Londoners flee as police shoot bomb suspect dead

HE vaulted over barriers chased by armed police, stumbled onto a train and then the man in a winter coat with a backpack was shot time and again, sending panic-stricken commuters in all directions.

Passengers at south London's Stockwell underground train station said at least four shots rang out yesterday after they were ushered up escalators to the street by police, who shot the man dead - a suspected suicide bomber in attacks on Thursday.

"I've never seen anything like it in my life. I saw them kill a man basically. I saw them shoot a man five times," witness Mark Whitby told BBC television.

"The other passengers were distraught. It was just mayhem, people were just getting off the Tube ... People running in all directions, looks of horror on their faces, screaming, a lot of screaming from women, absolute mayhem.

"It was a very, very distressing sight to watch, and to hear as well."

Sky Television quoted police as saying the man was a suspect in the attacks that caused chaos Thursday lunchtime but killed no one in an apparently failed bid to repeat suicide bombings which left 52 dead two weeks earlier.

Witness Teri Godly told Sky she heard six or seven shots as she fled the station.

"As I was about to get onto the train eight or nine undercover police with walkie talkies and handguns started screaming at everyone to "get out, get out," Godly said.

Witnesses gave sketchy detail of the man who some said was of south Asian appearance. Some said he looked wary as soon as he stumbled onto the train, some said he was thin, others that he was chubby. He raised suspicion wearing a bulky black coat in the heat of summer.

Most said he wore a backpack - reminding many of images of the four suicide bombers behind the July 7 attacks.

"I was about to go in when I saw a lot of people coming out. They looked shocked. There was a bit of panic. The guy I spoke to said, 'I've just seen someone shot'," said Andrew Wajnowski, 18, a part-time kitchen boy.

Danny Prescott, 33, a bus driver whose bus was stopped outside the station summed up a feeling of fear spreading across London.

-AFP