7/7 inquestFirst responders used runners because radios did not work underground

Published 13 October 2010

Emergency services battling to save lives in the wake of the 7 July 2005 London bombings needed to use runners to send messages back to the control room as their radios did not work underground, an inquest into the terrorist attacks has heard

Emergency services battling to save lives in the wake of the 7 July 2005 London bombings needed to use runners to send messages back to the control room as their radios did not work underground, an inquest into the terrorist attacks has heard.

The Daily Telegraph reports that paramedics, firefighters, and police attending to casualties on the stricken Tube trains sent messengers back to the surface to pass on requests for more help.

In the case of the deep London Underground station at Russell Square, which is linked to ground level by a long spiral staircase, this could take a quarter of an hour, the hearing was told.

Hugo Keith QC, counsel to the inquests, also highlighted the lack of a system for the drivers of the devastated Tube trains to communicate with their passengers.

Timothy Batkin, the driver of the train destroyed in the Aldgate bombing, said he could hear people screaming behind him ”help us, help” but he was unable to respond.

Four suicide bombers launched coordinated attacks on three Tube trains and a bus in London on 7 July 2005, killing fifty-two people and leaving more than 700 injured.

The inquest has heard that emergency service control rooms were confused about what had happened and where to send help for some time after the initial blasts on the Underground at 8.50am.

Emergency responders were sent to the wrong places, with the first ambulance not arriving at Aldgate until 9.14am because it was initially dispatched to Liverpool Street. The first fire engine only reached the Edgware Road bombing at 9.18am and the control rooms were not told that Russell Square Tube station had been targeted until 9.13am.

Keith said: ”The evidence tends to suggest that the emergency services encountered considerable difficulties in communicating with each other.”

He added: ”The evidence seems to suggest that all the emergency services, other than the British Transport Police and the City of London Police, had to rely upon individuals running back and forth from the trains to the platforms and from the platforms to the ground level … In relation to Russell Square, which is characterized by a very long spiral staircase, it could take as long as 15 minutes to walk from the tunnel to ground level.”

Keith went on: ”The central issue, of course, is not whether there were delays in the attendance by the emergency services, but whether it would have made a difference if those few minutes that I have identified had not been lost.”

Keith suggested one reason for the emergency services’ confusion was that very few 999 calls were made about the Tube bombings because they happened underground.

He said: “It seems to us that it is generally from the 999 calls that the emergency services are able to compare and cross-reference calls to find out what has happened where.”

 

Keith added: “Initially it is obvious that there were conflicting reports from the bomb sites. This led the network control centre of London Underground probably not being able to appreciate the overall picture. It is clear that information was received by it piecemeal and as a result it was not clear that the power failure and the bangs and explosions and the walking wounded were part of a single coordinated attack.”