UK News 08-09-2003 London`s Mock Apocalypse who: Ken Livingstone what: Says terror attack drill was "essential" where: LONDON when: Yesterday snippet: "A mock terror strike turned part of London into an apocalyptic nightmare yesterday," says The Sun. "Hundreds of police, fire and ambulance crews in special chemical suits swooped on a Tube station in the heart of the City for the simulated chemical attack exercise. The Square Mile was cordoned off and signs reading Decontamination Zone were set up in the streets as emergency teams went down into Bank underground station to rescue dozens of `casualties`." "In an exercise designed to be as realistic as possible, it was assumed that terrorists had struck, using a substance similar to the poisonous gas Sarin," explains The Guardian. "The operation was intended to test how the emergency services work together and the effectiveness of new equipment purchased in the aftermath of September 11." The statistics are chilling, says Adam Fresco of The Times. The "victims... had to wait almost half an hour before help arrived. And it took three hours for the last of them to be brought to the surface," he writes, complaining that the exercise was not realistic enough because there were no sirens, no tourists or commuters and "scores of personnel" were "walking around without protective clothing". "Today is about testing the new equipment," says mayor Ken Livingstone. "This is the first time we`ve had this much protective clothing and we want to see how long it takes firefighters wearing that to get down and pick up a body and bring it up." Meanwhile, the apparently real threat of global terrorism is spelled out in The Scotsman, which describes Iraq as "the new battleground" as intelligence reveals that supporters of the terrorist network are "pouring" over the borders from Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Turkey. [... more]

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