Explosions Hit Three London Subway Stations, Double-Decker Bus; One Person Reported Injured
Police work outside Oval Tube Station, London, Thursday, July 21, 2005. Explosions struck London's transport system Thursday, shutting down three underground train stations and blowing out the windows of a double-decker bus, authorities said, two weeks after four deadly suicide bombings. (AP Photo/Sergio Dionisio)
By ROBERT BARR Associated Press Writer
The Associated Press

LONDON Jul 21, 2005 — 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, British Transport Police said, but they caused major shock and disruption in the capital and were hauntingly similar to the July 7 bombings by four attackers.

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.


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Prime Minister Tony Blair appealed for calm and said it was too early to tell who was responsible.

"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 afterward but said no decisions "of a policy nature" were made.

Metropolitan Police Commissioner Ian Blair called it "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.

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.