Seven Seven, Twenty-Ten

Five years ago today, on 7/7/2005, a series of bombs exploded on the London underground and a bus.

I remember the day clearly: I had been working late the night before, so when I woke up at about 11am, I had about a hundred missed calls on my mobile (mainly from my mother in Australia) which was quite out of the ordinary. Why?

I couldn't get a mobile signal (I later found out that the mobile networks had been shut down) and when I turned on my computer, and fired up my web browser to the BBC (my homepage) I immediately saw what had happened.

The few hours that followed were oddly serene - I had slept through the worst terrorist bombing on British soil. I got through to my mother in Sydney on the landline (eventually) and she was distraught, having not heard from me. After calming her down, I called a few friends who I knew used the tube lines affected at their offices. They were all fine.

Later that day, and for the next few days, I had to walk everywhere as quite a bit of the tube network was shut down. London took on a completely different feel - people actually spoke to each other on the street, in queues and on the bus. There was a sense of "we're all in this together" as well as a sense of defiance - that we were not going to let the terrorists cow us into changing how we live in this great city.

(This photo taken at Embankment - Circle/District Line platform, looking east)