August 27, 2004

Aldwych drama part 2

Social Commentary

So yesterday we were not so much alerted, but kinda whispered to on the grapevine that we were locked in our building as there was a suspect package on a bus outside our office. In the end it was only a bag left behind or something, but it does highlight for me two issues.

1. Terrorist bombs, well its very expensive, and potentially lethal to the carrier, to plant bombs in London. Also if you get caught you will get sent to prison for quite a while (and if the american's get their hand on you probably abused for fun).

But, considering the chaos caused by suspect packages, tubes closing at rush hour (for 4 hours or so), bus and traffic routes being closed off, people being stopped going back in their offices after lunch to do more work (yay!), and the cost incurred by these in terms of hours lost / cash lost to buinesses and london / uk as a whole;

Why don't the terrorists stop meddling with all these dangerous chemicals, rockets and viruses and just plant cheese sandwich laden spiderman lunchboxes all round the city, and watch it grind to a halt.

Obviously, I amd very far from condoning terrorist action or an cheese sandwich abuse of any sort. But you think, by now, the police / bomb squad would have some way of detecting whether a package really is dangerous or not, before causing major gridlock of whatever variety. Its obviously good to be vigilant in telling people if you see a suspect package, it scares me some times how easy it would be to get on a bus at willsden green, stick a parcel under the seat at the back of the bus, or even that lugage shelf near the front, and have it delived to the centre of London for you.

Oh and the second point is; Police, they seem happy to cordon off roads and allow people to panic / think the worst, why don't they just put up a sign saying what the problem is and let people decide whether to rubberneck or run away.

Posted by nickh at August 27, 2004 09:39 AM

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