"The blast -- faster than the sound of the explosion itself -- then met one person running toward the light. George Rutherford was the first person who understood what the flames meant. That was his truck -- carrying 6 1/2 tons of dynamite and blasting agent -- parked by horrible coincidence next to a building now on fire.

Rutherford ran down Oak Street from his hotel three blocks from his truck. He had to get it out of there. If he could only get there in time --

Rutherford came to among rubble and glass. Other survivors found him, his nose hanging by a thin band of flesh. They didn't know who he was, just a crazed man trying to run back toward the scene of the blast, and they held him back.

'Let me go, let me go,' he cried. 'I've got to go back to see how many people I've killed.'"