‘Miracle baby’ from Oklahoma City bombing finds his purpose, 30 years on

The youngest survivor of the 1995 domestic terrorist attack had a breathing tube for a decade and was so badly burned he had to play outside at night. But PJ Allen says his family made him feel like he had a normal life.

PJ Allen’s tiny body was horrifically burned when rescuers found him. Later in the hospital, the toddler was so covered in bandages, his grandmother had only his belly button to recognize him. He bears the scars of the deadliest homegrown terrorist attack in US history but has no memory of the day that’s been seared into the minds of older generations. His 73-year-old grandmother, Deloris Watson, can recall every detail. She remembers dropping off the then 18-month-old Allen at daycare at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City on the morning of April 19, 1995. She was supposed to meet with the daycare’s director at 9 a.m. to discuss the boy’s recent asthma diagnosis, she told CNN. But after learning the appointment would be canceled, she went to take her wristwatch to a local repair shop, just a few blocks away. At 9:02 a.m., she was driving when she heard and felt a huge explosion. She jumped out of her truck and ran up the street, trying to make sense of the calamity unfolding downtown, she said. As clouds of thick smoke and dust began to part, the horror set in. The building that housed the daycare was now a mangled, catastrophic mess. Emergency responders rushed to the ruins, finding victims inside and on the street. Hours later, Watson found her grandson at the children’s hospital. The boy had burns across his body and doctors still had no accurate identification for him. But Watson recognized her grandson’s belly button instantly amid the bandages. She knew it belonged to PJ; she was raising him as her own son.