Bombers hit london again
Jul 21, 2005
<b>LONDON, Thursday </b> - Four small coordinated explosions hit London’s transport network on Thursday, but caused no fatalities, exactly two weeks after bombers killed more than 50 people on underground trains and a bus in the capital.
LONDON, Thursday - Four small coordinated explosions hit London’s transport network on Thursday, but caused no fatalities, exactly two weeks after bombers killed more than 50 people on underground trains and a bus in the capital.
Part of the underground train network was shut, but the Police reassured the public that the emergency was not as serious as two weeks ago, and Prime Minister Tony Blair called for calm.
London Police chief Ian Blair told reporters: “We know that we’ve had four explosions or attempts at explosions. It is still pretty unclear what’s happened ... The bombs appear to be smaller than the last occasion.â€
He said some devices appeared not to have gone off properly and only one person was injured, adding that he hoped London would now “get moving†again. “I smelled the smell, this terrible smell. I couldn’t breathe,†said Ingrid Guyon, evacuated from a train at the Oval underground station in south London.
Another witness at the Oval, Andrea, reported what appeared to be a would-be bomber alone in a carriage after a small blast: “We all got off on the platform and the guy just ran and started running up the escalator... He left a bag on the train.â€
Blair told a news conference, “We know why these things are done. They are done to scare people ... We’ve got to react calmly.â€
The emergency, at around 1:00pm (1200 GMT), coincided with a memorial service for victims of the attacks of July 7. Then, four young British Muslims detonated bombs in three underground trains and a bus during the morning rush hour, killing more than 50 people and shocking a capital that had hitherto been spared al Qaeda-style attacks on civilians.
In the first hours, the nature of the attacks was unclear. “The worst-case scenario ... would be that these are devices that haven’t triggered properly. Beyond that, it looks like it may be people messing around, copycat-type stuff,†said Shane Brighton of the Royal United Services Institute in London.
Robert Ayers of the Royal Institute of International Affairs (RIIA) said it appeared that Britain now had to deal with a concerted militant campaign.
“You had four guys that died (on July 7), but the infrastructure that trained them, equipped them, funded them, pointed them at the right target — the infrastructure’s still in place, still here.â€
The July 7 bombs, which were claimed on the Internet by a little-known Islamic militant group, coincided with a summit of the Group of Eight leading industrialised nations in Scotland. Emergency services rushed to three underground stations in or near central London and to the site of a blast on a bus in the east of the city.
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Part of the underground train network was shut, but the Police reassured the public that the emergency was not as serious as two weeks ago, and Prime Minister Tony Blair called for calm.
London Police chief Ian Blair told reporters: “We know that we’ve had four explosions or attempts at explosions. It is still pretty unclear what’s happened ... The bombs appear to be smaller than the last occasion.â€
He said some devices appeared not to have gone off properly and only one person was injured, adding that he hoped London would now “get moving†again. “I smelled the smell, this terrible smell. I couldn’t breathe,†said Ingrid Guyon, evacuated from a train at the Oval underground station in south London.
Another witness at the Oval, Andrea, reported what appeared to be a would-be bomber alone in a carriage after a small blast: “We all got off on the platform and the guy just ran and started running up the escalator... He left a bag on the train.â€
Blair told a news conference, “We know why these things are done. They are done to scare people ... We’ve got to react calmly.â€
The emergency, at around 1:00pm (1200 GMT), coincided with a memorial service for victims of the attacks of July 7. Then, four young British Muslims detonated bombs in three underground trains and a bus during the morning rush hour, killing more than 50 people and shocking a capital that had hitherto been spared al Qaeda-style attacks on civilians.
In the first hours, the nature of the attacks was unclear. “The worst-case scenario ... would be that these are devices that haven’t triggered properly. Beyond that, it looks like it may be people messing around, copycat-type stuff,†said Shane Brighton of the Royal United Services Institute in London.
Robert Ayers of the Royal Institute of International Affairs (RIIA) said it appeared that Britain now had to deal with a concerted militant campaign.
“You had four guys that died (on July 7), but the infrastructure that trained them, equipped them, funded them, pointed them at the right target — the infrastructure’s still in place, still here.â€
The July 7 bombs, which were claimed on the Internet by a little-known Islamic militant group, coincided with a summit of the Group of Eight leading industrialised nations in Scotland. Emergency services rushed to three underground stations in or near central London and to the site of a blast on a bus in the east of the city.
Ends