The family of Avril Monaghan appealed to the coroner at the Omagh inquests that her unborn twins should be included in the official list of victims. John Leckey, whose conduct of the inquest has been brave and compassionate, explained gently that, under the present rules, this was not possible, but said that he would be writing to the DPP to draw particular attention to their destruction.
A British army doctor described finding Avril Monaghan's body. She had been trying to shield her 20-month-old daughter, who was lying beneath her. It was, he said, a sight "totally burnt into his memory". A colleague who was with him, also a doctor, had collapsed when they found the two bodies.
The inquest into the deaths of 29 people on a sunny Saturday afternoon in August 1998 has made harrowing reading. For those who have been present at the Omagh Leisure Centre it must have been almost unbearable. Mr Leckey seemed close to tears on Tuesday as he read out the list of victims and the cause of each death. He described the hearing as "an emotional experience the like of which I have never encountered". He said he felt it had been important that distressing evidence should be heard. To have done otherwise would have been to "sanitise and reduce" the horror perpetrated by the "Real IRA".
Some of the families attended every day, praying together before listening to the evidence. Others, understandably, could not face the ordeal.
A young policeman said he had only been 12 weeks in the job when he was summoned to help with the aftermath of the bomb. A senior RUC officer told the relatives that the bodies of the victims had been treated with respect. But some policemen were still too traumatised, two years later, to be able to give evidence. It is, perhaps, something we need to take into account when considering the emotions aroused by the Patten report.
When the Omagh bomb exploded, within months of the Belfast Agreement being signed, there were fears that the horror of the deaths would undermine the fledgling peace process. By an act of grace the tragedy came to be a catalyst, drawing politicians and people together in a determination that such a thing should not recur.
Gerry Adams condemned the bomb, the first time a Sinn Fein leader had spoken in such terms about a republican attack. David Trimble was applauded in the Catholic church in Buncrana when he, alongside Seamus Mallon, attended the funeral Mass for a young victim. Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern promised to work to ensure that the peace process would not be derailed.
Do any of these politicians remember Omagh and that shared outpouring of grief? Perhaps we have come to take peace for granted. It is difficult, otherwise, to understand how Gerry Adams can dismiss David Trimble's present problems as a "bogus crisis", while Seamus Mallon describes unionists as "huffing and puffing". This is hardly the language of partnership.
The hard reality is that David Trimble is facing political death by a thousand cuts. Even if he survives next weekend's unionist party conference, the anti-agreement camp has served notice that it will be back to challenge his leadership. Next week the DUP will propose a no-confidence vote in the Assembly. It will not be carried but the rancour of the debate will deepen divisions within unionism.
Could the agreement survive the departure, forced or otherwise, of David Trimble? Yes, probably, but in a severely truncated form. Many of the institutions set up under the accord would survive. The danger is that the element of the deal most attractive to unionists, devolved government and local control of their own affairs, would be abandoned. Northern Ireland would move closer to some form of joint authority.
There are those on the nationalist side who think that this would be no bad thing and may, in fact, be inevitable. At the time the Assembly was suspended one Irish official suggested to me that it might be better to admit, with deep regret, that Northern Ireland's politicians were not yet ready to govern themselves.
This would be a dreadful - and dangerous - reversal of all that has been achieved. It is clear that the Executive, for all the strains that exist on contentious issues, has worked well. One of the most memorable images of this in recent times was the joint visit made by David Trimble and Bairbre de Brun to Downing Street to lobby for more money for Northern Ireland's health service.
There is still some light in this particular tunnel. In his article in the Daily Telegraph on Tuesday, David Trimble argued that there should be a moratorium on Patten until there is real progress on decommissioning. Gerry Adams, while sticking to his tough line on Patten, has said he believes the IRA will live up to its pledge on weapons by allowing regular inspections of arms dumps. It should not be beyond the wit of the two governments to find some way of reconciling these two positions.
It has become almost a cliche of the peace process that neither side will move until the very last moment. This is a factor which has led to the ebbing of confidence in the agreement, particularly in the unionist community.
On Tuesday Michael Gallagher, whose son Adrian was killed in the Omagh bombing, suggested that some of the horrific video material which was seen at the inquest should be shown more widely as a warning of what a 500lb bomb can do to human beings. There is a particular onus on nationalist politicians just now, because of the provenance of the bomb, to remember what happened and to respond with generosity of spirit. To do anything less would be to betray not only the victims of Omagh, but the 3,000 people who have died over the past 30 years.