GREATER Manchester Police were last night "very hopeful" of obtaining video film of the bombers parking the van which exploded outside the Arndale Centre in the heart of Manchester's commercial district.
They have released a picture of the British registered van containing the bomb and have appealed to any tourists who might have taken video footage in the area of the Arndale Centre to come forward.
They also want to view footage from businesses which have closed circuit TV cameras on the exterior of their premises.
Police said the 71/2 tonne truck used in the city centre bombing had been spotted in Peterborough in the east Midlands on Friday afternoon. It is thought to have belonged to a haulage firm based near Ipswich, Suffolk. About two months ago, it was sold to a dealer in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire.
As the structural cost of the blast was put "conservatively" at £100 million, key holders in the bombed area have been allowed to enter their premises to check damage and process insurance claims.
Two police cordons remained in place yesterday around Manchester city centre as officers and members of a forensic unit searched the debris for clues.
Meanwhile, 16 of the more than 200 people who were injured in the blast were last night still being treated in hospital. A heavily pregnant woman, Ms Melanie Russell, and her unborn child were both reported to be "doing well" by staff at St Mary's Hospital.
Ms Russell (23), who was thrown 15 feet in the air by the shock waves from the blast, was shopping for items for her baby, which is due in just a couple of weeks, when the bomb went off. She told hospital staff "I heard it go off. I felt a blast after it. It knocked me flying and I blanked out. I came around in the ambulance.
The most seriously injured victim received almost 300 stitches during facial surgery which lasted 71/2 hours. A consultant surgeon, Mr Peter White, said that the 42 year old Lancashire woman's injuries were among the worst lacerations he had ever seen.
A large "tongue of tissue" had been slashed from her forehead by a piece of glass, he said. She had lost four teeth and at least 30 splinters of glass and a piece of wood had been removed from her body.
"If you touched her arm, you could feel multiple pieces of glass", he told a press conference in the hospital. "I think she was very lucky. If a piece of glass or some other missile had fallen directly on top of her head, it could have split her wide open."
Mr White said that the woman would need several years of plastic surgery to correct what he described as "significant facial scarring".
A 51 year old woman from Swinton suffered a heart attack hours after being among the thousands of people who were evacuated from Manchester city centre before the bomb exploded. Yesterday she was said to be in a stable condition in a Salford hospital.