Baby was left with shrapnel inside brain by Omagh blast, inquiry hears

A mother has told how her baby daughter was blown across the street in her buggy by the force of the Omagh bomb, and left with a piece of shrapnel embedded in her brain.

Caroline McKinney was separated from her daughter Niamh for a week when they were both injured in the 1998 Real IRA blast.

Ms McKinney, a beauty therapist, told the Omagh Bombing Inquiry that she had pierced Niamh’s ears, and that is how her daughter was identified in hospital.

Ms McKinney owned a beauty salon in the Co Tyrone town and had taken her 13-month-old daughter to work on the day.

She gave evidence to the inquiry sitting beside Niamh.

She said her colleague Debra-Anne Cartwright, who was killed in the bombing, had taken Niamh for something to eat while she worked.

At 2.40pm, they were told there was a bomb alert in the area of the town’s courthouse and to evacuate.

Ms McKinney said: “Back in the day this was something that happened quite a bit.”

She said she collected her takings, closed the shop, collected Debra-Anne and Niamh, and moved further down the street.

She told the inquiry of the moment the car bomb detonated.

She said: “There was a flash, there was a bang.

“I was very aware of what was happening.”

She said she was pinned to the ground by a metal shutter which had fallen off a shop.

She said: “Debbie was beside me. The bomb had blown Niamh out into the middle of the street. She was still in the buggy.

“There was blood pouring down her face….she was alive, she was there. She was crying.

“Someone at that point had come up from the bakery and lifted her out of the buggy and took her away.

“I didn’t know where but I knew she was alive.”

The inquiry heard that Ms McKinney was not to be reunited with her infant daughter for a week.

She said she had been left with a bone sticking out of her arm and multiple shrapnel wounds.

Ms McKinney was taken to Altnagelvin Hospital in Londonderry, while her daughter was treated in Omagh.

She said: “Niamh was taken to hospital. She was given to someone in an ambulance.

“I was a beauty therapist. I had pierced her ears. Someone remembered she was wearing little gold studs.

“That is how she was identified.”

While Ms McKinney was in hospital for a week, her baby daughter was initially released on the same evening.

Ms McKinney said Niamh was staying with her godmother when she became ill.

She said: “She was vomiting, whatever was coming up, it was black.”

An X-ray revealed a piece of shrapnel was inside Niamh’s head and she was rushed to the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast.

Her mother told the inquiry: “She was taken to surgery. I got a phone call to say it was very serious, it could go either way.

“Her head was opened, they cleared away all the dust, dirt, debris.

“Her brain was swollen.”

The inquiry heard a piece of shrapnel had become embedded too deeply in Niamh’s brain to be removed.

Ms McKinney said: “She has a piece of shrapnel in the frontal lobe of her brain.

“She was fortunate that if it had of been any other area, it would have been more complicated.

“It was safer to leave the shrapnel in her head than to take it out, she would have been at higher risk to get it out because it was so deep.”

The inquiry heard Niamh was left at an increased risk of epilepsy, which she developed when she was 11.

Ms McKinney said she believed the buggy Niamh was in at the time of the explosion saved her life.

The inquiry was shown a photograph of the badly mangled buggy following the blast.

Ms McKinney also said the bag with the takings from her business was also later returned to her, not a penny was missing.

She told the inquiry that her daughter is now thriving.

She said: “She is brilliant, she is just great.

“She is loving life, travelling a lot, working, doing all the things she is supposed to do.”