The Numeral

Orange

2007-03-04T17:11:00.000Z

The Day The Bombs Came

2007-01-03T08:26:00.000Z

Image Captures

Journey through the Crossover

2006-11-25T13:12:00.000Z

Starting from the eastbound platform, going west

On the crossover

Joining the westbound track 1

Joining the westbound track 2

Russell Square ahead

More Screenshots from The Tube Show

2006-11-20T01:04:00.000Z

Platform 5 at KXSP, showing the rear four cars moved back into the station.

Farringdon Sidings, I think

TrackerNet Images from The Tube Show

2006-11-16T23:13:00.000Z

The Tube Show

2006-11-16T21:21:00.000Z

Model showing train 204 and two Metropolitan line train in Aldgate Station.

Model showing H&C train 235 stopped on the North Curve and a District Line train.

Between King's Cross and Russell Square

2006-02-16T21:12:00.000Z

The tunnel is 820m long. The layout of the track is important. Here is a link to a map of part of it. Starting 70m from the King's Cross platform is the trailing crossover, a piece of track that joins the eastbound and westbound tracks. It is 115m long and is constructed as a wide diameter tunnel.

Weaselbitch was in the 5th carriage of train 331:

When I got to the Picadilly Line platform London Underground were announcing delays on that line too, and you could tell. The platform was packed. I decided to make my way to the other end because it’s usually slightly less crowded down there. I just managed to squeeze onto the train in the second to last carriage. From what I’ve read/heard I think the bomb must have gone off in either the first or the third carriage from the front.

The train departed as normal. When I was describing it to thessalian and dodgyhoodoo last night I said we were about 30 seconds out of Kings Cross. The reports I’ve read since say it was 3 minutes, so all I can really say now is that it was “not long”. I was reading an article in the paper about London winning the bid to host the 2012 Olympics.

Suddenly there was an almighty bang, the train stopped, all the lights went out and the carriage was filled with thick, dark grey smoke.
...
One of the main reasons I think we were quite slow getting to the point of deciding to smash one of the windows is that we were in a very narrow tunnel. There was about a maximum of a foot's clearance on either side between the train and the curved tunnel wall. If we'd got outside the train we would have had to make our way along the side of the train propped up between the train and the tunnel wall. We didn't know about the fork in tunnel up ahead. I think this would have been where the people who'd smashed their window and climbed out came from.

At least part of the 5th carriage was in narrow tunnel. This puts the rear of train 331 much closer to the KXSP platform than the 100m often stated. If the whole of the 6th and half of the 5th carriage were in narrow tunnel, then the rear of train 331 would have been only about 45m from the platform.

In addition, the front of train 331 would have been in wide tunnel. Any explosion in either the first or third carriage would not have been as destructive as the explosion in train 311 in narrow tunnel up ahead.

Joe Orr places the front of train 311 about 440m from King's Cross.

...start running towards Russell Square down the left hand side of the track to try to get help. I look at the 100metre measurements along the track to see how far it is to Russell Square - about 380 metres.

The impossible carriage 346A

2006-02-12T03:29:00.000Z

A note on Piccadilly Line 1973 Tube Stock car numbering.

Each car has four axles labelled A, B, C, D. Each car has an A end and a D end. The couplings at the A end are different from the couplings at the D end. Cars can only couple A to D. Three cars couple to form a half train. For example, 146-546-346. 146 is the A car of the half train. 346 is the D car.

A full train would be: 146-546-346-4xx-6xx-2xx.

346 would be the third or fourth carriage from the front, depending on which way the train was going.

Which train does the physical set 166-566-366-417-617-217 belong to?

The Tubeprune informs me that:

"Unit 166-566-366 was severly damaged, 366 is probably the only possible survivor but it has no other cars to work with at this time."

Since the explosion in 311 was near the rear of the first carriage and also damaged the second carriage, there is a strong presumption that 166 belonged to train 311, the train near Russell Square.

346A is impossible and 346D cannot be the first or second carriage.

Yet the articles below refer to it.

Blue Watch relive the bomb hell inside carriage 346A

the gruesome, hellish confines of carriage 346A

Suicide bomber Jermaine Lindsay was probably two to three feet away when he detonated his device in carriage 346A but a woman sitting between them took the full impact

The number of the Piccadilly Line train

2006-01-24T19:20:00.000Z

The saga begins with the press statement issued by TfL on July 9th:

London Underground, the Metropolitan Police and the British Transport Police can now confirm that the three bombs which exploded on three Tubetrains on Thursday 7 July 2005 went off simultaneously at around 08.50.

Explosions were as follows (in succession):

Circle line train number 204 heading eastbound from Liverpool Street station to Aldgate station.

Circle line train number 216 travelling westbound heading from Edgware Road station to Paddington station.

Piccadilly line train number 311 travelling from King's Cross St Pancras to Russell Square southbound.

London Underground operates a system called TrackerNet which allows staff to observe electronically the movement of rolling stock on the Tube network. It is presently being introduced for all London Underground lines and is in full operation on the Circle line.

After careful consideration of the recorded archive of realtime movements on the Circle line we can confirm the above for Circle line trains numbers 204 and 216 to have occurred within the space of one minute respectively.

Six images are available in the News Centre. The first three images show the sequence of train movements prior to and including the explosion at Aldgate. The remaining three show the sequence of train movements prior to and including the explosion at Edgware Road.

TrackerNet is not yet live on the Piccadilly line between Hyde Park Corner and Arnos Grove. However, we can also confirm for the affected Piccadilly line train that the explosion occurred simultaneously at 08:50. Our evidence is based upon the precise time the Tunnel Telephone system on the Piccadilly line went out of service.
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/press-centre/press-releases/press-releases-content.asp?prID=420

The Piccadilly Line train number was given as 311. However, by the 10th of July the number had changed to 331:

London Underground, the Metropolitan Police and the British Transport Police can now confirm that the three bombs which exploded on three Tube trains on Thursday 7 July went off simultaneously at around 08.50am.

Explosions were as follows (in succession):

Circle line train number 204 heading eastbound from Liverpool Street station to Aldgate station.

Circle line train number 216 travelling westbound heading from Edgware Road station to Paddington station.

Piccadilly line train number 331 travelling from King's Cross St Pancras to Russell Square southbound.

London Underground operates a system called TrackerNet which allows staff to observe electronically the movement of rolling stock on the Tube network. It is presently being introduced for all London Underground lines and is in full operation on the Circle line.

TrackerNet is a management information tool only and not a system onwhich to base safety critical decisions. This is complimentary to existing LU signalling and track systems which feed into the individual line control rooms.

After careful consideration of the recorded archive of realtime TrackerNet movements on the Circle line we can confirm the above for Circle line trains numbers 204 and 216 to have occurred within the space of one minute respectively.

TrackerNet is not yet live on the central section of the Piccadilly Line. However, we can also confirm for Piccadilly line train 331 that the explosion occurred simultaneously at 08:50:00. Our evidence is based upon the precise time the Tunnel Telephone system went out of service.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/content/articles/2005/07/12/bomb_timeline_feature.shtml

Last year I wrote to TfL asking whether the number 311 was a typo. I received the following reply on Nov 24th:

Our ref: 1035453
19/Nov/2005

Dear xxxxxx

Thank you for your email dated 5 November.

I can confirm that the Piccadilly train involved on 7 July was the westbound train no 331. The initial reports that we received immediately at the time were incorrect and we updated our records accordingly as soon as we were advised.

Thank you for taking the time to contact us. Please let me know if you< have any further queries or if you need any help in the future.

Yours sincerely

Fola Olafare
Customer Service Centre

Subsequently there have been some significant developments, in view of which I replied to TfL as follows:

Dear Ms Olafare

Thank you for your reply.

A curious development has occurred concerning the number of the Piccadilly Line train. A blogger, Rachel North of London, has written:

At Kings Cross, we met Ranesh and Allen from LU, who explained that they had cordoned off a part of the Westbound Piccadilly line platform for us to say the words I posted in the entry below. We met up with David, the station manager of Russell Square, who ran into the tunnel to rescue us, and Tom and Ray the drivers of train 311, and Steve and Gerard the police officers who conducted the rescue & evacuation operation of the< passengers entering from Kings Cross. All are now members of KCU. And we are very proud to have them in the group.

http://rachelnorthlondon.blogspot.com/

(search in page for 311)

Further, the duty manager at Russell Square station is reported as saying:

'I will take 7 July to the grave'

Behind the worldwide headlines after the 7 July bombings lay hundreds of individual stories of bravery, hope and loss. Among those who experienced the horrors was Gary Stevens, duty manager of Russell Square Tube station.

It's a day I'll never forget. It will go to the grave with me. It won't ever go away.

On the seventh of July I should have started at 9 O'Clock. I woke early, I couldn't sleep and decided to come into work early.

At 8.54 all the lights flickered in the office. We were looking down the platform and we saw a light in the westbound tunnel. The driver of train 311 and about 30 customers, some of them seriously injured, had got out of the train themselves when the bomb had gone off, and we helped them up.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4566632.stm

Have you been advised of a second change to the number of the train?

The reply confirmed it was train 331:

Our ref: 1084546<

17/Jan/2006

Dear xxxxxxx

Thanks for your further email.

As stated in my previous email, the Piccadilly train involved on 7 July was the westbound train no 331 The initial reports that we received immediately at the time were incorrect and have now been subsequently updated.
Thank you for taking the time to contact us. Please get in touch if I can be of any further help.

Yours sincerely

Fola Olafare
Customer Service Centre

There were two people in the cab of train 311, Tom the driver and Ray Wright, another T/Op who was on his way to work at Acton Town. It was Ray Wright who Gary Stevens saw emerging from the tunnel.

Ray Wright's account is at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4694801.stm

He also posted on the rachelnorthlondon blog (now deleted):

Not wishing to denigrate any of the actions of police on the day, not ONE WORD has been said about the driver of Train 311, Tom. I joined Tom's train at Kings Cross,travelling in the cab with him on my way to work as a fellow driver, based at Acton Town. I took the first couple of batches of walking wounded to Russell Square and was probably the first member of staff to meet any collegue at the station. Tom stayed behind in the first car, doing what we as drivers are paid to do, looking after his train and his passengers on it. He helped some by applying tourniques and reassurring others. He saw things that even trained police officers found themselves unable to cope with, but most importantly had to face it on his own before help arrived probably 40 minutes later, a scene of utter devastation in almost total darkness. He has never been mentioned or praised, he has remained dignified and quiet, and has never returned to drive a train. Recently he applied for some compensation through his union. The response from the Met Police was "We have no knowledge of this person having been involved in this incident and therefore will not be processing his claim further." Rather odd because Tom and I were interviewed by police for around three hours after the incident. The press coverage of the other 'heroes' has left him feeling completely empty and devalued. Pity when the the reaction of Police and certain members of station staff are lauded he has been completely forgotten.

Ray Wright
Train Operator
Acton Town Depot

In order understand how such a state of affairs could have come about I have attempted a reconstruction of the events in the Piccadilly Line tunnel. After the explosions westbound train 331 was halted near to the point where the trailing crossover from the eastbound joins the westbound tunnel, which is 185m south of the King's Cross platform. Westbound train 311 was nearer Russell Square, 380m away. This is very brief. Further information is available at:

http://bridgetdunnes.blogspot.com/2006/01/mystery-of-non-existent-train-drivers.html
http://antagonise.blogspot.com/2006/01/london-77-information-event-horizon.html
http://antagonise.blogspot.com/2006/01/not-dead-yet.html
http://team8plus.org/forum_viewtopic.php?9.1914.0

The BBC TracketNet Animation

2005-12-11T12:59:00.000Z

On 16th November 2005 the BBC broadcast 7/7: The Day The Bombs Came.

You can download it for offline viewing using the last freeware version of NetTransfer.

Image 1

Note how the number 204 is black while the number 211 is yellow.

Image 2

Note how train 204 passes a signal set at danger.

Image 3

Note how train 204 passes another signal set at danger.

Image 4

Did this really happen? No. No train other than train 204 moves. No signal changes colour. What we are seeing is an animation based on a single TrackerNet still showing train 204 at Liverpool Street platform 1. In the original still the number 204 would have been yellow but this has been erased from the still as we see it. The box with the black 204 is held in the middle of the frame while the doctored still is moved left. This gives the impression of train 204 moving down the track.

It is a fake. In war truth is the first casualty.

This is a genuine TracketNet image.

Car Numbers

2005-11-28T21:01:00.000Z

This photo shows a car number, 6548, of a Circle Line train involved in 7/7. It is a trailer car. Its matching driving motor car, out of shot to the left, will have number 5548. I suspect this is at Aldgate Junction and the train is Circle Line train 204.

This shows the damaged car 6713, another trailer car. The front, driving motor car of the train will be 5713.

The first four cars are then 5548-6548-6713-5713

Tube related information from The Tube Prune and Clive Feather