1996 bomb in Manchester - was anyone there that day?

[mackthepony]

www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-manchester-62862703

Saw this which brought back some memories.

Me and my mates were in Aflecks Palace when it went off. No-one injured, very luckily

No but I heard it, lived a few miles out of the centre at the time. We looked on teletext to see what had happened 😂

Mu sister wss getting a coach at Chorlton Street and they were evacuated due to a " controlled explosion"
I was a few weeks off qualifying as a nurse I lived in Eccles and was onna late shift that day
It was a wonder no one was badly hurt .

I was 16 and clothes shopping in the area with my mum for my first holiday with my friends abroad, and they evacuated everybody very quickly. Heard and felt the blast because it was so massive.

I was also in very close proximity to the 7/7 London bombings in 2005. My office was just up the road from the bus explosion and my windows rattled from the blast.

Yes I was

Yes, at the train station waiting for a train to Crewe. Which came and I got on it after sticking my head out the front of the station and people were saying a bomb had gone off. Had to go back through Manchester and change trains at Manchester the next day. I can remember being worried about if the trains would be running or not, it was before the internet so hard to find information out. I don’t think I appreciated how bad it was until afterwards, I was only 18yo and probably didn’t bother watching the news to be honest.

My mother in law was as she works in Manchester at the time. She said it was terrifying.

I knew one of the Army bomb disposal team tasked to the scene that day. They got there in time and deployed their bomb disposal robot (known as a ‘wheelbarrow’), but the police directed them down the wrong street to where the van containing the bomb was parked. Just as they realised and managed to find correct van, the device functioned. If they hadn’t been misdirected, there’s a good chance they would have been able to disrupt it before it went off.

What happened in the months afterwards? I believe the Arndale centre was bulldozed and rebuilt but that must have taken ages. Was Manchester just without most large name shops for months/years or did they reopen elsewhere while waiting for the new Arndale to be built?

I was on the 192 bus just pulling into Piccadilly with my friend and our young children...we were stood up in the aisle, just about to get off. Came through on the drivers comms to keep everyone on the bus....we heard the explosion but didn't know what it was until the driver told us. Awful memories...I still think how lucky we were now, as we were so close, it might have been us! If the bus had been 10 minutes earlier, we would have been in The Arndale! 😥

Wow domestic that's amazing.

I wasn't in Manchester but I'd just accepted a job there and was preparing to move. Was horrified when I read about the bomb and had a few second thoughts.

The Arndale wasn’t rebuilt - M&S and the small square of shops next to it were demolished and rebuilt.
The old pub was moved back towards the corn exchange.

The ‘new’ M&S, Selfridges and Harvey Nichols are there now.

The Arndale wasn't bulldozed but it destroyed a lot of the city centre and there was a lot of building work for years after ,tbh it helped make the city centre the cosmopolitan place it is now ,back in the 90 s ,there was was none of this northern quarter ,stuff!

My friend was working in the Arndale Centre when it happened and described the day. It sounded terrifying. They were trying to calmly usher people out of the building when the warning came through and people were just arguing with her that they hadn't finished their shopping! She said it was horrible. All she wanted to do was shout "There's a bomb. We need to get out now." But obviously couldn't even hint at their being any concerns. People were so rude to her.

I'd moved out of Manchester the weekend before.

I was at Victoria station waiting for my train. I'd been in M&S about 20 mins before.

My brother was at uni in Manchester at the time and my dad had gone to collect him that day. Thankfully they were no where near but I remember my mum frantically phoning them to check they were OK when she heard.

I think people like to forget how bad things where with the IRA in the 80s and 90s TBH. I know people who were injured in the Warrington bombing and also worked with a man who was almost killed by an IRA bomb in Ireland.

Yes We were so lucky there were no fatalities ,whilst it destroyed a lot of the city centre in terms of human life it could have been do much worse .

We were in St Anne’s square as we (group of friends - I was 16) always met at GAP (Gap was in a different store in the square compared to the final store it occupied). There was a helicopter and police cordons. We got moved so we nipped down to King Street. It was very posh in those days (haven’t been to Manchester in a decade so maybe it still is) so we loved going down there. Anyway, we then hung about for what seemed like ages (probs 10 mins) and then there was a massive bang - massive. We ran to Kendall’s as we used to meet our friends mum there at a bar called Henry’s or maybe Harry’s? I can’t remember. Anyway, no mobile phones or anything so I just waited until I could get back to the station to get the train home. My poor parents.

The area around the corn exchange was genuinely really grotty, as was the old M&S. we loved the corn exchange and it is such a shame that it didn’t ever revert to how it was post bomb. However, the rest of the area was just incredible afterwards. Truly. The bomb was actually a blessing for that part of the city. I remember them paving the area around Sinclairs and saying to a workman ‘this is going to be absolutely beautiful’ and it was.

i think it all backfired for the IRA really.

I was working in one of the major hospitals. We heard the explosion but initially had no idea what it was. As the most senior doctor on site in my department at the time I had to take charge until the consultants started to arrive which obviously took quite a long time as roads were closed quickly and getting into the city was difficult.
I've been involved in several major incidents elsewhere since then. It's a whole different experience if it's a week day when a large proportion of your workforce is already in the building. It's a bit different now, but back in the 90s we really were running on the bare minimum of staff at weekends. So we had the double problem of looking after the injured people whilst simultaneously trying to get in extra people who weren't scheduled to be working and therefore of course were off doing their usual Saturday morning stuff, in the days when mobile phones were still relatively uncommon and not particularly reliable. It's remarkable how many people did get there in the circumstances in fact.
And there was no support afterwards either. Straight back on with the backlog of regular work on the Sunday with no break (we worked 48 hour shifts at weekends in those days) and I don't recall anyone even asking if we were ok.
I'm retired now but that day is still etched in my memory as one of the most stressful days of my career. Not the same as actually being there of course but standing in A&E hearing the sirens getting nearer with no clue what we were going to have to deal with, and trying not to show my nerves as others were looking to me for leadership was still bloody awful.

Yes I was there with my mum, we'd walked from the bus stop at Piccadilly and were near the Arndale office block when it went off, we were covered in glass. Very scary and how nobody lost their life still amazes me

No, but I remember it well, lots of friends were there and I was at university not very far away and upset/angry about it. It probably turned out well for the city in terms of redevelopment, though I did love the old corn exchange.

Oh me too ,I used to buy my joss sticks from there 🤣

I was in greater Manchester police on the day at the time of the bomb I was off duty i rushed into work I was put on boundary duty near the old Salford bus station. People were running from the city not knowing where to go . Those in cars I told to listen to greater Manchester radio I was told the football match was on the radio I thought that was disgusting. I had just got my first mobile with unlimited free local landline call loads used my phone till battery died .

We were staying in manchester that day. We weren’t around when the bomb went off but weren’t able to get back to our hotel.