For the people of Omagh, the arrival of Tony Blair on a wet afternoon was a welcome distraction from their pain. A crowd of several hundred lined High Street to observe the British Prime Minister as he viewed their shattered town.
Making his way slowly down a line of doctors and emergency workers who dealt with the aftermath of the atrocity, a grim-faced Mr Blair nodded slowly as they related the horror they had witnessed. Moving slowly, he drew breath as he reached the next person in line, as if preparing himself for what he knew he would hear.
Mr Blair was visibly moved as elderly women grasped his hands and told him how pleased they were he had come. This was his first visit to Omagh and he was "sad it was under such circumstances".
He paused to talk at length with Mrs Kay Marshall and her daughter, Lesley (13). They had been in Russell's shoe shop that afternoon and were evacuated down the street. She told how they could so easily have been killed, passing the car only minutes before the explosion. "I hope this finally brings peace," she said to him.
A young boy in a green baseball hat caught Mr Blair's attention as he made his way towards Watterson's Store where he was to meet a staff that had lost four of their colleagues in the blast. Stroking the small boy's head, Mr Blair gazed at him almost as if he reminded him of one of his own young sons.
Emerging from Watterson's, he moved along the barrier expressing his condolences to the crowd. It was obvious to outsiders that the people of Omagh had not come to hear him unveil his security measures: they had come to shake his hand and to have their community's pain acknowledged.
Just a few doors down was the Oxfam shop where Lorraine Wilson (15) and Samantha McFarland (17), both killed by the bomb, had worked as volunteers. As Mr Blair and his entourage of local civic and political leaders entered, he gave the crowd a hand salute. It was not enough, they surged forward extending their hands to him.
He responded, extending his arms as if trying to embrace the entire section of the crowd.
At the scene of the explosion, the media assembled for details of the new anti-terror laws. Nicholl & Shields, a gift shop now left with no front as a result of the blast, provided the necessary shelter and electricity supply for microphones and other equipment.
"I have felt the spirit that there is here," said Mr Blair of the people he had met. Indeed his short visit did something to lift those spirits but, on his departure, the crowds dispersed and the main street emptied.
Back in Watterson's, one of the shop attendants discussed the condition of someone injured in the blast who was still "heavily sedated". She could have been speaking about the whole town.