Hundreds of survivors were pulled out of the rubble of the bombed-out federal government building in Oklahoma City in April 1995 — but only one of them can thank obesity for keeping them alive.
Thirty years ago, Amy Downs, was a 28-year-old loan officer in a federal credit union who described herself as an unhappily married college dropout who’d comfort eaten her way to being 355lbs.
Speaking with the Daily Mail for the 30th anniversary of America’s worst act of homegrown terrorism, Downs reveals how being overweight saved her, and how the tragedy put her on a better path.
She has gradually turned her life around these past three decades, adopting a more positive attitude, shedding weight, competing in a triathlon, and working her way to becoming CEO of the credit union.
As she celebrates her 58th birthday, Downs is a trim, divorced and remarried motivational speaker living in a stunning home with cathedral ceilings in Medicine Park, an hour’s drive from the blast site.
She warns against the ‘hate’ and ‘evil’ embraced by Timothy McVeigh, the Army veteran who killed 168 people, including 19 children, and shows how survivors can pick up the pieces after a tragedy.
‘I had to deal with a lot of trauma because 18 of my 33 coworkers were killed that day,’ says Downs.
‘It was a little time before I got the traction to say: “Okay, I want to do this. I want to live my life with intention and purpose.” But once I did, I got that momentum, and I’ve just kept going.’
When Amy downs was pulled out of the rubble of the Oklahoma City bomb blast, she promised God she would turn her life around
Back then, the 28-year-old college dropout had comfort-eaten her way to being 355lbsÂ
The morning of April 19, 1995, was slightly chilly but much like any other day, as Downs, her ‘family’ of credit union coworkers, and federal employees, filed into the Alfred P. Murrah Building in downtown Oklahoma City.
But ‘everything changed’ at 9.02 am, she says.
McVeigh had parked a truck in the lot outside, packed with a deadly, explosive cocktail of agricultural fertilizer, diesel fuel, and other chemicals. The anti-government conspiracy theorist lit two fuses and ran.
Seconds later, the area looked like a war zone. A third of the building was reduced to rubble, with many floors flattened like pancakes.Â
Dozens of cars were incinerated and more than 300 nearby buildings were damaged or destroyed.
Downs’ office was on the third floor; her desk was 20ft from the windows. She recalls coming round, three storeys down, upside-down in her chair, gasping for air in the blackness of dust and rubble.
‘My weight may have saved my life,’ she says.
‘I weighed 355lbs, so my chair was stuck to me, and it sort of helped protect me. And when the building’s third and fourth floors broke off, the big, heavy pieces of concrete were behind me, creating a little cocoon that protected me.’
Downs caught another break that awful day, she says. Her leg was cut through to the bone, but rubble had packed so tight around the limb that it staunched the bleeding, sparing her a surgical amputation.
‘My story has a happy ending, and not everybody’s did,’ she says.
A National Geographic documentary, Oklahoma City Bombing: One Day in America, tells the story of Downs, other survivors, and the rescue crews that pulled people out of the rubble over the following three days.
It follows the manhunt, McVeigh’s arrest and eventual conviction on federal charges and execution. His accomplice Terry Nichols received multiple life prison sentences for his part in the bombing.
It features interviews with then-president Bill Clinton, and other officials, who initially wondered which foreign group had planted the bomb, and were then stunned to discover an American — and former service member — was responsible.
Downs relives in the show the six hours she spent ‘waiting, waiting, waiting to die’ and of telling rescuers she would bake them chocolate chip cookies if they saved her — a pledge she later came good on.
A third of the Alfred P. Murrah Building was reduced to rubble, with many floors flattened like pancakes
Downs’ credit union was located on the third floor of the building in downtown Oklahoma City
Medical workers run away from the building after being told another bomb device had been found
Downs calls bomber Timothy McVeigh a ‘narcissist, cold-blooded monster.’ He was executed by lethal injection in 2001
She was one of the last people to get pulled out alive. As she was taken away from the wreckage on a gurney, Downs looked upward and told God she would prove her worth and ‘never take life for granted’ again, she says.
After eight days’ recovering in hospital, she was soon back at work, rebuilding the credit union as a way to focus on something other than the trauma of losing so many beloved co-workers.
She gave birth to a son, went back to college for a degree and MBA, and in 2008 underwent a gastric sleeve surgery to tackle the chronic weight problem that threatened to put her in an early grave.
She ran, swam, and cycled to keep the weight off, eventually becoming a buff Ironman triathlete. Her 2020 book, Hope is a Verb, describes her self-styled ‘journey of impossible transformation.’
Downs ended an unhappy marriage, remarried, and rebuilt her relationship with God.
She ultimately became CEO of her Allegiance Credit Union; and stepped down this month to become a motivational speaker full-time.
‘It’s small, consistent steps over time, one after another, that lead to amazing transformation,’ she says.
As Downs has moved forward these past 30 years, so has Oklahoma City, where she lived until last year.
The bombed-out federal building was later razed and a park and memorial were built on the site.
The Oklahoma City National Memorial and Museum has 168 stone and glass chairs placed in rows on a lawn, one for each victim.
McVeigh was executed by lethal injection in 2001. Nichols, 69, is serving life in a Supermax prison in Colorado with no possibility of parole.
A child and woman injured in a truck bomb blast at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City
Dozens of cars were incinerated and more than 300 nearby buildings were damaged or destroyedÂ
Firefighter Chris Fields holds one of the 19 infants that died as a result of their injuries in the blast. The federal building had a daycare center on the first floorÂ
A National Geographic documentary tells the story of Downs, other survivors, and the rescue crews that pulled people out of the rubble
Both men were former US Army soldiers and associated with the extreme right-wing and militant Patriot movement, which rejects the legitimacy of the federal government and law enforcement.
McVeigh’s hatred was fueled by a government raid on a Christian sect near Waco, Texas, that left 76 people dead, and a standoff in Ruby Ridge, Idaho, that left a 14-year-old boy, his mother, and a federal agent dead.
Downs attended McVeigh’s trial in Denver, Colorado, in 1997. She calls him a ‘narcissist’ who succumbed to extremism and hatred and whose execution came as a ‘huge relief’.
The daughter of a World War II veteran says she still cannot understand how ‘an American, one of our people, did this,’ she says, but does not dwell on what motivates a ‘cold-blooded monster.’Â
‘I choose to focus on how we overcame instead of the evil that caused it,’ she says.
