are named.
And if I'm not still around, I have made sure that whoever succeeds me will take care of that task.
For I can assure you they deserve recognition beyond what they will ever get, even when that happens.
Some of these people take incredible risks, ladies and gentlemen.
And I can't tell you much more than that, without increasing their risks.
But I believe that once you obtain this book and read it, and the succeeding volumes, and the other works that we are in the process of producing, those of you who read it and understand
We'll also be amazed at the abilities of our people and their dedication and their sacrifice.
And I think that so many people will eventually possess this book and read it without making themselves known.
and they will bask quietly in the glow of success.
So sit back and listen.
I'm just going to read you some of this for the rest of the hour.
And then that's all you're ever going to hear about this book on this broadcast until it's present bound and ready to go out.
So start putting aside a little money now.
Now.
Ten percent of all the sales will go to Michelle Moore as the author, as her royalty, so to speak.
A portion will go into the operating fund of the Intelligence Service.
Other portions will go to unnamed people who need funds desperately to continue their research.
And we have not yet...
set a price on this book.
But as soon as we do, I will let you know.
And as soon as we're able to take orders for the book, we will begin to do that.
But not yet.
I'm going to read you as much of Chapter 14 as I can during the remainder of this hour ladies and gentlemen.
So make sure that you're in a position to hear and listen carefully.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Make that chapter 13, entitled, That Which Was Before.
Thank you.
Traffic on the interstate out of Oklahoma City was flowing more steadily as I cautiously made my way farther from the central part of the city.
So pervasive was the oppressive sadness combined with the sensation of danger that all motorists were driving courteously at the speed limit, as if in some way trying to commiserate with others on the road.
As any professional trucker can attest, Oklahoma City has always been known as Zoom City by CB radio enthusiasts.
Traditionally, the highway traffic speeds along at a minimum of 10 miles an hour above the legal limit at all times in all weather.
But these were unusual circumstances.
It seemed inappropriate, almost rude, to drive with the typical devil-may-care attitude normally demonstrated by most motorists.
The need to express sympathy, care and concern, even non-verbally, It was demonstrated in the most remarkable ways—the headlights of morning, the observation of the speed limit, and the considerate manner in which motorists allowed merging traffic to enter the highway—a most unusual phenomenon, all evidence of the public reactions to the shock and sorrow of the day.
It would be good to be home again.
I was feeling very much in need of the support and affection of my family.
During my journey home, I began planning the report I would soon be preparing for my commanding officer, William Cooper.
Twice during the drive, I pulled off under the shoulder of the highway to quickly jot down notes about situations and conditions which I felt might be of importance.
So many things had occurred during the day that I didn't trust my memory to recall every significant thing.
I wasn't sure at that moment what was important and what was negligible.
I knew that I was flying blind and decided that the best procedure was to report everything that could be publicly known at the time and let the experts sort it out later.
Although that method seemed somewhat scatter-shocked at first, it proved to be an extremely efficient manner of intelligence reporting which produced an overall picture of staggering detail as the investigation progressed.
It was almost time for the national news affiliates to begin their coverage of the tragedy of the dead.
I expected my husband to be at home when I arrived, and I was certain he would have videotape and audiotape rolling in the machines, recording and monitoring the developments downtown, capturing the coverage from every perspective.
During the drive home, ABC National News offered its evening report over the radio.
I was thunderstruck by the text of the report.
From local sources, it had just been stated that the official death toll at that moment had risen to 22 confirmed deaths, of which 17 were children.
These were the official numbers being released by the state medical examiner's office.
Amazingly enough, however, ABC National News reported that there were 81 people killed in the Murrah building, of which 17 were children.
Although we all knew that the death toll would inevitably rise as the search through the mirror building continued, there was simply no explanation for the sudden increase of almost 60 additional fatalities over and above the medical examiner's report.
Where had this inflated number originated?
Searching through my memory, I recalled hearing earlier estimates that some 80 persons might have been in the Social Security Administration offices at the time of the explosions.
I wondered if that was where ABC had obtained the figure.
But at the same time, I knew that the official death toll numbers were being very cautiously handled by the local authorities.
Officials in the Medical Examiner's Office were not releasing new figures until they were certain what they were reporting.
There were many problems encountered in the attempts to determine the true number of the deceased.
The absence of recognizable facial features and identifying body markings was only one difficulty.
Another major obstacle was the incredible number of severed body parts which were found inside the mirror building.
These body parts and tissue samples were ultimately subjected to intense medical scrutiny and testing to determine if there were other recovered human remains to which the parts might belong.
Assistant Fire Chief John Hanson wrote in Oklahoma Rescue, In determining the numbers, we would release to the public.
We were very careful.
Above all, we wanted to avoid compounding the situation with unjustified numbers.
We made a conscious effort to be accurate in the numbers we released.
In the aftermath of this tragedy, with so many rescue workers moving around in the disaster area, it would have been easy to double and triple count people.
After careful planning, we determined that the official count of the deceased would be based on the actual number of bodies turned over to the medical examiner.
Assembling the statistical data was extremely time-consuming and labor-intensive.
Ray Blakeney, Director of Operations and Spokesman for the State Medical Examiner's Office, stated that the recovered bodies were x-rayed to make sure that there was no bomb-related evidence within the body itself.
Fingerprint and dental records were input into computers for the cross-checking of all post-mortem information.
By the end of the search and recovery period, There were literally thousands of pages of handwritten field notes which had to be collated and entered as computer data.
A task made more trying than necessary when FEMA pulled out of the operation and took its computer systems away.
Said Blakeney, this is an extremely difficult situation and unbelievably stressful.
Nobody in the United States has ever worked anything of this magnitude.
Ten months after the bombing, the Medical Examiner's Office reported that there were still over 80 unidentified body parts and tissue samples for which there was no corresponding match with any other deceased victim.
The identity of the persons whose parts were found may never be known, and it is most peculiar that no family members have ever come forward claiming that their loved ones were never recovered from the building.
At one time, a common tissue burial of these severed parts was discussed by officials, but the burial was delayed pending the trial of the bombing suspects.
At the time of this writing, the unidentified remains are still in long-term storage at the facilities of the medical examiner.
There was something vaguely familiar about the death toll reported by ABC News.
I could not quite find the correlating memory of 81 dead, 17 children.
But I knew that I had heard it before.
It was only later that I came to realize that the figures were the same as those initially released following the Waco massacre two years previously.
Waco massacre two years later.
Thank you.
There were some who speculated that it was some kind of a signal or coded communication to someone for whom those numbers would be significant.
In later reports originating with ABC News, the medical examiner's officially released count would be offered with no explanation ever given for the inaccurate figures previously reported.
Another problem with the official death toll was an unexpected change which occurred Thursday, April 20th.
Throughout the day, on Wednesday, April 19th, we had been told officially that 17 children had been killed in the Muir Building.
Remarkably, that figure was amended in reports given the next day.
For some reason, on Thursday, the number of deceased children was changed without explanation from 17 to 12.
I questioned how such a thing could have occurred.
It was impossible that media personnel might have misread a physician's ill-edgable handwriting and thus reported the number incorrectly.
No written reports were being issued by the medical examiner's office.
All reports were given orally.
It was inconceivable that any examining physician would mistake five unconscious but living children for five dead ones and accidentally report their decease in error.
It also seemed an impossibility that even under the most stressful of conditions, trained medical technicians would miscount the number of deceased children present before them.
I found it very difficult to believe that given the size differential, an adult's body or body part would be confused for that of a child.
Thus, unexplained discrepancy bothered me greatly.
In a statement made two days after the bombing, the medical examiner explained the identification procedure to the public.
The bodies and body parts, once removed from the debris of the building, were taken to a medical examination preliminary holding area.
A part of this holding area was comprised of several refrigerator trucks which served as a temporary morgue in which to store the bodies to prevent deterioration.
When a complete or near-complete body was recovered, it was taken to the medical examiner's working area, which had been established in a local church building nearby.
There were over a hundred persons working in this examination area, including forensic pathologists, x-ray technicians, dental examiners, radiologists, and representatives from the FBI Fingerprint Records Division.
Upon arriving at the work area, each body was first taken to an initial examination room where items of clothing were removed and personal effects, if any, were collected.
The medical examiner stated that the most difficult body identifications were the children.
Most of the children had no fingerprints on file anywhere, had not been living long enough to accumulate any significant medical records, and many had not yet acquired any dental records.
Some footprints taken at birth were provided by the parents, but this was the only immediate clue, other than bits of recognizable clothing available for identification of the children's bodies.
The necessarily elaborate and technical procedures being followed in the identification of the bodies made it impossible to miscount by five the number of deceased children.
To this day the inaccurate initial reports have never been explained nor even addressed.
Throughout the day of the bombing we had been told in street curb interviews that there were more fatalities than were being reported.
Simply because the medical examiner wanted to make absolutely certain that the official death count was not unintentionally inflated by counting each recovered severed part as an individual.
The task of assembling the bodily remains for burial was time-consuming, stressful, and extremely gruesome.
Many of the medical workers who had spent the entire day at the bomb site were upset by the body count reports and conveyed their distress to the media.
Said KWTV Channel 9 reporter Randy Renner, Everybody who walks out of there, you can tell they've been in there.
And they come by and they say, it's worse than anybody realizes.
And that's all you have to know.
Nurse Toni Garrett was particularly distressed.
She had volunteered in company with another nurse and a physician to tag the bodies in the Mirror Building, the street, and the other buildings in the area.
This traumatic task was especially important during the rescue effort because it enabled the rescue workers to determine at a glance that a discovered victim was deceased.
If they saw the body tag, They knew that there was no immediate need at that moment to extricate the body from the rubble.
Their much-needed attentions could be directed toward finding and removing the survivors.
Nurse Garrett had personally tagged over 120 deceased victims that day, and the medical examiner's reports of 22 dead had stunned her by its inaccuracy.
Garrett was not ignorant of the identification procedures employed by the medical examiner's team of experts, and she was not overreacting to the stress of the day's labors.
In Garrett's opinion, the actual number of the deceased was being suppressed.
She based her allegations on an unexpected encounter with the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Toni Garrett and her husband Earl told their story in private interviews conducted by Chuck Allen.
Tony's narrative begins during the late afternoon of April 19th, when it had been determined that there would be no second wave of injured in need of treatment by the medical personnel.
Nurse Garrett began the narrative, and her husband Earl interjected comments during her statements.
Said Tony, My husband and I had gone down to a triage center that they had set up at Fifth and Oklahoma Street The makeshift morgue had been moved from the church across the street south of the Mirror building, which was also destroyed in the bombing, to this building next to the triage center.
We were told that we were going to wait for any more wounded or dead to be brought to this location.
There were several doctors and nurses who had come in to work at the triage center.
My husband and I told them we were going for a short walk since we were all waiting and had been for some time.
At this point Earl continued, When we left the triage morgue, we needed to take a break.
We had been walking down the side streets.
It was about 6th Street that we went to.
We looked at the damage.
There was damage all the way over on Oklahoma Street.
The Oklahoma Publishing Company had had their doors blown out.
Suddenly cars started pulling up.
They were all federal agencies.
You could tell because they were getting their jackets out that said FBI and ATF and everything.
I think they were wiring in a command center because there were the phone people there and the cable companies and so forth.
They acted like it was just a drill, like it was no big deal.
They were kind of joking around and all that kind of stuff.
I made a comment to Tony.
I said, I can't believe they're here and acting like nothing has even happened, like it's just another drill.
They acted like it was no big deal," said Tony.
When we left to take a break, the doctors and nurses were busily working, trying to get the cot set up and get the IVs set up.
When we got back, the news media was there, and I was upset about the fact that they were not giving the true body count.
I was being interviewed by a lady from TBN, Trinity Broadcasting Network.
I told her that I was highly upset because the news media and the information they were being given was not accurate information.
There were many more bodies than what they were saying on the news media and releasing at the time.
I had tagged over 120 bodies myself during the day.
I told her I was very distressed over that because I felt like the public had a right to know exactly what took place up there.
When the interview was over, we entered the building and I noticed that most of the doctors and nurses who had been there before were gone.
We hadn't been away more than twenty minutes or so.
During the twenty minutes that Tony and Earl had been on their break, a change in mood had occurred at the triage center.
Earl continued the narrative at this point.
There was just a different atmosphere, said Mr. Garrett.
There was nobody helping anyone.
Before, there were people bringing in food and medical supplies, just everything.
When we came back in, there was a cold, callous atmosphere.
I found out later that the FBI had taken over, and that changed everything.
They, the FBI, didn't like that Tony was being interviewed by the media.
An agent walked up to me and said, Do you know her?
I said, Yes, she's my wife.
He said, What is she doing?
I said she's kind of upset because they're trying to keep the Body County secret.
The man turned around and walked away from me.
I found out later that they were federal officials.
They then spoke to my wife.
The FBI told TBN to shut their cameras off.
The gentleman was questioning me at the same time that Tony was being interviewed by TBN.
I saw these two men walk up to her, and they had been talking to the agent who had been talking to me.
Another agent came back up to me and said, Do you know her?
pointing to Tony.
I said, Yes, she's my wife.
He said, What is she?
I said, Well, she's been down here all day trying to get people out of this building and help people.
He turned around to his friend and said, Well, we need to get her out of here.
Tony then told me that the agents had told her that the FBI was taking over and all of us could get out.
They told us to keep our mouths shut.
Nurse Garrett continued the statement at this point.
I had had no dealings with the FBI, ATF, or Secret Service prior to the bombing.
I had a friend who worked in the Secret Service Department who was killed in the building, and she was a wonderful person, but this was my first encounter with actual agents.
When they came over to me, one of the agents was a very pompous and arrogant about asking me who I was.
What I was doing there, if I was a civilian, where I worked, and what my name was.
I didn't feel like any of that pertained to what was going on that day or what had happened that day, and he wanted to know everything about me.
Since I didn't feel that it was important, I just told him that I had been down there all day and had done what needed to be done.
It was just hard for me to be down there and see what went on, knowing what went on, and none of it was portrayed accurately by the media.
He said, Well, we're down here now, and we're taking over the building.
It would be advisable and recommendable that you keep your mouth shut.
The questions raised by the Garretts concerning the inaccurate body count remain unanswered to this day.
No explanation has ever been given for the FBI's insistence that the Garretts keep their mouths shut about the issue.
In addition, there has never been any move on the part of the Medical Examiner's Office to increase the official death toll to include the over eighty remaining body parts and tissue samples held in storage, and the full disclosure of the circumstances surrounding the exhumation of the body of victim Lakeisha Levy, to remove one of the legs which had been buried with her, and to replace it with what had become known as the Mystery
A situation which changed the official death toll months after the bombing is a matter for close examination in another volume of this narrative.
Suffice it to say that on April 19th, the death toll was still climbing.
The number determined by members of the medical community involved in the body count was six times The number officially released by the Medical Examiner's Office, and the FBI was telling medical personnel to keep their mouths shut about what they knew.
The incorrect body count was but one inaccuracy of many that day, deliberate or otherwise.
Of all the mainstream broadcast media, only ABC News had released a death toll different from the Medical Examiner's official number.
As the national media began to take over the airwaves during the dinner hour, the seeds of disinformation which had been planted by federal authorities at the five o'clock press conference took root and became the sprouts of the, quote, official story, end quote, which would now be presented as absolute fact to an unsuspecting and uninformed public.
ABC News was not the only national syndicate to make something of a spectacle of itself.
CBS News began an encounter with the citizens of Oklahoma City, which to this day is still spoken of with disgust.
This incident has become by a byword whenever one wishes to refer to someone who insults from a position of arrogance and ignorance.
This situation began With the arrival of a limousine in Satellite City, from which emerged none other than Connie Chung, now former co-anchor with Dan Rather of the CBS Evening News.
During her live broadcast, Ms.
Chung managed to alienate and anger the entire city.
If Ms.
Chung had simply experienced a momentary lapse of poise, all would have been forgiven and the incident would never have acquired the notoriety it soon achieved.
If she had simply misspoken, no one would have been upset.
But four times, four times during the CBS evening broadcast of April 19th, Ms.
Chung put her foot firmly in her mouth and chewed vigorously.
In each instance, the officials to whom Ms.
Chung was speaking felt obligated to politely cover for her obvious lack of understanding of what had occurred in Oklahoma City that day.
To the people of the city, it appeared that Ms.
Chung was decidedly lacking in manners, and they applauded the courteous responses given by our local officials to her thoughtless questions, and the discreet manner in which they tried to divert attention away from her public display of ignorance.
To Mayor Ron Norig, Ms.
Chung asked, quote, Tell me, Mr. Mayor, is your city able to handle this?
I mean, it's an extraordinary event.
Major Norrick replied, We are handling it.
We have a very well-trained police and fire department, and we have trained for emergencies such as this, hoping that you never have to use it.
We have a very good medical system here, and it came together very, very quickly.
We have a lot of fire personnel that are still in the building.
It's a very dangerous situation because the nine floors are collapsed down.
Basically down like an accordion to the bottom.
They're trying to go through the rubble to make sure that the building itself doesn't collapse and catch some of the rescue workers.
But yes, I think we're well trained, and I appreciate the support we're getting from all around the country.
We've had many, many calls from a lot of mayors and people in emergency services wanting to help.
To Assistant Fire Chief John Hanson, Ms.
Chung remarked, Can you handle this?
Can this fire department handle this?
I know you're doing a great job, but it's extraordinarily difficult.
John Hanson patiently explained, we've got our friends from all over the state.
Fire, emergency, medical, state police are in here helping us.
It's a team effort.
It's not just the Oklahoma City Fire Department.
It's the metropolitan area fire departments.
We've got fire department people here from Tulsa, Stillwater, Oklahoma.
So with their help, we're able to rotate people and pretty well take care of the whole week.
We're limited on how many people we can put in the building because of the weight of the rescue equipment that we bring in and because of the building itself.
In a somewhat condescending, lecturing tone, Ms.
Chung continued, But it also occurred to me You have to have these investigators, these bomb investigators, sifting through everything.
And if you have rescue workers moving critical evidence away, isn't that part of the problem?
Oh, yes, ma'am, replied Hanson.
We're not moving anything that the FBI or the ATF believe to be evidence.
We'll find another way around that.
With the team effort inside, we have firefighters, we have the FBI, ATF, bomb squad people.
We're going in together, kind of a unified search.
So those representatives can take care of those things those individuals need to, all systematically, all working together.
Not seeming to know when to quit, Ms.
Jung continued her pedantic lecturing.
As you well know, in bomb investigations there is a signature.
If you can find just a little morsel of information, a medal here, a shard there, that can be critical.
Without only a hint of impatience, John Hanson answered, Yes, ma'am.
That's why we're being very cautious in our rescue efforts to preserve the scene and not move anything that our friends of the FBI or the ATF would need to convict the people who did this.
Later in that same interview with Assistant Chief Hanson, Chung asked, Do you know if your hospitals are able to handle all of those who are injured?
Ever long-suffering, Hanson explained.
Yes, ma'am, our hospitals, their emergency plans were tested today.
They worked very well.
And again, in Oklahoma City, we've got a number of very competent hospitals in close proximity to the downtown area, and their emergency rooms were able to handle the number of people.
As if she were not content with the answers given by Oklahoma City's Mayor and Assistant Fire Chief, Ms.
Chung interviewed Dr. Tom Coniglioni, the medical director for St.
Anthony Hospital, asking, How are you able to handle this onslaught of injuries?
I mean, you said that you handled more than a hundred of them.
Dr. Coniglioni replied, Well, because of the location of the hospital, and because so many doctors in Oklahoma trained at this hospital, they knew, when they heard of the location of the blast, that our hospital would be receiving a lot of injuries.
Incredulously, Ms.
Chung asked, You mean, and they just came from all over the state?
They just came.
They came from all over, said Dr. Carneglioni.
At one point, I had a hundred doctors in that area, and three times as many nurses and emergency medical technicians, and every injured patient had his own doctor or team of doctors.
It was the most amazing outpouring of support that I have ever seen for any occasion.
Ms.
Chung could only respond, That's extraordinary!
All agreed that the emergency response had been extraordinary, not just in terms of the implementation of interdepartmental plans which had been established and rehearsed previously, but also, as it concerned, the hundreds of civilian volunteers who appeared from all over the state to assist in the rescue effort.
At the same time, all agreed that it was simply the right thing to do.
In that respect, it was not so very extraordinary at all.
It was just the natural response stemming from the kind of people that we are.
Again, Ms.
Chung's questions and comments were viewed as something of a personal insult to the entire state.
It was never known if Ms.
Chung had imagined Oklahoma City as a town of rutted, red-dirt roads, swinging saloon doors, clapboard houses, and sod-roofed schools with cattle meandering along metropolitan area streets.
But the impression made upon the citizens of Oklahoma City was that Ms.
Chung must have considered us a primitive, uneducated, and unsophisticated lot, and may have been somewhat shocked when she did not find bucket brigades, steam-powered, mule-drawn fire wagons, and doctors treating the injured with leeches and magical amulets.
Needless to say, all were highly offended.
During the days which followed, the public outcry against what appeared to be blatant arrogance grew in intensity.
T-shirts began appearing throughout the city with anti-Connie Chung slogans, anti-CBS slogans, and the inevitable photograph of Ms.
Chung over which was superimposed the universal NO symbol.
Assistant Fire Chief John Hanson wrote about what became known as the Chung incident in his book, Oklahoma Rescue, when Connie Chung asked, My initial reaction was certainly surprised, because that's exactly what we've been doing, and doing well, since 9.02 a.m.
I had done dozens of interviews by that time, and no other member of the press had questioned our ability to deal with the crises.
I didn't really take offense.
I simply answered what seemed to be a silly question as politely as possible.
The community had endured with the bombing itself, and after pulling resources and personnel together to meet an overwhelming need, this high-handed treatment by Ms.
Chung was intolerable.
Letters to the editor of the local newspapers raged at her elitism and lack of compassion.
all remarked that if there had been the slightest indication that the manpower, equipment, and facilities available had been inadequate.
Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen.
I'm having a great problem keeping my mouth and throat adequately dampened.
All I'll remark that if there had been the slightest indication that the manpower, equipment, and facilities available had been inadequate to deal with the tragedy, local authorities would most certainly have been the first to address the situation and remedy it without delay.
Assistant Chief Hanson wrote, I had no idea at the time that her doubts about our department would so deeply offend many of my fellow Oklahomans and even the rest of the nation.
Citizens here have always felt a pride of ownership in the fire department, and after watching the rescuers at work all day on April 19th, they interpreted her remark as degrading and, frankly, ridiculous.
The anti- Connie Chung t-shirts that showed up on the streets downtown sent a message to CBS that the problem wasn't going to go away easily.
Apparently she felt it was her responsibility to ask me what she believed were tough questions.
I saw the public get tough as they responded to her question, with a huge outpouring of support and respect for the firefighters searching for survivors.
Although CBS arranged another televised interview, during which Connie Chung spoke once more With Assistant Chief John Hanson unapologetically tried to put the matter to rest, the resentment ran too deep to be wiped away by this awkwardly staged and obviously contrived reconciliation.
On Saturday, May 20, 1995, Connie Chung's contract as co-anchor of the CBS Evening News was terminated.
Good night, ladies and gentlemen.
Major Michelle Marie Moore, you have done a remarkable thing, and from my heart, I thank you.
And God bless each and every single one of you.
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