Teenage volunteer killed in Omagh bomb ‘a wonderful girl with a kind heart’
Samantha McFarland’s work at an Oxfam shop was contrasted with the actions of those who planted the explosives.
The chair of the Omagh bomb inquiry has contrasted the actions of a teenage girl killed in the blast as she was volunteering at a charity shop with those responsible for the 1998 attack.
Samantha McFarland, 17, from Omagh, was described as “popular, diligent and a person who passed with flying colours the test of life”.
Paul Greaney KC said she was the youngest of three children and was to be the bridesmaid at her older brother’s wedding.
The inquiry heard she was “a wonderful young girl who had a kind heart and a genuine kindness that people were drawn to”.
She was studying for her A level exams, loved music, books and geography, and had “a curiosity about other parts of the world”.
She had been volunteering in the Oxfam shop with her best friend Lorraine Wilson, where she worked one day a week over the summer, and also sometimes volunteered at the town’s Barnardo’s charity shop.
When the girls were evacuated from the shop on August 15 1998, the inquiry heard that Samantha did not want to go too far because she had the keys to the shop.
At her funeral, she was described as “popular, diligent, and a person who passed with flying colours the test of life”.
“She was a very private person, but also a very sociable person who touched the lives of so many others. So many people attended Samantha’s funeral that mourners had to stand outside.”
The chair of the inquiry, The Rt Hon Lord Turnbull, said that they had heard many accounts about young people killed in the Omagh bombing.
He said that among the other “awful” losses of life, there was “the senseless killing of children and young people who were about to embark on the adventure of life”.
He added: “One really has to wonder whether there could be any greater contrast of the generous and socially minded attitude of a teenager who chose to spend the precious spare time of her young years trying to help those with less advantages than herself, and on the other hand, the morality of those who would walk away from a car loaded with explosives in the middle of the main street on a sunny Saturday afternoon in the sure knowledge that devastation would ensue shortly thereafter.
“The loss to Samantha’s family will have weighed heavily with them over all of these years, but the inquiry is grateful to have learned of her life and of its real value. Unlike those responsible for the bombing, Samantha truly did pass the test of life with flying colours.”
A cousin of Samantha, Gerald, was present at the hearing, and Samantha’s father Gerald and brother Richard watched the proceedings remotely, the inquiry heard.
