7/7 London bombings 10th anniversary: Timeline of the day that changed the capital
Four young British men carrying large rucksacks enter Luton train station.
The men – later named as Mohammad Sidique Khan, 30, Shehzad Tanweer, 22, Hasib Hussain, 18 and 19-year-old Germaine Lindsa – join the commuter train to Kings Cross.
CCTV images show the men hugging before splitting off in different directions.
An incident between Liverpool Street and Aldgate Tube stations – either an explosion or a collision between trains – is reported. Both stations report the matter,
leading to confusion over the number of incidents.
Seconds later a bomb goes off on the Tube between King’s Cross and Russell Square. Eyewitnesses report explosion appeared to come from outside the train.
Almost instantaneously there is an explosion on a train at Edgware Road Tube station.
London Underground reports power surges on the network.
Hussain is seen on Euston Road outside Kings Cross station, on his phone. He goes back to the station, where he buys a battery
from WH Smiths and then goes into the McDonald’s over the road.
Emergency services confirm they have been called to Liverpool Street after reports of an explosion, thought to be caused by the power failure.
London Underground begins shutting down the network and evacuating around 200,000 passengers from more than 500 trains after receiving reports of
a train derailment at Edgware Road, a person under a train at Liverpool Street and walking wounded leaving stations.
Hussain gets on the number 91 bus from King’s Cross to Euston station, where he switches to the number 30 travelling east from Marble Arch.
Metropolitan Police confirm they are dealing with a major incident in London, but say it’s too early to know what has happened.
A Cobra meeting is called
Reports start to surface of an incident at Edgware Road Tube station
British Transport Police announces there have been explosions at King’s Cross, Old Street, Moorgate, and Russell Square.
The number 30 bus explodes at Upper Woburn Place/Tavistock Square.
The entire London Underground system is shut down.
National Grid announces there had been no problem with power surges.
Reports of fatalities emerge. All hospitals are put on major-incident alert.
Home secretary Charles Clarke says “dreadful incidents” have caused “terrible injuries”.
Bus services suspended across central London.
Metropolitan Police commissioner Sir Ian Blair says police believe there have been six explosions in what is believed to have been a coordinated terror attack.
He appeals for calm, asks people not to travel to London or make unnecessary calls to emergency services.
Police spokesman confirms there have been at least two fatalities.
Prime Minister Tony Blair speaks from G8 summit in Gleneagles, calling the attacks a coordinated series of “barbaric” terrorist attacks.
“There have been people who have died and people seriously injured,” he says.
A website linked to al-Qaeda carries a statement saying it has carried out a “blessed raid” in London “in retaliation for the massacres Britain
is committing in Iraq and Afghanistan”.
Clarke tells MPs four explosions have been confirmed, although it is still not clear who carried out the attacks.
Mayor Ken Livingstone praises Londoners for responding “calmly and courageously” to the “cowardly terrorist attacks”.
At least 33 people are confirmed dead, while some of the injured have lost limbs.
The Union Jack flying over Buckingham Palace is lowered to half-mast at the Queen’s request.
Blair, who has flown back to London to attend an emergency meeting in Downing Street, urges the public not to “be terrorised”.
Deputy Assistant Police Commissioner Brian Paddick confirms 37 fatalities and seven hundred injuries, with roughly three hundred of those
being transported by ambulance to London hospitals.
Foreign secretary Jack Straw says attack appears to have been carried out by Al Qaeda.
The Metropolitan Police announces that a person injured in one of the blasts has since died in hospital care.
Hussain’s family reports him missing
Metropolitan Police holds a press conference, confirming four blast sites – three on the underground and one on the bus – not six as briefly thought.
Death toll has risen overnight to 50.
Queen Elizabeth visits victims of the attacks at the Royal London Hospital, and speaks out against terrorism.
Police commissioner Ian Blair and Ken Livingstone hold press conference, confirming 13 of those killed were caught in the Tavistock Square bomb.
Metropolitan Police deputy assistant commissioner Brian Paddick, British Transport Police deputy chief constable Andy Trotter and London Underground
managing director Tim O’Toole give a joint press conference, confirming that the three Tube explosions took place almost simultaneously.
Police evacuate Birmingham city centre after a security alert.
Armed police and army bomb disposal experts conduct three raids in the Beeston and Holbeck areas of Leeds and two in nearby Dewsbury, in West Yorkshire.
The Metropolitan Police lead this operation, working in conjunction with West Yorkshire Police. By this point three suspects have been identified from
CCTV footage, a missing person’s report and documents found in the debris at each bomb site.
Up to 600 residents are evacuated from the area of a sixth raid, in the Burley area of Leeds. Residents are unable to return to their homes for two days
following the confirmation that explosives have been found at the site.
A controlled explosion is carried out at the site of the raid in Burley. Luton Railway Station is closed as police investigate a car parked there and
believed to be associated with the suspects caught on CCTV cameras. After a series of controlled explosions the car is taken away for further examination.
A raid by police and bomb disposal experts takes place at a house in Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire, after the identification of a fourth suspect.
Small explosions occur at Shepherd’s Bush Tube station (Hammersmith and City line), Warren Street and Oval.
A backpack is reported as exploding in east London on the Number 26 bus travelling from Waterloo to Hackney Wick.
University College Hospital is cordoned off by police, amid fears the bomber from the Warren Street Tube station ran into the building.
Sir Ian Blair says the situation is “firmly under control”.
Jean Charles de Menezes is shot dead by plain clothes police at Stockwell tube station.
Yasin Hassan Omar, suspected of the failed attack at Warren Street on 21 July 2005, along with three other men, is arrested in Heybarnes Road,
Birmingham. He was carrying a rucksack when he was arrested and, after resisting arrest, was hit with a Taser stun gun.
Later he is taken to London for questioning by the Police.
Two more suspects are arrested in London. Later that same day, Hussain Osman, the fourth suspect, is arrested in Rome.
Piccadilly Line returns to service.
