London remembers July 7 attacks a decade on
Britain will pause to remember the July 7 attacks amid a welter of warnings about the enduring and changing threat from terrorism a decade on.
The country will fall silent to mark the 10th anniversary of the atrocity in which 52 people were murdered and hundreds more injured when four suicide bombers attacked London’s transport network.
David Cameron said the Tunisian beach massacre showed the danger remains 10 years on but vowed the nation would not be cowed by violent extremists.
He said: “Today the country comes together to remember the victims of one of the deadliest terrorist atrocities on mainland Britain.
“Ten years on from the 7/7 London attacks, the threat from terrorism continues to be as real as it is deadly – the murder of 30 innocent Britons whilst holidaying in Tunisia is a brutal reminder of that fact. But we will never be cowed by terrorism.
“We will keep on doing all that we can to keep the British public safe, protecting vulnerable young minds from others’ extremist beliefs and promoting the shared values of tolerance, love and respect that make Britain so great.”
The anniversary falls at a time of heightened alert after the rise of Islamic State (IS).
Events are being held to mark the anniversary, including a national minute’s silence at 11.30am.
Announcements will be halted and bus drivers asked to bring vehicles to a stop if they can do so safely.
Tube services will run as normal but passengers will be asked to observe the silence and announcements will be halted for the duration, Transport for London said.
Survivors, relatives of the dead and members of the emergency services have been invited to the event.
Jacqui Putnam, who survived the Edgware Road explosion, said: “It doesn’t seem like 10 years ago. There is only one group of people who I want to be with and that is my survivor family.”
Ms Putnam, from Cambridgeshire, said her overriding feeling will be sadness as she remembers the 52 people who were killed.
“I think of them as my silent friends,” she said. “Those 52 people are with me every day because I could so easily have been with them. The fact that I’m not is random luck.”
How the July 7 attacks unfolded
July 7 2005 had dawned with London still elated from learning the previous day that it had won the 2012 Olympics, but within hours, the country was consumed by horror and grief.
Suicide bombers Mohammed Sidique Khan, 30, Shehzad Tanweer, 22, Hasib Hussain, 18, and Jermaine Lindsay, 19, met at Luton station that morning.
They took a train to King’s Cross in London, hugged and separated to carry out their deadly missions.
Within three minutes of 8.50am, Tanweer detonated his bomb at Aldgate, Khan set his device off at Edgware Road and Lindsay blew himself up between King’s Cross and Russell Square.
Hussain detonated his device on a number 30 bus at Tavistock Square at 9.47am.
Twenty-six died in the bombing at Russell Square on the Piccadilly line, six in the bombing at Edgware Road on the Circle line, seven in the bombing at Aldgate on the Circle line, and 13 in the bombing on the bus at Tavistock Square.
A fortnight later, another four would-be suicide bombers launched failed attacks on the Tube and a bus, leading to police marksmen killing innocent Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes.
