UK: Taxi explodes outside Liverpool Women's Hospital, declared a terrorist incident, 14 Nov 2021

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Miracle survival of Liverpool cabbie who escaped Poppy Day car blast inside his taxi | Daily Mail Online


Rachel Perry wrote on Facebook: 'I would just like to thank each and every one of you who has messaged asking how David is. He is doing ok but is extremely sore and trying to process what's happened.

'There are a lot of rumours flying round about him being a hero and locking the passenger inside the car. But the truth of the matter is, he is without doubt, lucky to be alive. The explosion happened whilst he was in the car and how he managed to escape is an utter miracle. He certainly had some guardian angels looking over him.'

Experts believe that Mr Perry managed to escape with just cuts and bruises because of a faulty bomb.

Nick Aldworth, a former counter-terrorism national co-ordinator, told BBC Radio 4's Today Programme that from what he has seen there is 'very little blast damage' indicating that whatever was in the vehicle was 'low yield or didn't work properly, or possibly an incendiary'.
 
Police name suicide bomber who blew himself up in taxi outside Liverpool's Women's Hospital | Daily Mail Online

From the article, a bit of background:

A suicide bomber who died inside a taxi as it blew up outside a hospital in Liverpool on Remembrance Sunday was a Syrian asylum seeker who converted to Christianity and was once arrested for carrying a knife, MailOnline can reveal.

Enzo Almeni, 32, is thought to have suffered from mental health problems and was sectioned in around 2014 after being caught for brandishing a knife in central Liverpool, according to friends.

He arrived in the UK several years ago, and mostly lived in Liverpool, where he was being supported by Christian volunteers from a network of churches who help asylum seekers, it is understood.

In 2017, Almeni spent eight months living with devoted Christians Malcolm and Elizabeth Hitchott at their home in the Aigburth district of Liverpool.
 
Police name suicide bomber who blew himself up in taxi outside Liverpool's Women's Hospital - 247 News Around The World

247 News Around The World
''Almeni’s birth name is Emad Jamil Al-Swealmeen and is believed to have spent a large part of his life in Iraq, where his mother came from. The motor racing enthusiast changed his first name to Enzo in honour of the Ferrari founder Enzo Ferrari and to sound less Muslim and appear more Western, in the hope that it would help his asylum application.


He died after being locked in a cab by hero taxi driver David Perry as it exploded into a fireball outside Liverpool Women’s Hospital, seconds before the 11am minute’s silence was due to take place on Remembrance Sunday in what is being probed as a Poppy Day terror attack.

Almeni converted to Christianity in Liverpool’s Anglican Cathedral in March 2017, the very same place he asked Mr Perry to initially drive him to, which it is suspected was his initial target. But traffic and road closures meant that Almeni could not get to the cathedral where 1,200 military personnel, veterans and families of the fallen had gathered.

In 2017, Almeni spent eight months living with devoted Christians Malcolm and Elizabeth Hitchott at their home in the Aigburth district of the city.''

‘He was destitute at that time and we took him in.’
 
Minute by minute: How the suicide bomb horror at Liverpool Women's Hospital unfolded | Daily Mail Online
''1. Rutland Avenue

At around 10.45am on Remembrance Sunday, taxi driver David Perry pulls up to a Victorian red-brick house in the Sefton Park district of Liverpool.

His fare, a man of Middle Eastern origin, climbs into the Delta Taxis estate cab.

He keeps his luggage on the back seat beside him, and asks to be taken to Liverpool Women's Hospital.''

2. The Journey

This is a seven-minute drive, and at some point on the journey Mr Perry apparently becomes suspicious, with his passenger 'fiddling with something' on the back seat.

To his alarm, as he pulls up to the main hospital entrance, the man is said to have started 'vibrating' and 'flashing', according to a friend of the driver who said: 'David noticed the man had some kind of light attached to his clothing and was messing around with it.

'It didn't look right at all.'

3. Liverpool Women's Hospital

CCTV footage shows the shocking moment the taxi explodes, time-stamped 10:56am and 50 seconds.

The car swings into the picture around the mini roundabout, going slightly fast, and just before it comes to a halt outside reception, a blast shatters all the windows and sends the windscreen spinning 50ft into the air in a cloud of white smoke.

4. Fireball

The first flicker of orange flame appears about 30 seconds later, turning the car into a fireball within a minute.

Explosives experts suggest the bomb malfunctioned, with the blast caused by the detonator alone, and the bulk of the explosive material burning rather than exploding.

Mr Perry is taken to hospital with a partially severed ear and suspected spinal fracture.''

''5. Early investigation

1pm - The property on Rutland Avenue was cordoned off.

Investigators examining the man's phone records quickly identified 'associates' and an address on Sutcliffe Street, almost three miles across the city in the Kensington district, which was a hostel for asylum seekers.

At 2.30pm, on Sutcliffe Street, 47-year-old Keith Ford 'saw police everywhere'. Armed officers were swarming the hostel for asylum seekers run by Serco. ''

''Around 11.30pm on Sunday, eight families living in the next-door addresses were all evacuated.''
 
Liverpool Women's Hospital explosion: Four freed as suspect killed in blast named
''Four men arrested under terrorism laws following a bomb explosion outside Liverpool Women's Hospital on Sunday have been released without charge.

It comes after police named Emad Al Swealmeen as the man who died when a homemade device blew up in the back of a taxi shortly before 11.00 GMT.''

''He is believed to have originally come from the Middle East and went into the asylum system. But in recent years he may have converted to Christianity and also suffered from mental health issues.

The decision to declare this a terrorist incident looks less to be based on a clear understanding of his ideology and more on his methodology, with the use of an improvised explosive device.

However, investigators will still be hoping to gain a better understanding of what exactly lay behind this incident.''
 
Christian pensioners who opened their house to Liverpool suicide bomber tell of their shock | Daily Mail Online


Last night Mr Hitchcott, a former British Army soldier, said he felt 'numbed' to learn that the 'lovely man' who lived at his home for eight months was behind the plot. 'It's almost too impossible to believe,' he told the Daily Mail. 'There was nothing to suggest he could go on to become radicalised.'

He said Almeni had been arrested for possession of a 'large knife' after the rejection of his asylum claim in 2014, resulting in him being sectioned under the Mental Health Act and hospitalised for several months.
 
Liverpool bombing: Cabbie is seen with his head in his hands | Daily Mail Online

This is the moment heroic cabbie David Perry holds his head in his hands as he staggers from his wrecked taxi - seconds after a Poppy Day suicide bomber detonated a ball-bearing device on the back seat.

Dramatic CCTV footage showed the scene as Emad Jamil Al Swealmeen launched his botched bid to maim patients at Liverpool Women's Hospital just before 11am on Remembrance Sunday.

Glass is sent flying as the car's windows blow out, before a plume of smoke billows upwards. Around nine seconds later, dazed driver Mr Perry opens his door and staggers out.

Despite his injuries, he warns others to stay away as he stumbles towards the hospital reception with his head in his hands. Half a minute later the car is engulfed in flames.

Security staff including a man in a high-vis jacket run towards the blaze to try to help the passenger, not realising he is a bomber.

His wife yesterday said it was an 'utter miracle' he survived with only minor injuries, as security sources revealed Al Swealmeen did not intend to set off the device in the taxi.
 
Whitehall 1212 said:
It looks far from squalid! That's the Daily Mail for you......sensationalism to sell copy :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

I was about to say that perhaps "squalid" is the word they use when they haven't been able to put a market value on a home... except that I see the photos were obtained from: "An ex-resident, who lived at the four bedroom property worth around £70,000". :rolleyes:
 
JuicyLucy said:
I was about to say that perhaps "squalid" is the word they use when they haven't been able to put a market value on a home... except that I see the photos were obtained from: "An ex-resident, who lived at the four bedroom property worth around £70,000". :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Maybe at the Mail less than 250k = squalid. 250 - 500k = comfortable. Above 500k = palatial.

The surreal world of a Daily Mail hack :D
 
The Telegraph has established that after his initial application was rejected in 2014, Emad al-Swealmeen, 32, converted to Christianity on a five-week course in a bid to persuade officials to let him stay in the UK.

He then launched "appeal, after appeal, after appeal" to frustrate the system and even had a legal challenge pending when he launched his terror attack on Remembrance Sunday.

The Home Office believes changing religion is now "standard practice" among asylum seekers from countries including Iraq "to game the asylum system", as converts claim they are at risk of persecution in their home countries.


The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, has called for Britain to be "generous" to migrants fleeing conflict and remember Jesus was a refugee.

On Tuesday, Ms Patel hit out at the way asylum seekers and their lawyers were taking the British taxpayers "for a ride" by deliberately frustrating the system in order to remain in the UK.

She said: "It's a complete merry-go-round. And it's been exploited. It has been exploited quite frankly by a whole professional legal services industry that has based itself rights of appeal, going to the courts day in, day out at the expense of the taxpayers through legal aid."
Church under fire in wake of Liverpool suicide bombing for helping asylum seekers to ‘game’ system
 
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