It’s been 30 years since the Oklahoma City bombing claimed the lives of 168 people in the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in United States history.
On April 19, 1995, a truck filled with explosives was parked outside the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building as hundreds of employees were settling at their desks to begin their day. Minutes later, the bombs inside the vehicle detonated, instantly crumbling the entire north side of the nine-story building and killing over 150 people.
Behind the act of terrorism was former Army sergeant and Gulf War veteran, Timothy McVeigh, and his co-conspirator, Terry Nichols. But in the aftermath of what was an incredible tragedy, the people of Oklahoma City united to assist all those who had been affected.
“We were defined not by the tragedy, but by the tenderness of the response,” Kari Watkins, president and CEO of the Oklahoma City National Memorial & Museum, told PEOPLE in 2020. “Instead of running away from the building in fear, people rushed toward it to help.”
Now, three decades later, those directly impacted by the attack are speaking out in the new Netflix documentary, Oklahoma City Bombing: American Terror, which premiered April 18. The documentary offers a moment-by-moment account of what really happened from the people who were actually there.
Here’s a look back at the Oklahoma City bombing, 30 years later.
What happened during the Oklahoma City bombing?
On the morning of April 19, 1995, the deadliest domestic terrorist attack in United States history took place at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.
The building was home to numerous governmental agencies, including offices for employees of the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives as well as the Social Security Administration, and recruiting offices for the Army and Marine Corps.
That morning had started like any typical workday for the hundreds of employees inside. Just as they were sitting down at their desks to begin their day, a Ryder rental truck full of explosives parked in front of the building. Per the FBI, the truck contained a mixture of 2,000 lbs. of agricultural fertilizer, diesel fuel and other chemicals.
At 9:02 a.m., the bombs detonated inside the vehicle, instantly crumbling the north side of the nine-story concrete and granite building. With a third of the building reduced to rubble, the FBI compared the surrounding area to a war zone. Nearby cars were incinerated and almost 300 other buildings were damaged or destroyed. The impact of the explosion could be felt all across the city — including in the FBI’s Oklahoma City Field Office five miles northwest of the federal building.
“People, they’d come out and they were walking like zombies and they’d walk as far as they could walk and they’d collapse. They were in shock,” Dr. Carl Spengler recalled in Oklahoma City Bombing: American Terror.
In the midst of the chaos, concern grew that there was another bomb planted in the building and the area was temporarily evacuated, leaving trapped victims behind. Once the supposed bomb was retrieved from the eighth floor, it was taken off-site to be examined, only to be discovered that it was a prop from a planned sting operation, per Oklahoma City Bombing: American Terror.
Rescue efforts were able to begin again later that morning. Over 50 people were rescued from the debris in total, according to The Oklahoma City Bombing by Geraldine Giordano, but many others died due to their injuries while they were trapped.
How many died in the Oklahoma City bombing?
The bombing and its aftermath killed 168 people, including 19 babies and children, some of whom were at a daycare center inside the building.
There were also over 684 victims who were injured in the attack.
Who was responsible for the Oklahoma City bombing?
The primary conspirators behind the Oklahoma City bombing were Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols. The pair met in 1988 while they were both in basic training for the U.S. Army at Fort Benning, per The Seattle Times.
After McVeigh and Nichols completed basic training, they headed to Fort Riley in Kansas, where they met their other future accomplice, Michael Fortier, who knew about the attack plans but allegedly refused to be involved in enacting them. They bonded over their passion for guns — and their shared anti-government conspiracies.
McVeigh had previously worked as an armored truck driver and then briefly took a job as a gun salesman, per The Washington Post. By the time he enlisted in the military at age 20, he already owned a plot of land where he reportedly experimented with explosives and allegedly had plans to turn it into a survivalist bunker.
Meanwhile, Nichols, who was already in his 30s when he enlisted, had a short stint in the military, like many of his other failed career ventures, according to The Seattle Times. Less than a year after enlisting, he received a hardship discharge to go take care of his son, who had been left in the care of his mother’s parents.
Without Nichols, McVeigh went on to serve in the Gulf War in Iraq and received a Bronze Star and a Combat Infantry Badge. After the ceasefire, McVeigh returned stateside for a Green Berets tryout. Two days into the test, he dropped out, writing a letter saying he did not feel “physically ready,” per The Washington Post. He was discharged from the military in December 1991.
In the years that followed, Nichols and McVeigh reconnected, grew closer and started planning the deadliest domestic terrorist attack in United States history.
Why did Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols plan the Oklahoma City bombing?
After leaving the military, McVeigh bounced around, living with his father and then Nichols for a time. While working as a security guard, coworkers noted him becoming increasingly angry and erratic, per The Washington Post, and in early 1992, he penned letters to the Lockport Union-Sun and Journal condemning the government for rising crime, “cataclysmic” taxes and the disappearance of the “American Dream.”
“When I got out of the military I was starting to want to explore issues of fundamental rights — especially gun rights and property rights and that kind of thing,” McVeigh explained in a never-before-heard interview uncovered in Oklahoma City Bombing: American Terror.
McVeigh’s views only intensified as time went on and, in 1993, just months after the FBI’s infamous standoff with survivalist Randy Weaver over weapons charges, the government found themselves in another standoff, this time with religious cult leader David Koresh and his Branch Davidian followers.
What began as a search warrant for the stockpiling of illegal weapons turned into a 51-day siege, during which McVeigh traveled to Waco, Texas, to get a closer look. The standoff ended in a massive fire that killed 76 Branch Davidians.
“For somebody like McVeigh, this was absolute evidence that the feds were after people like him,” journalist Lee Hancock said in Oklahoma City Bombing: American Terror. “He thought that he could be the hero to alert everybody in America that it was time to take on the government before they came for your guns.”
McVeigh allegedly began plans for a bombing that he hoped would spark a revolution — and it reportedly didn’t take long to bring Nichols on board. By that time, Nichols had already attempted to renounce his citizenship, citing “total corruption in the entire political system,” per The Seattle Times. He had also attempted to withdraw from paying taxes and had written to a local county attorney saying that he believed he was not subject to government authority.
The pair, who had previously built bombs on a farm owned by Nichols’ brother, began gathering the materials needed to blow up a large-scale building. They collected explosives and ammonium nitrate fertilizer, using fake identities and sometimes even allegedly stealing what they needed. McVeigh and Nichols made plans for April 19, exactly two years after the end of the Waco Siege.
How were Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols arrested for the Oklahoma City bombing?
McVeigh was arrested less than two hours after the attack, initially for charges unrelated to the bombing. After leaving the Ryder truck full of explosives in front of the federal building, he made a getaway in his 1977 Mercury Marquis. While driving on Interstate 35 near Perry, Okla., he was pulled over for driving without a license plate.
Oklahoma State Trooper Charlie Hanger soon realized that McVeigh had a concealed weapon and booked him at Noble County Jail. Hanger recalled in Oklahoma City Bombing: American Terror that McVeigh was calmly watching the television broadcast of the tragedy that was unfolding.
In the hours that McVeigh was being held, authorities launched an investigation into the bombing. Police traced the truck back to a rental agency in Junction City, Kan., where the staff worked with a sketch artist to create a portrait of the man who rented the vehicle.
Upon questioning employees at the nearby Dreamland Motel, the owner recognized the sketch of McVeigh — and confirmed she had seen him with a Ryder truck. It was also the first time investigators heard McVeigh’s real name as he had used the false identity “Robert Kling” to rent the truck.
By the time the FBI got in touch with local authorities, McVeigh was standing before a judge on charges of carrying a concealed weapon. With just minutes to spare before he was to be released on April 21, federal agents arrived to arrest him.
At the same time, authorities were also investigating an address in rural Michigan that McVeigh had used when checking into the hotel and renting the truck. It was discovered the home was owned by Nichols’ older brother. Inside, they found a company photo of Nichols and McVeigh while they were in the army together, officially connecting the two men.
While staking out Nichols’ Kansas home, authorities witnessed him enter the Herington Department of Public Safety. During a nine-hour interview, he did not confess his involvement in the bombing, but his comments, as well as incriminating evidence at his home, were enough information for him to be held in federal custody until his trial.
What happened to Timothy McVeigh?
While over 28,000 interviews about the Oklahoma City bombing were conducted, per the FBI, much of the incriminating evidence came from McVeigh’s accomplice, Fortier.
He claimed that he declined to take part in any aspect of the bombing but was well aware of McVeigh’s plans — and had even been in the car with him while he staked out the federal building, per The New York Times. In a plea deal, Fortier gave up information and agreed to testify against McVeigh in exchange for a reduced sentence. He was given a 12-year sentence and was released in 2006, per NBC News.
“He gave us a lot of information. That may have been the biggest break in the whole case,” FBI Assistant Special Agent Bob Ricks said in Oklahoma City Bombing: American Terror. “He talked about meeting with McVeigh in his kitchen and how McVeigh talked about how he was going to construct the bomb.”
McVeigh’s trial began on April 24, 1997, in Denver, Colo., a location chosen as it would have been very difficult to draw an impartial jury in Oklahoma, according to the Oklahoma City National Memorial & Museum. Over the course of the trial, 137 witnesses were called to the stand, including Fortier, his wife Lori and McVeigh’s sister, Jennifer, all of whom testified against him.
The trial went on for weeks but on June 2, the jury ultimately ruled that McVeigh was guilty of the 11 counts against him including eight counts of murder of federal officers, conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction, using a weapon of mass destruction and destruction of a federal building, per The Denver Post.
He was sentenced to death. On June 11, 2001, McVeigh was executed by lethal injection.
Where is Terry Nichols now?
In 1997, Nichols was tried by the federal government and was acquitted of murder but found guilty of eight counts of involuntary manslaughter of federal officers as well as conspiring to build a weapon of mass destruction, per The New York Times.
He was sentenced to life behind bars without the possibility of parole. Nearly seven years later, Nichols headed back to the courtroom in Oklahoma, where he faced over two months of testimony and hundreds of pieces of evidence.
In May 2004, he was found guilty of 161 counts of first-degree murder — one for each of the 160 victims who were not federal agents, and one for the fetus of a pregnant woman who died, per SFGate. He was sentenced to 161 consecutive life terms without the possibility of parole.
Nichols, now in his 70s, is currently still serving time behind bars at ADX Florence, a super maximum security prison in Colorado.
Where are the Oklahoma City bombing survivors today?
While there were over 150 people killed in the Oklahoma City bombing, there were also numerous people who survived the tragic event, including six of the children who were in the building’s daycare.
Amy Downs, a 28-year-old bank teller at the time of the attack, spent six hours in the rubble of the federal building before being rescued, and the moment marked a transformation in her life. While waiting to be pulled from the debris, she told the American Heart Association that she connected with God and realized she was missing her calling to be a mother.
In the years that followed, Downs became a mother, went back to college to get a degree and committed to a healthier lifestyle, losing 200 lbs. She became the CEO of the credit union where she worked at the time of the bombing and retired in March 2025.
Like Downs, Daina Bradley was also trapped in the rubble for hours. After rescuers found her, they discovered that the pillar crushing her leg happened to be supporting what was left of the federal building. Unable to free her without collapsing the building, Dr. Andy Sullivan stepped in to amputate her leg.
Twenty-two years later, Bradley told News 9, “I’m here, I’m alive, I’m grateful. I’ve had my good days and I’ve had my bad days … then, I get that strength in me that says don’t give up. That’s what I live off of, I’ve got to or I’ll never be happy.”
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