Don't mess with us, we will ignore you
As far as I know everyone is OK.
London is a city uniquely conditioned to cope with this, tomorrow everyone will go to work and the shops will be open, the buses are running again (and have been for several hours) and most of the tube should be open tomorrow (may take a week for the lines hit by the blasts though).
If the purpose of terrorism is to terrorise they picked the wrong place, London has had something like 17 terrorist bombs in 20 years (I just missed one in 2001 on my way home from the pub one night)
London’s proudest memory is of being bombed every night by the entire Luftwaffe and refusing to be cowed. People are unlikely to be much more afraid tomorrow than yesterday.
An integral part of the experience of living in London is suffering daily misery of one sort or another, the transport system craps out all the time, the weather is either wet and miserable or so damn hot people pass out on the tube, for all those not directly affected by this the net result was less of a hassle than a tube and train drivers strike. London = Pain even when everything is going to plan.
The emergency services have been planning for this sort of thing for years, every time some idiot with some explosives has a go they have refined the plan and they practice it regularly using tube stations that are closed at the weekend and hundreds of volunteers as casualties.. Today was a model in major incident planning, every spare ambulance in the south of England congregated in Hyde park, every doctor and nurse for 50 miles around headed for the nearest hospital, London buses were commandeered to move the slightly injured to hospital in an orderly fashion. Thousands of people from builders to lawyers who were near hospitals lined up to give blood.
The services were prepared for thousands of casualties but thankfully they didn't have to deal with nearly that number.
The only thing that I have not been impressed with was the sensationalist behaviour of the news agencies, they were speculating pointlessly and just giving the terrorists what they want.
However after having seen some clips of CNN and other US news channels I feel a lot better about how the UK news handled it. The problem with commercialisation of TV news over the last few years is that now the channels compete to be more and more sensational in order to win the viewers and therefore the funding.
All that said 37 (expected to rise) people have been killed and a couple of dozen others maimed badly and the trauma for those involved must be awful.
But probably by this time next week this will be very old news and we can again get back to the serious business of wondering which celebrities are shagging each other.
At the end of the day we Brits are uniquely good at acting like nothing untoward is happening no matter what the situation, there was a classic story (may be a myth) of a couple having sex on a train, nobody paid the slightest bit of attention, acted like nothing was happening until they lit up a traditional post coital smoke, at that point the other passengers complained.
This somewhat quirky character trait is what we need now, just ignore the buggers publicly while the security services quietly bag the terrorists in private, eventually when they realise they are risking prison and death for no effect on us and minimal publicity they will stop what they are doing and sod off.
To those of you that have expressed concern, thank you for your thoughts and wishes.
London is a city uniquely conditioned to cope with this, tomorrow everyone will go to work and the shops will be open, the buses are running again (and have been for several hours) and most of the tube should be open tomorrow (may take a week for the lines hit by the blasts though).
If the purpose of terrorism is to terrorise they picked the wrong place, London has had something like 17 terrorist bombs in 20 years (I just missed one in 2001 on my way home from the pub one night)
London’s proudest memory is of being bombed every night by the entire Luftwaffe and refusing to be cowed. People are unlikely to be much more afraid tomorrow than yesterday.
An integral part of the experience of living in London is suffering daily misery of one sort or another, the transport system craps out all the time, the weather is either wet and miserable or so damn hot people pass out on the tube, for all those not directly affected by this the net result was less of a hassle than a tube and train drivers strike. London = Pain even when everything is going to plan.
The emergency services have been planning for this sort of thing for years, every time some idiot with some explosives has a go they have refined the plan and they practice it regularly using tube stations that are closed at the weekend and hundreds of volunteers as casualties.. Today was a model in major incident planning, every spare ambulance in the south of England congregated in Hyde park, every doctor and nurse for 50 miles around headed for the nearest hospital, London buses were commandeered to move the slightly injured to hospital in an orderly fashion. Thousands of people from builders to lawyers who were near hospitals lined up to give blood.
The services were prepared for thousands of casualties but thankfully they didn't have to deal with nearly that number.
The only thing that I have not been impressed with was the sensationalist behaviour of the news agencies, they were speculating pointlessly and just giving the terrorists what they want.
However after having seen some clips of CNN and other US news channels I feel a lot better about how the UK news handled it. The problem with commercialisation of TV news over the last few years is that now the channels compete to be more and more sensational in order to win the viewers and therefore the funding.
All that said 37 (expected to rise) people have been killed and a couple of dozen others maimed badly and the trauma for those involved must be awful.
But probably by this time next week this will be very old news and we can again get back to the serious business of wondering which celebrities are shagging each other.
At the end of the day we Brits are uniquely good at acting like nothing untoward is happening no matter what the situation, there was a classic story (may be a myth) of a couple having sex on a train, nobody paid the slightest bit of attention, acted like nothing was happening until they lit up a traditional post coital smoke, at that point the other passengers complained.
This somewhat quirky character trait is what we need now, just ignore the buggers publicly while the security services quietly bag the terrorists in private, eventually when they realise they are risking prison and death for no effect on us and minimal publicity they will stop what they are doing and sod off.
To those of you that have expressed concern, thank you for your thoughts and wishes.