London Explosions

There have been reports of explosions across London today. Initial reports said it was a power surge but then there were explosions on buses – so not much sense here. There is not much information being released but there does not seem to be mass panic, and the emergency services seem to be organised which is good news. Tube network closed down.

[UPDATE – 10:30am] Supposedly 6 bombs on the tube, 3 bombs on buses. Unfortunately there seem to be a large number of injured at Aldgate 🙁 As a result of one of these, there was a collision at Kings Cross.

[UPDATE – 11am] Security incidents at Swindon and Bright train stations.

[UPDATE – 11:30am] verbal/email reports (not from press) say there have been explosions at Brighton train station. All bus services in Zone 1 suspended. St. Mary’s Hospital released a statement that they have admitted 4 critical, 8 severe and several minor injures. Injuries are limb damage, cuts, burns, head injuries and chest problems.

[UPDATE – 11:49am] DEFRA (Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) are saying dont use public services in London. There is an issue here – should we not be centralising communications through one government department or is it better to not do this? Is DEFRA the right department to be releasing info like this? Surely it should come from Department of Transport?

[UPDATE – 11:58am] A senior Israeli official said Scotland Yard told Israel minutes before the explosions that it had received warnings of possible terror attacks.

[UPDATE – 12:00pm] Tony Blair confirms a terrorist attack.

[UPDATE – 12:20pm] Unconfirmed reports Al Qaeda behind the attacks. Technorati goes down..

[UPDATE – 1:20pm] Mostly confusion seems to reign with regard to the facts being made public – was it 4 bombs, 5? 6? 7? Meanwhile it looks like the emergency services are working away. France raises their alert level to RED (from ORANGE). Local Brighton radio tells of a controlled explosion of a suspicous briefcase at approximately 12:55 PM local time in a telephone box outside of Brighton station. All London to Brighton trains have been cancelled for now.

[UPDATE – 1:35pm] Bus was believed to be the Number 30 (on Tavistick Square, a mere block from my flat 🙁 ). This is one of the buses I take to work – luckily I was on the 73 this morning on the way to work. Tony Blair has left Gleneagles, where the G8 is being held, to fly down to London.

Meanwhile, I am hearing that New York has closed down part of their financial sector and are sweeping the subways.

[UPDATE – 3:55pm] Not much in the way of updates coming through now. The number of injured and dead is unfortunately rising, with the press doing their usual thing of upping each other’s numbers. Police seem to be confirming the numbers as 33 dead and hundreds injured currently.

Riaz Kanani

Founder of Radiate B2B, which helps companies target advertising at specific companies usually as part of an account based marketing programme.

I have spent almost two decades building startups or expanding fast growth companies in a variety of functions - from tech to operations to marketing, with a little corp dev on the side.

Always up for a discussion on building tech businesses and the latest tech trends. Tweet me.