Quotes of the Day
Thursday, Jul. 07, 2005
London has been targeted by a wave of at least four separate terrorist attacks that have paralyzed the city's transport network and caused at least 37 fatalities and 700 casualties.
In what looks like a major co-ordinated attack on London, several explosions tore through the city's underground rail network during the morning rush hour and another bomb ripped the roof off a double-decker bus packed with commuters.
The blasts come only one day into the G-8 summit, where the leaders of the world's richest nations are gathered in Scotland. Prime Minister Tony Blair held two press conferences before leaving Gleneagles to return to his official residence at 10 Downing Street in London.
"Today's bombings will not weaken in any way our resolve to uphold the most deeply held principles of our societies and to defeat those who would impose their fanaticism and extremism on all of us. We shall prevail. They shall not." Blair plans to rejoin the other world leaders this evening.
Coming the morning after London won the 2012 Olympic bid, the mood in the U.K. capital has changed from widespread jubilation to shock and confusion. Hundreds of police and scores of ambulances packed the city center as medics tried to treat the victims of the attacks at the various locations.
Only 100 yards from the British Museum, London's Russell Square in Bloomsbury, considered the heart of literary London, is usually a calm and leafy oasis sheltering cafes full of the chattering classes. But today swarming, panic-stricken crowds packed the square, as police screamed at people to clear the area after two unexpected explosions brought the neighborhood to a screeching halt.
Signs of the first explosion, at 0856 on the Piccadilly tube line between Kings Cross and Russell Square underground stations, were not immediately visible. But the target of the second bomb was all too clear. Only one block away, strewn on its side in the road, an iconic red London double-decker bus lay destroyed, its roof ripped off like an open sardine can.
Peter Gordon, 30, heard the blast from inside the British Medical Association building, opposite the bomb site, which blew out all the windows on the ground floor of the building. Dense smoke meant it was difficult to see what was going on but people were clearly strewn on the ground. Others on the other side of the road saw people screaming and running away from the bus obviously wounded. The front of the BMA building was covered with blood.
One man interviewed by TIME received a panicked call from his partner saying "I'm alive," before he even knew of the explosions. She says she was on a Piccadilly line tube train when the carriage appeared to derail in a tunnel somewhere between Kings Cross and Russell Square. Her carriage, near the drivers compartment, was tossed on its side, leaving shattered glass flying through the carriage and bodies thrown onto the tracks. "She said lots of people who were still OK were stopping to help as they tried to find they way out of the tunnel. Then she just kept asking me if anyone had been killed." But with mobile phone networks unable to cope with the increased activity he was unable to find out where she had been.
All surrounding roads were closed off by policemen screaming for people to retreat from the area in fear of other explosions. A stream of paramedics armed with blankets, oxygen canisters and wheelchairs sprinted through the streets and at least 12 ambulances were on the scene at that site alone. So far authorities have confirmed 21 people died in that attack.
Elsewhere, sirens could be heard shrieking throughout London as endless convoys of ambulances ferried victims to hospital. Helicopters shuddered overhead and swarms of people jammed the streets after being evacuated from their offices, huddling around televisions in cafes and store windows, which relayed the shocking footage. Confused tourists wandered aimlessly among them, some still trying to get into the tube stations.
At the Royal London hospital Mustafa Kurtuldu, 24, was treated after surviving an attack on a tube line near Liverpool Street station, another major transport hub in the city. The train was packed, he said, and then, "at about five to nine, everything went white — it felt like an electrical explosion and the train juddered as though it had run over concrete."
At that stage people in the carriage thought the problem was merely a power failure and the reaction was calm, not hysterical. It was only when passengers ventured past a carriage a few compartments down that they saw the carnage first hand.
"I saw someone on the track being seen to by others — I don't know whether the person was dead or alive. One person had blood gushing down his face, another was covered in soot."
More than nine hours after the first attack, stunned Londoners are now trying to come to terms with the day's events, such a short time after city celebrated its Olympic bid win with such elation. Some buses are now running again but the underground rail network will be closed until Friday at least.
In Gleaneagles President George W. Bush made a separate statement drawing a contrast between world leaders trying to alleviate poverty at the G-8 and terrorists killing innocent people. "The war on terror goes on," he said.
In London Blair welcomed a statement of support from the Muslim Council of Great Britain after it appeared an Al-Qaeda splinter group claimed responsibility for the attacks on their web site. That claim has not been substantiated.
Metropolitan police chief Sir Ian Blair said only a few months ago that a terrorist attack on London was "inevitable," and not a question of "if", but "when". That "when" appears to be today, and no matter the anticipation, it has shaken the city to its core.
- JESSICA CARSEN
- Terrorists hit Britain's capital in the crowded rush hour
Photo: ADAM STACEY