London has been hit by a powerful explosion during the rush hour this morning as commuters headed to work on the city’s subway. The blast left 22 people injured.
According to media reports, an improvised explosive device (IED) went off on a Tube train in south-west London at about 8:20 a.m. local time (3:20 a.m. ET). London’s Metropolitan Police are treating the incident as an act of terror and have called in the MI5, country’s domestic counter-intelligence agency, to look into the explosion.
“The Parsons Green tube bomb was several times the size of the device used in the Manchester Arena attack and could have caused 'devastation' if it had detonated as intended,” London-based newspaper Daily Mirror confirmed. Twenty-two people died and more than hundred were injured in that Islamist terror attack that took place on May 22, 2017. The newspaper further reported:
The explosion is believed to have been caused by a home-made device contained in a large white tub and wrapped in a Lidl carrier bag.
It is believed that the improvised explosive device did not detonate properly.
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Hamish De Bretton-Gordon, the Ministry of Defence's former Assistant Director of Intelligence Surveillance, said the size of the device is alarming as it was several times bigger than that used in the Manchester Bomb attack.
"It looks like a pretty unsophisticated device and I think we have been pretty fortunate as it doesn't seem to have detonated as intended," said de Bretton-Gordon.
On Twitter, President Donald Trump reacted to the London Subway attack, saying, “Another attack in London by a loser terrorist. These are sick and demented people who were in the sights of Scotland Yard. Must be proactive!”
Stressing the need for a stricter travel ban from terrorism-ridden countries, he added, “The travel ban into the United States should be far larger, tougher and more specific-but stupidly, that would not be politically correct!”
This is the 5th terror attack on the British soil this year; 6 other plots have been foiled during the same period.
