Explosions
At 20:11 a man with an Irish accent telephoned the Birmingham Post newspaper and said: "There is a bomb planted in the Rotunda and there is a bomb in New Street at the tax office". A telephoned warning was also sent to the Evening Mail newspaper. The Rotunda was a 25-storey office block that housed the "Mulberry Bush" pub on its lower two floors. The police started to check the upper floors of the Rotunda but failed to clear the crowded pub at street level. Six minutes after the warning, at 20:17, the bomb exploded inside a duffel bag, devastating the pub. Ten people were killed in this explosion and dozens injured, including one woman who was so badly wounded she was given the last rites administered by the Catholic Church to those on the point of death.
Police were attempting to clear the nearby "Tavern in the Town" basement pub on New Street below King Edward House, when at 20:27 a second bomb exploded there, killing another 11 people and leaving many with appalling injuries. The bodies of the dead and injured were strewn about the ruined pub. A passing West Midlands bus was wrecked in the blast. The explosion was so powerful that several victims were blown through a brick wall into an area just below the main front entrance to King Edward House. Their remains were wedged between the rubble and underground electric cables; it took hours for firemen to remove them. The two pubs were about 50 yards (46 m) apart. Buildings near the pubs were damaged and passersby in the street were struck by flying glass from shattered shop windows.
A third device, an "Eversoft Frangex" bomb, was placed outside a branch of Barclays Bank on Hagley Road but failed to detonate.
Altogether, 21 people were killed and 182 people were injured. Most of the dead and wounded were young people between the ages of 17 and 25, including two brothers, Desmond and Eugene Reilly. One of the victims, 18-year-old Maxine Hambleton, had not been a customer. She had just gone into the "Tavern in the Town" to hand out tickets to friends for a party. She was killed seconds after entering the pub and had been standing beside the bag containing the bomb when it exploded. Her friend Jane Davis, aged 17, was the youngest victim of the two bombings.
Read more about this topic: Birmingham Pub Bombings
Famous quotes containing the word explosions:
“Our Lamaze instructor . . . assured our class . . . that our cervix muscles would become “naturally numb” as they swelled and stretched, and deep breathing would turn the final explosions of pain into “manageable discomfort.” This descriptions turned out to be as accurate as, say a steward advising passengers aboard the Titanic to prepare for a brisk but bracing swim.”
—Mary Kay Blakely (20th century)