Explosions struck the London Underground and a bus at midday Thursday in a chilling but far less bloody replay of the suicide bombings that killed 56 people two weeks ago.
Only one person was reported injured in the nearly simultaneous lunch-hour blasts, which shocked and disrupted the capital and were hauntingly similar to the July 7 bombings by four attackers.
The BBC reported that two people had been arrested, but Metropolitan Police Commissioner Ian Blair would not comment on whether any arrests had been made Thursday in connection with the explosions.
Police said that forensic evidence collected from the crime scenes could provide a “significant break” in the latest attacks.
“Clearly, the intention must have been to kill,” Blair told a news conference. “You don’t do this with any other intention.”
Panicked and screaming commuters fled the three affected Underground stations, sometimes leaving behind their shoes. Firefighters and police with bomb-sniffing dogs sealed off nearby city blocks and evacuated rows of restaurants, pubs and offices.
Blair appeals for calm
Prime Minister Tony Blair appealed for calm.
“We can’t minimize incidents such as this,” he said at a joint news conference with the Australian prime minister at No. 10 Downing St. “They’re done to scare people, to frighten them and make them worried.”
He held an emergency Cabinet meeting but said no policy decisions were made.
Police Chief Blair called the blasts “a very serious incident.”
“We know that we have four explosions or attempts of explosions, and it is still pretty unclear as to what has happened,” he said outside Scotland Yard.
“At the moment the casualty numbers appear to be very low ... the bombs appear to be smaller” than those detonated July 7, he said. He added later that not all the bombs went off.
New York to start random searches
President Bush was briefed on the explosions and said the terrorists “understand when they kill in cold blood it ends up on our TV screens and they’re trying to shake our will. And they’re trying to create vacuums in which their ideology can move.”
U.S. mass transit systems remain on code orange, or high alert, since the London bombings two weeks ago, but the rest of the country is at yellow, signifying an elevated risk.
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said police will begin conducting random searches of packages and backpacks carried by people entering the city’s subway, which carries about 4.5 million passengers on the average weekday. Officials would not immediately say how frequently the checks would occur.
London Transport spokesman Steve Taylor told The Associated Press that it would be impractical to check bags, or to install airport-style metal detectors and X-ray machines in a subway network that carries 3 million passengers a day, or a bus system that carries some 6 million daily.
Pieces of the puzzle
An armed police unit entered University College hospital shortly after an injured person was carried in, Britain’s Press Association reported.
Sky News TV reported that police were searching for a man with a blue shirt with wires protruding. Officers asked employees to look for a black or Asian male about 6-foot-2.
The attacks, which targeted trains near the Warren Street, Oval and Shepherd’s Bush stations, did not shut down the subway system, only three of its lines. The double-decker bus had its windows blown out on Hackney Road in east London.
Witnesses told The Associated Press they did not hear a bang but smelled something similar to an electrical fire at the Warren Street station.
Police in chemical protection suits were at the Warren Street station, but no chemical agents were found.
"These attacks don't look like they were a hallmark of any one group," said Paul Beaver, an independent security and defense expert. "They don't fit into any clear patterns that we know of except they were timed."
It appeared two devices detonated but the other two did not, Beaver said, adding that detonators on commercial and military devices are often faulty.
Stagecoach, the company that operates the stricken bus, said the driver heard a bang and went upstairs, where he found the windows blown out. The company said the bus was structurally intact and there were no injuries.
Parallels with July 7
The incidents paralleled the July 7 blasts, which involved explosions at three Underground stations simultaneously starting at 8:51 a.m., followed quickly by a bomb going off on a bus. Those bombings, during the morning rush hour, also occurred in the center of London, hitting the Underground from various directions.
Thursday’s incidents, however, were more spread out.
Emergency teams were sent to all three stations after the incidents, which began at 12:38 p.m.
“People were panicking. But very fortunately the train was only 15 seconds from the station,” witness Ivan McCracken told Sky news.
McCracken said another passenger at Warren Street told him he saw a backpack explode. The July 7 bombs were carried in backpacks, police said.
'As if something had gone wrong'
McCracken said he smelled smoke, and people were panicking and coming into his carriage. He said he spoke to an Italian man who was comforting a woman after the evacuation.
“He said that a man was carrying a rucksack and the rucksack suddenly exploded. It was a minor explosion but enough to blow open the rucksack,” McCracken said. “The man then made an exclamation as if something had gone wrong. At that point everyone rushed from the carriage.”
Losiane Mohellavi, 35, who was evacuated at Warren Street, said, “I was in the carriage and we smelled smoke — it was like something was burning. Everyone was panicked and people were screaming. We had to pull the alarm. I am still shaking.”
The U.S. Embassy was closed to visitors about two hours after the blasts as a precaution, but embassy staff continued working, said spokeswoman Susan Domowitz.
