Brussels attacks: ‘There are going to be questions asked of the authorities’

An Irishman has recounted how he narrowly avoided the bombing of a Brussels metro station yesterday morning, having just dropped his daughter off to crèche.

Eoghan Walsh said that he took the metro a matter of minutes before the explosion that the Belgian public broadcaster reports claimed the lives of at least 20 people.

“I normally take the metro in to work in the morning, I drop my daughter off at the crèche at around 8.30am,” Mr Walsh told the Today with Sean O’Rourke Show

on RTÉ Radio 1.

“As I was getting on the metro I got a text from my wife saying that there had been an explosion at the airport.

“I had a sense of unease getting on the metro. I got off the metro at around 8.45, texted her saying I don’t feel like getting the metro this evening because you never know what might happen.

“I got back into the office around 10 minutes later, sat down for my morning meeting and someone came in saying there had been another explosion at Maalbeek metro station, which is about 500m from our office.

“Five or ten minutes later — there but for the grace of God.”

Speaking yesterday morning, Mr Walsh said he was unsure how he would collect his daughter from crèche given the city-wide lockdown and the fact that his wife is in the late stages of pregnancy.

“We went through this before with the lockdown before Christmas, schools also had heightened security. I’ll have to go get her at some stage, I don’t know how. My wife is also at home, she’s 39 weeks pregnant now so we’re hoping that today isn’t the day. There’s a sense of unease and unrest,” he said.

The lockdown was lifted in the afternoon.

Another Irish man who decided not to take the metro to work as usual following the airport attack has questioned why the authorities did not immediately close the subway after the initial bombings.

“I think there’s going to be questions asked of the authorities, why they didn’t immediately shut down the public transport system after the airport attacks,” said Barry Magee, 33, from Co Down.

Mr Magee, a communications manager for the European biofuels industry, emailed his boss to say he did not feel safe to take public transport after hearing of the explosions at the airport. The subsequent explosion occurred on the metro line he takes to work.

“The fact that it happened really close to my own doorstep, on my way to work, that’s unnerving. That could’ve been me,” he said.