Mumbai serial blast was the worst case sinario in the history of serial blasts in india on july 11, 2006 series of seven explosions killed at least 174 people on crowded commuter trains and stations Tuesday evening in the Indian financial capital of Mumbai.
At least 464 people were injured in the blasts in the city's western suburbs as commuters made their way home. All seven blasts came within an 11-minute span, between 6:24 and 6:35 p.m. (12:54 and 1:05 p.m. GMT). Analysts compared these attack with the mass transit bombings in Madrid in 2004 and London last year, saying they all involved a series of mutiple blasts and were well-coordinated.
There was some confusion about the number of dead and injured as information was compiled from hospitals and explosion sites in Mumbai, the west Indian seaport previously called Bombay.
People started running helter-skelter and started jumping from the train. The first-class compartment was totally ripped apart and people were hanging from the train. There are some people who were thrown out from the train and they were lying on the track, bleeding completely.
One person was arrested in New Delhi in police raids after the explosions, but there was no claim of responsibility for the attacks. Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh urged calm and said the attacks were "shocking and cowardly attempts to spread a feeling of fear and terror." "I reiterate our commitment to fighting terror in all its forms," he said in a written statement.
Both the 2005 London bombings and the 2004 Madrid bombings, that killed 191 people, were directed against rush hour commuters on mass transit systems. It was a coordinated, multiple, simultaneous mass casualty atrocity. This is the hallmark of a powerful transnational group.
These attacks targeted a first-class commuter car, and police were looking at that carriage to see if it might yield clues. The names of those aboard would have been known beforehand as opposed to regular computers.
The blasts hit trains or platforms at the Khar, Mahim, Matunga, Jogeshwari, Borivili and Bhayander stations. The seventh explosion struck a train between the Khar and Santacruz stations. Police also found and defused another bomb at the Borivili station. Video footage from a train station showed people in bloodstained clothes receiving medical treatment, while others were carrying victims and some lying motionless near railroad tracks. Windows of a train appeared to be spattered with blood. At least one train was split in half.
People jumped and were killed as the train hit them. Limbs were lying everywhere, bodies were cleared from the tracks by local business owners who rushed from their shops. People living almost two miles (three kilometers) away from the Borivili station said they heard the blast.
The Western Railway system which 4.5 million people use daily was shut down and Mumbai's subway system put on high alert after the blasts. Police in the capital of New Delhi also heightened security. Airports across India were put on high alert, too. U.S. officials said the blasts followed a pattern of initiated by the two main Islamic Kashmiri separatist terrorist groups.
Indian Home Minister Shivraj Patil said the government had some advance knowledge that such an attack might take place. "What we didn't have was the place and the time," Patil said.
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