8.51am: first blast claims at least seven lives

AT least seven people were killed in the first blast in a tube tunnel at 8.51am, but eyewitnesses spoke of seeing many bodies in the wreckage of the train.

Deputy Assistant Commissioner Brian Paddick said that the first explosion happened at 8.51am at Moorgate, Liverpool Street and Aldgate East underground stations. He said the explosion was in the tunnel 100 yards from Liverpool Street station on either the Circle or Central line.

The Royal London Hospital, near Liverpool Street Station, said it had received 183 patients from the attack and one of the other blasts. Eight were critically injured, including one in cardiac arrest.

Six people were operated upon.

Some 123 patients were treated and discharged.

Ten fire appliances and 50 firefighters had been sent to Aldgate to assist with the rescue operation.

At Liverpool Street Station in the City, the wounded were treated by medics as they lay on the concourse. The Royal London said staff responded immediately when informed of the major incident.

The Helicopter Emergency Medical Service was despatched along with mobile medical response teams.

The Rev Brian Lee, from St Botolph’s Church next to Aldgate Station, said: “I know there were 80 major casualties. Opposite the station is a bus station. They took a bus and put the casualties on the public bus.”

The church was opened for the emergency services throughout the night. They were offered food and coffee and the chance to light candles and say a quiet prayer.

* MOORGATE is the Tube station serving the City of London and the Bank of England. It was the scene in February 1975 of one of London’s worst Tube disasters when a train packed with commuters ploughed into the end of a tunnel at 56 kilometres per hour killing 29 and injuring hundreds.

The station is one of London’s oldest, opening in the late 1800s. Liverpool Street is an important station for commuters to The Square Mile and for tourists using the fast rail link from Stansted. The station has undergone vast redevelopment since the poet John Betjeman described it as the best place in the world to take a journey from because anywhere else was bound to be an improvement.

A short walk away is 30 St Mary Axe, the “Gherkin” building built to replace the Baltic Exchange blown up by the IRA in 1992.

* ALDGATE EAST in Whitechapel is a busy interchange on the Underground system and marks the start of the old East End of London. It was the haunt of Jack the Ripper and part of the “manor” of the notorious 60s gangsters, the Kray Twins, and is a frequent starting point for popular walking tours of the capital.

The area has seen successive waves of immigration and an originally strong Jewish community has been successively replaced by Bangladeshis who have built nearby Brick Lane into one of the most vibrant ethnic communities in the world. Known to Londoners as “Banglatown”, it has some of the best curry houses in Britain. Just around the corner from Aldgate East station is Petticoat Lane, London’s 400-year-old street market with more than 1,000 stalls open six days a week.