se71

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July 08, 2005

London 7/7/5

Most everyone with a blog will be writing something about this, and I'm reluctant to be seen as just adding my own 2p to the throng of information. However my blog is 90% for me, and I want to write down my experiences so that I can remember them in years to come. This is not particularly interesting except to me.

The news of the 'power surge' on the London Underground travelled round my office like wildfire. Everyone was concerned obviously whether anyone had been hurt, but mostly they were worried about the effect it would have on their journey home that evening.

The second incident had a much more serious impact. Now it was obvious that this was a bomb attack. Every monitor was now showing a news site as people looked for updates. I work very near Moorgate tube station, and could see police out of the window closing down the entrance, and fire engines going past.

BBC News Online was slow off the mark with information - cnn.com was better. The best news though was my MP3 player/radio which I tuned to BBC London 94.9 FM for the John Gaunt show. This is a live phone in show, and it really worked. John Gaunt is a fantastic presenter and he's been thrown in at the deep end in crises situations like this before.

My mother was on a coach coming down to London, and luckily she has a mobile phone. I managed to contact her and tell her I was OK, and that her journey would probably not go to plan today, before Vodafone shut down the network. I was angry that this happened, do the emergency services really need our airwaves? A large reason for owning a mobile is to be able to contact friends and family in emergencies, and I feel let down that this was impossible for several hours. I talked to my friends and sister on MSN Messenger, which thankfully was unaffected all day.

I talked to a lady in my office who had just arived She had been on the underground and had heard the first blast. People had been annoyed - another London Underground delay, just one of many. She had then taken another tube and a bus to get to Moorgate. When she got here and realised that her second two journeys could have cost her her life, and had been preventable, she was really angry. why the cover story about power problems? This must be in the government's disaster rule book to stop pandemonium. I think this is a mistake, a total immediate shutdown of all transport and some honesty from the authorities is in order. This won't work next time.

Now we knew it was terrorism, my first thought was that it was a coordinated simultaneous attack on the tube, and that it was now over. When the news of the bus came in I had to revise this. Things really got serious and scary then. The first hand account of the roof blowing off a bus took the attack into the streets, now no one was safe. The fire warden for our floor came along and closed all the window blinds - this is standard practice in case a bomb goes off and sprays the office with broken glass and should protect us. Sitting by a window I did have thoughts that this might not be the best place to be.

A local conference room was opened up and BBC News 24 was playing on a big screen in there. Work continued, but people drifted in and out to watch, epecially the broadcasts from the House of Commons, and the statements from Tony Blair at the G8 conference.

I was pleased and touched that many friends from overseas checked in with me by MSN and email during the day to make sure I was OK. I heard in the afternoon that my mother's coach had decided to turn around and go back up north. Luckily my brother was nearby and he picked her up. Now I only had to worry about getting myself home.

News reports, which at one point claimed six tube blasts and three busses, gradually settled on lower numbers. The number of reported dead was two for a long time, then jumped to 33. The photos of the bus had come through at this stage - I think this image will be the lasting one. After a few hours mainline services were reported as getting back to normal, and a lot of people started to head home. My workplace announced that everyone should go home, and not come in on Friday unless they had essential work.

I hung on until 5pm, and not really wanting to change my plans for the day, decided to meet my sister in Leicester Square to maybe see a film - we thought War of the Worlds would be appropriate, and not too tasteless. I left and walked up through the city past St Pauls, Fleet St, and Covent Garden. People were very calm, I saw a few jogging home, some brave souls were on the busses which had by now reappeared. I wasn't feeling that foolhardy. Leicester Square was nearly deserted however and all the cinemas were closed. It was kind of nice to enjoy a summer afternoon without the crowds. Meeting my sister, and finding one of the few open pubs, we had a drink at a pavement side table and reflected on the day. Another peaceful walk too us to Waterloo, and the train out of London was quiet and very civilised.

This morning, the news said that London transport, apart from the lines directly affected yesterday, was back to normal. Normally it's heaving and hot and smelly, but the overground and the Waterloo-City line were actually very pleasant indeed - I've never seen them so quiet. I did check the platform for suspicious items, and also gave my fellow passengers a quick once over. I'm sure they did the same to me.

Company security decided to search my bag and look closely at my ID, understandable of course, but the words bolted, horse and stable-door immediately sprang to mind. Everyone else seems to have taken the advice and stayed at home, so I'm sitting here in a dark, empty office (motion controlled lights go off if I don't get up and walk around every 5 minutes). I think I'll go to the gym later, and get off home fairly early.

Posted by se71 at July 8, 2005 09:01 AM

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