Blasts destroy bus, disrupt London subway
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-07-07 16:52
An explosion destroyed a double-decker bus in central London during rush hour Thursday, police said, and several blasts also went off on the London subway. There were reports of casualties.
People covered in blood stumbled out of the subway, and a witness said the entire top deck of the bus was destroyed.
London Underground staff provide assistance to passengers prevented from entering the tube station at Victoria after the London Underground network was shut-down Thursday July 7, 2005, following explosions initially blamed on a power surge. Emergency services reported several injuries and Scotland Yard declared the emergency a 'major incident'.[AP] |
"I was on the bus in front and heard an incredible bang, I turned round and half the double decker bus was in the air," Belinda Seabrook told Press Association, the British news agency.
She said the bus was packed with people.
"It was a massive explosion and there were papers and half a bus flying through the air," she said.
Officials shut down the entire underground network after the explosions. Initial reports blamed a power surge, but officials were not ruling out an intentional attack.
The attacks came a day after London was awarded the 2012 Olympics and as the G-8 summit was getting underway in Scotland.
One witness, Darren Hall, said some passengers emerging from an evacuated subway station and that some passengers had soot and blood on their faces. He told BBC TV that he was evacuated along with others near the major King's Cross station and only afterward heard a blast.
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