A Terrible Day

I didn’t get any work done today. Not until this evening at least. I’ve spent the day watching the terrible events in London unfold.

I did think about blogging about it earlier, but there seemed little point. Anyone reading my blog is bound to have heard about it elsewhere beforehand. And anything I say would just be re-iterating what other have already said. I am surprised at how few fatalities there’ve been (so far, perhaps). I have been impressed with how well the emergency services have reacted, and generally with how well London seems to be picking itself up and dusting itself down.

It was interesting to discover that most of the people I know in London are bloggers - it was reassuring to tick them off one by one as they posted to let everyone know they were okay.

It’s also interesting how much information and communication I have access to. I first heard about the attacks on IRC, and soon after decamped to the front room in front of the TV. The TV was the best source for facts, as they scale better than websites for disseminating information to lots of people. BBC News 24 seemed to do a more responsible job - reporting which facts were officially confirmed, and pretty clearly marking what was rumour - much better than ITN or Sky News.

Instant messenger meant I could discuss events, and exchange facts and rumours with friends up and down the country, and even abroad; and text messaging meant I could find out that my friend in London was okay, although things will no doubt be a bit strange when she got into work this evening at St. Thomas’s Hospital (South of the river, so probably not too involved).

And blogs and digital (or even mobile phone) cameras have provided a less filtered, unofficial, but more real view on events. Tom Reynolds has posted about his day, something I’d been waiting for all day, given his job at the London Ambulance Service. I’m sure there’ll be interesting posts from him over the coming days. Via Mike, there’s a a detailed report from someone caught in one of the tube explosions. And all day there more and more photos have been appearing in two Flickr photo pools for the explosions.

My thoughts are with the victims and their families.