Groomed, kissed, then crushed to death

If there was one aspect of the Oklahoma City bombing more terrible than any other, more capable of inspiring deep and lasting anger, it was the death of the children. And if there was one image that captured the horror inflicted on them, it was the firefighter - named yesterday as - Chris Fields carrying a badly injured baby from the wreckage, craded in his arms.

Even that act of heroism, caught in a photograph by a passing bank clerk, Charles Porter, and published around the world, was lost to the carnage wrought by the bombers. The baby, who has not yet been identified, died, bringing the number of small children claimed by the blast to at least 12 - a figure that seemed likely to rise last night as the search through the debris continued. The youngsters had been having breakfast on the second storey, an area that doubles as their nursery, when the building was blown apart on Wednesday morning.

They had been groomed, kissed, and dropped off by their work-bound parents, and left to play in the happy, noisy, room, as they usually did. Moments later, they were lying beneath concrete blocks and twisted metal, after the bulk of a nine-storey building came crashing down. "You couldn't even tell if they had been little boys or little girls," said one nurse.

There are many Americans who will long grieve over the effects of the bombing, but no loss is likely to elicit more outrage than this. Two of the bodies were burnt beyond recognition; a third had been decapitated.

After the blast, terrified parents rushed back, only to find the building destroyed, and the street littered with toys and dolls. "Where's my baby?" screamed Melissa McNeely. "My baby's in there." Later, relatives gathered at hospitals, desperately searching for their own. Some wore plastic masking tape, bearing the names of their children, in the hope that they would turn up somewhere.

The federal building's day care centre, which caters for children between four months and five years, was on the second floor, just above the spot where the bomb exploded. No one knows precisely how many youngsters were inside, although there are believed to have been around 30.

Across the road, a second batch of children in the YMCA day-care centre, was rocked by the blast which showered them with glass and plaster, causing numerous injuries. "To think that someone would target children - and it seems children were targeted - adds to the horror," said Susan Bates, director of the Children's World Learning Centre in the city.

Robert Buckner, a volunteer picking through the rubble, was still more distraught: "I'm 33 and I have lived my life. They haven't even started theirs. I would have gladly given my life for one of those children's lives. Just one child."