If only I’d packed my fridge magnet

Thursday 7 July 2005

It may surprise many readers to learn that I have a job. It certainly surprised my dad when he rang me today. He was worried that I had gotten myself blown up on the Underground this morning. I went a long way toward convincing him that I had not, although it wasn’t for lack of trying.
I struggled out of the bunker a little later than usual this morning and took a later tube into the city. At about ten to nine the train ground to a stop just outside Edgware Road station and we all sat motionless in the tunnel for a while. This is not an unusual phenomenon.
When we finally crawled into the station everyone had to get off the train because a “power surge” further down the line had disabled all the trains. Again, nothing unusual there. Nor was it entirely unexpected when the station staff started changing all the signs on the platforms showing that the entire system was crashing down.
No-one realised that bombs had gone off at Liverpool Street and Kings Cross at about this time. Anyone who suspected the disruption wasn’t because of a power surge didn’t suspect terrorism, but a train crash or a PUT (person under train). I was thinking only that I should be at work by now and would have to squeeze onto a bus.
By the time I finally arrived at work, up near Kings Cross, it was about quarter past nine. There was no easily visible sign of catastrophe up at the station. However, everyone at work was very suprised to see me there, because I’d forgotten I was supposed to be at a training session that day – back at Edgware Road, where unbeknownst to us another bomb had just blasted through a station.
At work I was told there had been “a bang” at Liverpool Street which had shut down all the Tube lines and may have hurt or killed a few people. Once again, most Londoners still didn’t think it was a terrorist attack, as London Transport has achieved this tragic situation without external assistance on previous occasions. I left work and grabbed another bus back towards Edgware Road. By this time all the Underground stations had been evacuated and were locked up, which I assumed was simply because no trains were running.
At quarter to ten I got off the bus back near Edgware Road and arrived very late for the training session, unaware that for the last hour or so I had been faffing back and forth between several bomb blasts. Around this time the bus bomb went off, but I was now indoors learning that the training session had been cancelled because the training staff were stranded at Euston. Also, I was not allowed to leave the building. In any case, even if I could leave there was no transport on the streets, and what’s more it had started to rain.
As the only person in the building who didn’t work there, I was stranded in the canteen for several hours, making full use of the lunch voucher I had been given and watching the TV in the corner to find out what was really happening. Except for at the explosion sites themselves, no-one knew what was really going on until everything had been shut down and everyone evacuated: up until then everyone was assuming a massive breakdown of the public transport system. We stood around watching the news until it was reduced to spouting random nonsense like “Buckingham Palace Sealed Off”. (Damn, and I’d been planning to wander through the joint this weekend.)
Finally, the sun came out and security gave me permission to walk out into the street. Lots of police blocking off Edgware Road. The streets were quiet, with stranded travellers dragging their luggage along the pavements and Londoners starting long walks home. It took me over two hours to walk the 8km back to the bunker. No buses, no taxis, very little traffic except for the occasional unmarked police car speeding past with lights and sirens – very disturbing, given this was hours after and miles away from the explosions.
By the end of my walk buses had reappeared on the streets. Buses, most trains and some Tube lines are supposed to be running tomorrow. I, however, have totally capitulated to the terrorists and will be staying home tomorrow. Presumably because my workplace is so close to Kings Cross they figure no-one will be able to get into the offices.
Others are made of sterner stuff, determined to soldier on as normal; like the woman who phoned up this evening asking if I was interested in having my kitchen refitted. I’m now off to bed, because my dodgy TV keeps phasing between BBC News 24 and Big Brother Up Late, and I’m starting to wonder if anyone’s told the hamsters what’s been going on today, as if I care what their reaction would be – dull surprise, maybe?

Filed under: London by Ben.H

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