EMERGENCY teams are facing the traumatic task of counting and indentifying the dead in the makeshift base of a King’s Cross hotel tonight (Thursday) following the bomb blasts which ripped through three underground stations (Liverpool Street Station, Edgeware Road Tube Station and King's Cross Station) and obliterated a double-decker bus in Tavistock Square.
While charred bodies are taken to the Holiday Inn in Euston Road, scarred survivors who limped free from the carnage are being treated in hospitals across the capital.
They are the victims of terrorist attacks on the underground which brought the capital to a chilling standstill during what is normally the bustling morning rush hour.
The first blast occurred in an underground tunnel 100 yards from Liverpool Street station at around 8.50am, followed soon after by a wild explosion in a tunnel between King’s Cross and Russell Square.
Initial reports blamed a power surge.
But at 9.17am, the Edgware Road bomb fired glass through three Tube carriages, leaving five dead in the blast, and police and politicians in little doubt that terrorists had unleashed a deadly attack.
The attacks also coincided with a devastating explosion on a bus in Woburn Place, Bloomsbury, which wreaked further havoc and claimed the lives of at least seven passengers.
More than 38 people are thought to have perished in the four explosions but the death toll is likely to rise.
An Islamist website has posted a statement claiming al-Qaeda was behind the attacks.
Around 1,000 are believed to have been injured overall.
Nearly 60 patients were taken to the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead, three needed amputations. Among them was a female doctor who was on the bombed bus. She is believed to have been badly burned.
At the University College Hospital in Bloomsbury, around 50 casualties were treated.
Student nurse Yezen Sheena said: "The first patient I saw was a female with severe burns that you would expect from a blast. I was shocked but everyone pulled together and at one point one of the senior consultants came down to applaud everyone’s work."
Other injured passengers were taken to St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington, Great Ormond Street Hospital in Holborn and the Royal London Hospital in Mile End.
Helicopter emergency teams dropped doctors off in Argyle Square, while staff at Camden Town Hall in Judd Street opened the council chamber to receive the walking wounded from the King's Cross bomb.
Blast survivors at King’s Cross told of how they battled to break free from a crowded Tube train carriage as they were submerged in clouds of thick black smoke.
Eamonn Spelman, 47, was one of the passengers who had to walk to safety along the underground tracks.
He said: "Just after we pulled out of King’s Cross Station there was a huge red flash and the train dipped. I was in the third carriage which filled up with thick black smoke. I put my handkerchief over my mouth. Someone had smashed open a window and people had forced open two of the doors. The smoke came in and we had to get out. I had a light on my key-ring. I saw people with burnt hair and blood on their faces — people with head injuries were carried off."
Mr Spelman, who was on his way to Harrod’s, where he works in the carpet section, added: "We got out and walked about 400 yards down the tracks. There were masses of people crammed in shoulder to shoulder."
At street level, onlookers saw charred corpses carried out onto the roadside.
Piano removal man Rob Deller, 26, was working in Argyle Street, close to King’s Cross station.
He said: "We saw four burned bodies pulled out onto the street near the post office. They were lined up on the pavement and then put in an ambulance. One woman’s body was covered in a red blanket but you could still see her face. I thought that wasn’t very dignified and couldn’t believe they just left her face for all to see."
Carl Saunders, 34, said: "The police were just shouting at people to clear the area and they were just legging it."
There were shocking accounts from Tavistock Square too where witnesses were told to run from the scene after a blast ripped through a Number 30 bus which plies the route between Hackney and Marble Arch.
Frances Aboushousha, 42, is the manager of Valencia sandwich shop on the corner of Marchmont Place and Tavistock Place.
She said her regular customers were crying and shaking as they came into the shop.
Emma Taylor, 22, said: I was on a bus near Tavistock Crescent and we suddenly got evacuated. Police told us to just run away and we just ran. I ran around the corner into Russell Square and people were being pulled out of the station covered in blood. People were crying and people were saying there were more people stuck under ground."
One passenger on the Bloomsbury bus was a doctor who sustained serious burns. She is in a serious condition at the Royal Free.
Father-of-two Peter McKee, 41, said: "We were walking about 50 feet from the bus when the bomb exploded, ripping off the top deck like a tin of sardines. I got covered in glass and just grabbed my wife and my parents and ran into an office block."
Mr McKee, a holidaymaker staying at the Ambassador's Hotel in Tavistock Place, added: "Then the walking wounded came in and they were in bad shape. Their clothes were shredded and they were covered in cuts and blood. Everyone was dazed."
Passengers at Edgware Road station told grim scenes
Schools in Camden and Westminster will be closed.
Plans for a homecoming party for delegates who worked on London’s successful bid to stage the Olympic Games — currently in Singapore — have been cancelled.
Mayor of London Ken Livingstone said: "This was a cowardly attack, which has resulted in injury and loss of life. Our thoughts are with everyone who has been injured, or lost loved ones. I want to thank the emergency services for the way they have responded."