'Stupid person couldn't even blow up a bucket': London Tube terror attack survivors return to work in defiance

A police forensic tent at the scene of the attack at Parsons Green station
PA
Daniel Omahony18 September 2017
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Survivors of the Parsons Green terror attack today returned to their daily commutes in defiance, saying: “I won’t stop taking the tube because of some idiot.”

Barely 72 hours after the homemade device partially exploded on a District Line train, injuring 30 people, defiant passengers caught up in the blast described how they were planning to go about their regular Monday morning commute.

Sylvain Pennec, 36, a software developer from Southfields, was about 10 metres from Friday’s explosion and filmed the smouldering “bucket bomb” on his phone as he left the train.

He said: “I don’t want to live scared, so I just keep on going on with my life. If it stops me taking the tube it means the terrorists have won. I don’t want to stop taking the tube because of some idiot.”

The bucket believed to have caused the explosion at Parsons Green ()
Kett News

Mr Pennec, who celebrated his 36th birthday a day after the bombing, said he would have taken the District Line home on Friday evening if the line had not been closed.

He added: “Maybe I will have some thoughts when we stop at Parsons Green, but I think that’s normal.”

Sylvain Pennec, 36, was on the train when the bucket exploded

Beauty consultant Emma Stevie, 27, said she “thought I was going to die” after being caught in the crush of fleeing passengers on the stairs of the south west London station after a fireball ripped through the train at about 8.20am.

She said: “After getting out of the station I was so relieved to be alive it was almost euphoric.

Parsons Green explosion incident on the Tube - In pictures

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"I was happy that the stupid person that made that bomb was so incompetent it didn’t work. They couldn’t even blow up a bucket.

“I don’t think the people who plant these bomb care about my attitude. They didn’t care about that little schoolboy.

Emma Stevie, 27, said she “thought I was going to die” in the crush when fleeing the train

“I’m just going to do the British thing, keep calm and carry on.”

Ms Stevie, who was left “quite bruised” from the stampede to exit the station, said she was “still happy” to live in Parsons Green despite the attack.

She added: “I still feel pretty safe. I don’t think it was supposed to go off there. We always joke that terrorists don’t even know where Parson’s Green is.

“It was just quite a crazy Friday morning.”

A woman is led to safety after the attack at Parsons Green
Kerry Davies/Daily Mail

Finance director Michael Bennett, 38, who “felt the heat of the flames” of Friday’s blast from his spot in the rear carriage, said he had no plans to alter his daily commute.

He said: ““When it really hit me was when I heard that it was a partially exploded device, because then it’s more like: what if? But If I don’t get the tube as normal, then when do I?”

Schoolchildren caught up ion the bomb were also set to take the route again to school.

Emergency workers help people to disembark a train near the Parsons Green
Pool via AP

Among those injured in the attack was schoolboy, Alex Ojeda-Sierra, 13, from Morden, south London.

The London Oratory pupil was trampled as commuters desperately tried to exit the station.

Armed police patrol the train after the attack
AFP/Getty Images

Describing his ordeal he said: ‘One man fell on me and my legs bent backwards and my right ankle got twisted. I started screaming that I had no air.”

He was later pictured being carried to safety by two firefighters.

Two people have been arrested as part of the police probe into the attack.

CCTV showing a man carrying a Lidl bag just before the explosion on the Tube at Parsons Green has also been given to police.

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