Police officer describes chaos after Oslo bomb

A police officer has described the chaos that reigned in Oslo after the bomb planted by Anders Breivik exploded on July 22 last year.

Tor Langli said the initial reports he received after the blast suggested there were two suspects, and two other bombs about to explode.

Mr Langli recalled standing next to the head of an anti-terror squad in Oslo when he received a call about the second attack at the Labor Party’s youth camp on Utoya, 25 miles away.

“I saw on his face that it was something serious,” Mr Langli said. “And while I was watching him he said out of the corner of his mouth: ’Shooting on Utoya.”’

Another report came in that about 50 people had been shot on the island. The anti-terror unit was dispatched to Utoya. When it arrived, some 70 minutes after the first reports of Breivik’s rampage, 100 youth had been shot.

Breivik has said the victims had betrayed Norway by embracing immigration.

The self-described militant nationalist claimed last week that he had expected to be shot by police after the bombing. But no one stopped him as he walked to a getaway car parked near the bomb site, and drove to Utoya.

Mr Langli said he first got a report of a suspect with a “non-Nordic” appearance leaving the scene.

He then got another report of a Nordic-looking suspect, which made him believe there were two suspects.

When he heard about the Utoya shooting, he started thinking the bomb and the massacre were the actions of the same person.

“I thought there was a connection. But I didn’t have any evidence for that,” he said. Turning to Breivik, he added: “I could not imagine there being two people with so many crazy ideas.”

Two psychiatric examinations conducted before the trial reached opposite conclusions on whether Breivik is psychotic – the key issue to be resolved during the trial.

Svein Olav Christensen, an explosives expert working for a defence agency, showed pictures of the bomb site to the court. The two ton fertiliser and diesel bomb had ripped holes in the concrete platform underneath the vehicle, and also in the subterranean floor below.

The trial is scheduled to go on for nine more weeks.