A simulated terror attack on London’s tube network tested the capital’s emergency response capabilities on Tuesday, five days after a gunman killed at least 30 Britons on a beach in Tunisia.
Armed men in balaclavas were seen on a London street, “victims” were treated by emergency services and sounds of gunfire emerged from a disused part of the underground network during the drill.
The exercise, planned since January, was sometimes “noisy and visible” as the Metropolitan police had warned, though the force stressed there had been no intelligence about any imminent attack.
The two-day operation, which began on Tuesday and is codenamed Strong Tower, is designed to test responses to such an attack. London’s largest ever counter-terror drill included intelligence officers, transport services and the Ministry of Defence among 14 different organisations and agencies.
The Metsays it now arrests on average one person a day for possible terror offences and believes it has disrupted some “very serious” plots.
Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, the Met’s commissioner, said before the exercise started that mistakes were bound to be made “but best we make them today in an environment in which we don’t have terrorists than make those mistakes when we do.”
The Met tweeted updates about the training on #999exercise, which involved police officers playing the part of armed terrorists “attacking” members of the public.
Paramedics and fire officers could also be seen carrying casualties, played by actors, out of the station on stretchers while sirens wailed in the surrounding streets. The simulation involved the use of the disused tube station Aldwych and the closure of Surrey Street, running from t he Strand to the Thames.
The Charlie Hebdo attack in Paris, the hostage siege in Sydney , and the Mumbai terror attacks are among events that influenced planning for the test. The Met’s deputy assistant commissioner Maxine de Brunner, asked about Friday’s attack in Tunisia, said it was likely to be taken into account in future.
“Sadly, London is no stranger to terrorism,” she said. “Given the changing nature of the very real terrorism threat and events around the world we need to constantly adapt our plans and prepare for new or emerging threats.”
