Month: July 2005

A first-hand blog account of terror:

Travelling just past Edgware Station the train entered a tunnel. We shook like any usual tube train as it rattled down the tracks. It was then I heard a loud bang.

The train left the tracks and started to rumble down the tunnel. It was incapable of stopping and just rolled on. A series of explosions followed as if tube electric motor after motor was exploding. Each explosion shook the train in the air and seems to make it land at a lower point.

I fell to the ground like most people, scrunched up in a ball in minimize injury. At this point I wondered if the train would ever stop, I thought “please make it stop”, but it kept going. In the end I just wished that it didn’t hit something and crush. It didn’t.

When the train came to a standstill people were screaming, but mainly due to panic as the carriage was rapidly filling with smoke and the smell of burning motors was giving clear clues of fire.

As little as 5 seconds later we were unable to see and had all hit the ground for the precious air that remaining. We were all literally choking to death.

The carriage however was pretty sealed; no window could open, no door would slide and no hammers seemed to exist to grant exit. If there were instructions on how to act then they were impossible to see in the thick acrid black smoke.

In the end I opted to do something about the problem and began shouting to find out in which direction the fires were emanating from. I then tested with the inter-carriage door to see if venting the smoke caused fire to spread. It didn’t so I held the door open trying to clear the carriage and look for escape routes.

The train was packed and so there was no escape to the other carriages. Through the gap between the carriages however I saw an escape route and it calmed me from panic; if things got bad I could see an exit along the tunnel wall.

The fire concerned me and the acrid smoke never seems to fully dissipate. I calmed passengers playing down the issue as a bad tube network and a network derailment. Naturally people were in a mixture of states from quiet to abject panic in all its colours.

People could be heard screaming from all around; people were trapped, yet no-one could move and do anything.

After an eternity a guard moved through the carriages and asked everyone to move in the opposite direction. No one however moved, I think they were all in shock.

May the murdered rest in peace.

Here’s one cultural difference between Brits and Americans. Brits regard the best response to outrage to carry on as if nothing has happened. Yes, they will fight back. But first, they will just carry on as normal. Right now, a million kettles are boiling. “Is that the best you can do?” will be a typical response. Stoicism is not an American virtue. Apart from a sense of humor, it is the ultimate British one. Neveratoss captures this perfectly today:

Went to the pub at lunchtime to see the latest new on events in London. Three young guys were sitting directly in front of the TV as details of a major terrorist attack on London were emerging – all three avidly reading the Sun’s account of the Steven Gerard/Liverpool fiasco.

That’s a reference to a soccer story. Do not mistake this attitude for indifference. It’s a very English form of determination.

“I have a prediction to make, that tomorrow we’ll find out whether Britons are, still, in fact, Britons. Many years ago I was working in The City and there were two events that made travel into work almost impossible.
The first was a series of storms that brought down power lines, blocked train routes and so on. Not surprisingly, the place was empty the next day. Why bother to struggle through?
The other event was an IRA bomb which caused massive damage and loss of life. Trains were disrupted, travel to work the next day was horribly difficult and yet there were more people at work than on a normal day. There was no co-ordination to this, no instructions went out, but it appeared that people were crawling off their sick beds in order to be there at work the next day, thrusting their mewling and pewling infants into the arms of anyone at all so that they could be there.

Yes, we’ll take an excuse for a day off, throw a sickie. But you threaten us, try to kill us? Kill and injure some of us?

Fuck you, sunshine.

We’ll not be having that.

No grand demonstrations, few warlike chants, a desire for revenge, of course, but the reaction of the average man and woman in the street? Yes, you’ve tried it now bugger off. We’re not scared, no, you won’t change us. Even if we are scared, you can still bugger off.” – Tim Worstall, Brit blogger. Priceless. I love my homeland.

Here’s a great one from a blogger:

I just rang up Lord Coe to be the first to congratulate him and to nominate a new, typically British, Olympic Sport – War! We’re very good at it and the French are, quite frankly, merde! Germany are pretty good but lack a decent finish, the Italians don’t quite get the “half time no changing sides” rule and Argentinians are rubbish even when playing at home. Did I miss anyone out?

He wrote that yesterday. Now we know who he missed out.

Yes, it’s old Red Ken himself, the famously left-wing mayor of London. Here’s what he just said:

“This was not a terrorist attack against the mighty and the powerful; it is not aimed at presidents or prime ministers; it was aimed at ordinary working class Londoners, black and white, Muslim and Christians, Hindu and Jew, young and old, indiscriminate attempt at slaughter irrespective of any considerations, of age, of class, of religion, whatever, that isn’t an ideology, it isn’t even a perverted faith, it’s just indiscriminate attempt at mass murder, and we know what the objective is, they seek to divide London. They seek to turn Londoners against each other and Londoners will not be divided by this cowardly attack… I wish to speak through you directly, to those who came to London to claim lives, nothing you do, how many of us you kill will stop that flight to our cities where freedom is strong and where people can live in harmony with one another, whatever you do, how many you kill, you will fail.”

Amen a million times. How dumb are these fascists to take on the Brits and the Americans? Sure, we fight with each other; but up against this kind of evil, our divisions are petty. I also admire Livingstone’s ability to see how liberal and left-wing Londoners who have helped build an amazingly vibrant, diverse and tolerant city are particularly affronted by these medieval monsters. Maybe this will help build support for a war that is as unavoidable as it is unlosable. I don’t mean we won’t continue to differ over means and methods and tactics and strategy. We will. That’s our strength. But right and left, we are in this together.

I liked this email from one of the Brits:

Londoners (Brits) will fight back. That is obvious. Always have always will. One thing I’ve got to disagree with you on is that there will be a push for policy change but not for the reason Galloway and others suggest. Brits will demand that we hand over the calm south to Iraqis and move troops (in particular SAS) to Afghanistan. There are some people in the mountains that we need to settle a score with.

That’s the spirit.

Scuttlebutt from friends in London. Just passing along: cell-phones don’t work on the tube, so the likelihood of suicide bombers is that much higher; ditto the bus. The bus behind the one attacked was packed with school-kids. “There’s a surprising lack of panic,” my sister tells me. When it’s really serious, Londoners calm down. On the bright side, seniors are reminding the young that this is nothing compared to the Blitz. It’s the anniversary of victory in World War II, so the memories are particularly fresh. My sister is taking care of a neighbor’s child whose mother is stranded in London (but ok). What’s she doing? Making him tea.

Of course, George Galloway had to offer the following statement:

The loss of innocent lives, whether in this country or Iraq, is precisely the result of a world that has become a less safe and peaceful place in recent years.
We have worked without rest to remove the causes of such violence from our world. We argued, as did the Security Services in this country, that the attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq would increase the threat of terrorist attack in Britain. Tragically Londoners have now paid the price of the government ignoring such warnings.
We urge the government to remove people in this country from harms way, as the Spanish government acted to remove its people from harm, by ending the occupation of Iraq and by turning its full attention to the development of a real solution to the wider conflicts in the Middle East.
Only then will the innocents here and abroad be able to enjoy a life free of the threat of needless violence.

The opposite, of course, is true. If we give in to these forces of murder in Iraq and Afghanistan and elsewhere, their determination to attack us will only grow. While Brits may well have strong disagreements about the war and the conduct of the war, as Americans do, I do not believe that they are in any doubt as to who is responsible for these barbaric acts; and will not flinch from fighting the real enemy. That enemy is not our own flawed, fallible but elected governments. It is the people who would remove our ability to elect anyone.

Jeff Jarvis poses an interesting question.