Double Strike at Heart of London
By David Williams, Stephen Wright and Charlotte Gill
A SECOND car bomb was defused last night in the heart of London, raising fears that others could be primed and parked around the capital.
The petrol, gas and nail bomb was discovered in a Mercedes towed to a car pound after being found illegally parked in the West End.
The vehicle had been left just yards from the spot outside a nightclub where two bomb-disposal officers risked their lives to make the first rigged car safe.
With vapour coming from the 60 litres of petrol, gas cylinders and nails packed inside, the pair entered the vehicle to disable the mobile phone trigger device.
Anti-terrorist officers say the bomb was primed to explode minutes later, around 2am yesterday, as up to 800 revellers spilled from the Tiger Tiger club on to the Haymarket.
The discovery of two devices has left anti-terror detectives asking ‘How many more?’ as thousands of officers searched the capital for other suspect vehicles and for the terrorist cell.
They are keenly aware that in previand ous major attacks on the capital at least four bombs were used.
One officer said London had enjoyed ‘extraordinarily good fortune’ in escaping mass slaughter.
The second car had been parked close to the first and was believed to have been timed to explode around 15 minutes after the initial blast, targeting rescue workers and emergency services as they tended the wounded.
Had either or both gone off, experts said hundreds could have died or suffered appalling injuries in a fireball that would have spread 100 yards down Haymarket.
Red-hot shrapnel from the remains of the vehicle and nails on its floor in the boot would have torn through the air at hundreds of miles an hour, causing maximum casualties.
‘It would have been a massive fireball,’ said one source.
‘There is no doubt that it would have killed and injured hundreds of people. If it had gone off it would have been carnage.’ The Baghdad-style attack would have mirrored those carried out by Al Qaeda and immediate suspicion fell yesterday on Islamic extremists.
Two Al Qaeda-linked plots using car bombs to target nightclubs have been foiled by Scotland Yard and MI5 in the last two years but yesterday’s attack was the closest the terrorists have been to success.
It emerged last night that hours before the first bomb was found, a message on a jihadist website proclaimed: ‘Today I say: Rejoice by Allah, London shall be bombed.’ Posted in the ‘Al Hesbah’ chatroom, the message suggested the attack was linked to the war in Iraq and to the controversial author Salman Rushdie, whose award of a knighthood earlier this month sparked outrage in the Islamic world.
Only a chance sequence of events begun by a drunken man requiring medical treatment outside the club led to the Haymarket bomb being deactivated.
An ambulance crew called to the ‘London shall be bombed’ scene saw what they thought was smoke – which is now believed to be petrol vapour – coming from a light green Mercedes apparently abandoned on the pavement a few feet from the club at 1.30am.
They called the police after seeing gas canisters and petrol containers in the vehicle.
As the area was sealed off and up to 800 evacuated from the club to join hundreds of others on the West End’s streets, bomb disposal officers who rushed to the scene deactivated the trigger mechanism.
The Haymarket is in the very heart of London, close to Piccadilly Circus and Leicester Square and half a mile from Downing Street.
The second car bomb – a blue 280E Mercedes – was parked illegally in Cockspur Street, which leads from Haymarket to Trafalgar Square. It was towed away by a Westminster Council lorry.
Again, a device with two mobile phones linked by wire to canisters on the back seat is said to have been found inside.
A security source said the lack of a mobile signal in the car pound underneath Hyde Park may have prevented the bomb going off there.
Park Lane car park employee Ispan Chowdhury, 39, said: ‘This blue Mercedes came in at 3.15am. My colleague said that there was something smelling inside the car.
‘He said it smelt like gas. He said not to take it into the car park and to leave it outside the office.’ He said police told staff to evacuate the pound at 1.15pm and officers spent the afternoon examining up to 700 cars in it. The blue Mercedes contained very similar materials to those of the first car – fuel, gas canisters and nails.
Scotland Yard Deputy Assistant Commissioner Peter Clarke said: ‘This, like the first device, was potentially viable and was made safe by the explosives officers.
The vehicles are clearly linked.
‘The discovery of what appears to be a second bomb is obviously troubling and reinforces the need for the public to be alert.’ Last night as police hunted a new terrorist cell, a massive review of security was under way, with tomorrow’s Princess Diana memorial concert at Wembley Stadium, to be attended by Princes William and Harry, a particular concern.
The foiled bombing came just a week before the second anniversary of the Al Qaeda inspired July 7 suicide bombings on London’s transport system that left 52 innocent people dead.
A terrorist atrocity had been feared in the days leading up to Tony Blair standing down as Prime Minister but the terrorists chose instead to launch their attack within hours of Gordon Brown taking over at 10 Downing Street.
Huge areas of Central London were sealed off yesterday as forensic officers examined the scene.
Footage from hundreds of CCTV and congestion charge cameras was being studied.
It was hoped the cameras will have captured images of the bomber fleeing the scene and indicate whether accomplices were dropped off from the vehicle.
Serial numbers on the gas cylinders should also reveal where they were bought.
Michael Clarke, a defence expert at King’s College London, said that the bomb gang would have left plenty of clues at the scene.
‘Any car coming into central London would be on a lot of surveillance footage,’ the professor added. ‘Also nobody can make a bomb without leaving behind a lot of DNA.’ The Government’s emergency response committee, Cobra, met within hours of the bomb’s discovery.
The current threat level for terrorism in the UK, set by MI5, is classed as ‘severe’, one level lower than the highest ‘critical’.
Last night police were checking for links to a massive car bomb found by French police near Aix-en-Provence.
d.williams@dailymail.co.uk Comment – Page 14
HOW TERROR GANG TRIED TO DEVASTATE THE CAPITAL HOW TERROR GANG TRIED TO DEVASTATE THE CAPITAL heart of London TRIED TO DEVASTATE THE CAPITAL
The first car was packed with 13 gallons of petrol, gas cylinders and nails. It was parked within feet of the exit doors of Tiger Tiger, a Haymarket nightclub. Police believe the bomb was to be detonated at 2am, when 800 nightclubbers were due to leave. The blast would have triggered a fireball that would have spread up to 100metres with red hot shrapnel firing in all directions.
Bomb 1
The second vehicle was a blue Mercedes and contained a ‘considerable amount’ of explosive material and nails. It was found in Cockspur Street, a few hundred yards from the first car, and given a parking ticket at 2.30am before being towed to an underground car park in Park Lane (above) at 3.30am.
Police cleared the pound yesterday afternoon to deactivate the bomb.
Bomb 2
Five or six canisters of propane gas of varying sizes, divided between the boot and the back seat.
13 gallons of petrol in plastic containers, again divided between boot and back seat
Mobile phones one on the back seat and one in the boot, connected by wire to a detonating device. When the phone rang the circuit would have completed and ignited the petrol..
The first device was disabled at around 1.30am by police bomb disposal experts, who had been alerted by an ambulance crew who saw smoke coming from the Mercedes..
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