Court hears evidence of Omagh warning

The Special Criminal Court in Dublin has heard how a warning received by UTV ahead of the Omagh bombing in August 1998 gave an incorrect location for the bomb.

The court was told that the warning said the bomb was placed in High Street, next to the courthouse, but it actually exploded in Market Street.

The RUC had evacuated hundreds of people away from High Street and into Market Street when the bomb exploded.

This information was presented at the trial of 49-year-old Colm Murphy, from Jordan’s Corner, Ravensdale, Dundalk, Co Louth, who is charged with conspiring to cause the Omagh attack and with membership of the Real IRA.

Sgt Marshall told the court: "We always take every bomb warning seriously but when you are alerted that there is a code word attached to it you take it more seriously.

Michael O’Higgins, defending, said to the sergeant: "You had managed to clear that area where the bomb was supposed to be located but in fact it was located in a different area."

"Yes," he answered.

Messages were being relayed to officers on the ground from a command centre half a mile from the blast scene.

Communications officer Martin Miller told the court he received contradictory messages which had been given to officers.

But as he tried to direct the different "call signs", clearing the streets around the Omagh Court House the bomb exploded, knocking out his telephone and computer systems, he told the court.

He told of the events of August 15, 1998, starting with the first warning at 2.34pm: "The warning came up - there’s a bomb going to go off in 30 minutes at the Court House.

"Whatever call signs were out on the ground we told to start going there.

"Then I got a telephone call from Belfast regional control saying that they had received another bomb warning, it was now given as 15 minutes.

"I was relaying the same information to the call signs on the ground. There was a large explosion.

"Most of the power and communications went off, the computers went off and the telephones went off."

The control centre was half a mile from the seat of the blast, he said.

Earlier, the court heard evidence from cartographers, siting mobile phone masts around Omagh.