I stared into eyes of 7/7 bomber & saw moment he blew himself up – all I remember is a white flash… it was hell on earth

Scottish Sun

2 days ago

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A MAN who survived the 7/7 bombings has recalled the chilling moment he stared into the eyes of a terrorist just seconds before he blew himself up.
Dan Biddle, now 46, lost a spleen along with both legs and his left eye after a suicide bomb exploded next to him on a Tube train near Edgware Road station on that fateful morning 20 years ago.
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Dan Biddle recalls the moment he locked eyes with the suicide bomber Mohammad Sidique Khan
Credit: Olivia West
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The scene of the devastation near Edgware Road
Credit: Getty
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The bombed Edgware Road Circle Line train where six victims died
Credit: Gavin Rodgers
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Dan Biddle pictured above with the hero that saved his life, army medic Adrian Heili
Credit: Olivia West
In the morning rush hour on July 7, 2005, four home-grown Islamic terrorists detonated suicide bombs on three Underground trains and a bus killing 52 commuters and wounding 748.
Dan, was in touching distance of lead bomber Mohammad Sidique Khan, on a rush-hour London Underground Circle line train.
But despite surviving his near-fatal wounds against the odds, he can never forget the moment he locked eyes with the crazed bomber.
At 8.52am Dan was leaning against the Perspex partition at the front of the second carriage on the Tube train travelling from Edgware Road towards Paddington.
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Suicide bomber Khan, 30, from Leeds, was on the seat the other side of the Perspex, just six inches away.
In an exclusive chat with The Sun, Dan said: "As as we pulled out of Edgware Road station, I could feel somebody staring at me.
"I was just about to turn around and say, 'What are you looking at?', and I see him put his hand in the bag.
"He looked up at me, quickly lowered his eyes, put his right hand through the zip in the top of his bag and exploded himself.
'When the bomb went off in a brilliant white flash an immense amount of heat hit me."
Khan had detonated a homemade bomb - made using an al-Qaeda-devised chemical recipe - that he was carrying in his rucksack.
The catastrophic explosion severed both Dan Biddle's legs and sprayed coins into his face like bullets, blinding him in one eye.
With the one eye he had left he looked around the wrecked train and he confessed that the carnage he witnessed still haunts him decades on.
Speaking to The Sun in a new documentary that said: "Straight after the explosion, you could have heard a pin drop. It was almost as if everybody had just taken a big breat.
"And then it was like opening the gates of hell. Screaming like I've never heard before."
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The device killed David Foulkes, 22, Jennifer Nicholson, 24, Laura Webb, 29, Jonathan Downey, 34, Colin Morley and Michael Brewster, both 52.
Dan continued: "It was as if someone had pumped the carriage up to the maximum it could take and then sucked it out really quickly.
'The hand pole from the carriage speared my body before I bounced out of the train headfirst, hit the tunnel wall and landed in the crawlspace with a big chunk of metal on top of me.
"My arms and hands were alight and my face was burnt as well."
And now, as survivors prepare to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the 7/7 bombings, construction worker Dan faces fresh agony.
Because while the great and the good will join survivors and families of the 52 dead at St Paul's Cathedral on July 7, Dan will not be one of them.
Despite being the most injured survivor of the London bombings, both he and the hero who saved his life have not been invited.
Dan only survived because brave former Army medic Adrian Heili ignored his own injuries to crawl under the mangled carriage to stop him bleeding to death.
The former military medic had blood pouring down his face and a dislocated shoulder but instead of fleeing he stepped over several charred bodies and headed towards Dan's cries for help.
The pair who are best of pals have supported each other through the horrors they have each endured in the last 20 years since fate brought them together amid the nightmare of Britain's first suicide bombing.
Dan added: 'I've died three times on an operating table and had the same number of goes at killing myself. Luckily, the doctors were brilliant at saving my life and I was crap at ending it.
'It's 20 years since the bombing and it's still as crystal clear in my head now as if it happened 30 seconds ago.'
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First responder Paul Dadge helps an injured passenger at Edgware Road tube station
Credit: AP