Basic Oracle Concepts and Programming Question:

If a DELETE statement is deleting a single row, you can assign column values of the deleted row to variables by using the RETURNING clause, which an extension of DELETE statements for PL/SQL. The tutorial script shows you how to do this:

CREATE TABLE emp_temp AS SELECT * FROM employees;

DECLARE
fname VARCHAR2(10);
lname VARCHAR2(10);
BEGIN
DELETE FROM emp_temp WHERE employee_id = 100;
RETURNING first_name, last_name INTO fname, lname;
DBMS_OUTPUT.PUT_LINE('Name deleted = ' || fname || ' '
|| lname);

-- This will not work because multiple rows deleted
-- DELETE FROM emp_temp WHERE employee_id > 100;
-- RETURNING first_name, last_name INTO fname, lname;
END;
/
Name deleted = Steven King

Similar to SELECT ... INTO, RETURNING ... INTO will not work if multiple rows are deleted.