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Special Report Transcript Episode 4, Section 2, Time 01:19

10:15 pm, June14 1986. A powerful car bomb explodes in front of the Why not Bar, a popular Durban nightspot. Three people die, 67 are injured. Helen Kearney was the barmaid. // There was this enormous explosion. What I remember is seeing flashing lights of all colours: red, blue, green and a horrendous noise that actually went right down into your body. But there was like a vacuum after that, there was silence and then all of a sudden there was this swishing sound and everything just went bezerk. I don’t know, when I spoke to the bomb squad afterwards they told me it’s an impact, there is a fraction of a second or two seconds, before it actually takes everything away in its find. It happened so fast and you … actually we didn’t know what had happened. It was so tremendous, that for the moment you don’t know what … and then we saw it in its full colours. It was a massive bloodbath with flesh and blood dripping from the walls. I remember seeing half a head, on an optic. I remember smelling burning flesh. And dragging people out. There were people walking round in circles, they had splinters of glass, enormous, through their heads, through their backs, they didn’t know what had happened. One minute they’re enjoying a beer and laughing to the music, and the next minute there was this chaos. // It has lived with me for about ten years now; I still have nightmares. Because you wake up and you see this in front of you again.

Notes: Scene of blast; TRC testimony: Helen Kearney

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Hearing Transcripts TRC Final Report TRC Victims Glossary
On 24 June 1986, MK operatives detonated a car bomb outside the Parade Hotel on the Durban beachfront on 14 June 1986. The explosion killed three women and injured at least 74 other people in the Why Not Bar and adjacent Magoo's Bar. Seven MK operatives were granted amnesty for their roles in the ...
 
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