Students safe after close calls with London bombings

LONDON -- Students attending Loyola's Summer Session in London were not injured in the terrorist bombings of the London transportation system this morning. Many students were in class when the bombs exploded, but a few were on London's underground train, also called the "tube." Several other students were near the Edgware Road station when a bomb exploded there shortly after 9 a.m., London time. Chris Nakamoto, communications junior, said he had almost arrived at the station to ride the tube to class when he heard sirens and noticed something was wrong. "People were coming out of the station with blood and soot on their faces," he said. "The people on the trains didn't even know what happened. I talked to a lady who came out, and she said she saw people injured, but she wasn't sure what had happened. "I was sitting there as they blocked it off and brought out the bomb-sniffing dogs." "I was outside of Edgware when the bomb went off. You could actually hear it go off. (It sounded) like a loud thud, you didn't really know it was a bomb," said Blake Muxo, business management sophomore. Muxo said he saw people coming out of the station with "minor cuts and bruises." "The police were trying to cover it up, saying there were minor electrical malfunctions," he said. "They were quickly pushing everyone away. You knew it had to be something serious." Chris Chivleatto, a fourth-year pharmacy student at Xavier University in New Orleans, said he was on the tube with his roommate, Tyler Mellos, an engineering science sophomore at Trinity University in San Antonio, Tex., when the bomb exploded. "We accidentally took the train going in a different direction," Chivleatto said. "Then as we were heading back the other way, we were in the station next to Edgware, and (an announcer) said that 'we've been instructed to stop,'" Chivleatto said. "The bomb exploded on the stop we were supposed to be at," Mellos said. "The station was packed, because everyone was getting off. There was a rush of people out of the stations, trying to take buses," Chivleatto said. The male students are staying in an area of London away from the female students and take the tube to class each morning. The four separate explosions, three in the underground and one on a double-decker bus, occurred between 8 and 10 a.m. London time, according to the BBC. More than 30 people have been confirmed dead as of press time. "We know how it feels after 9/11. Luckily, all of our people are safe," said William Hammel, associate professor of communications. "I'm hoping (the terrorists) hit once and then crawl back into the dreadful holes from which they came. "Everybody is fine. Everybody is accounted for - and urged to call their parents. We have had a lot of calls from parents, and we have assured them we are out of harm's way. "Tomorrow we go to Blenheim Place in Oxford in our own motor coach. So we won't be using public transportation." Hammel and David Moore, chair of the history department, are coordinating the summer session. The 17th annual session of Loyola's London program began Tuesday.