Man cheats death - again
2005-07-08 11:13
Sydney - As the death toll mounted on Friday from the London bombings, one Australian tourist counted his blessings after narrowly surviving his second terrorist bomb attack in less than three years.
Trent Mongan, a 31-year-old army paramedic from Brisbane, walked out of King's Cross subway station on Thursday morning just moments before a bomb ripped through a train below, killing more than 20 people.
In October 2002, Mongan likewise walked out of a nightclub on the Indonesian resort island of Bali just minutes before a suicide car bomb devastated the building, killing 202 people, 88 of them Australians.
"I just can't believe it has happened to me again," Mongan told ABC radio on Friday from London.
"Like I walked out of the Sari Club two minutes before it blew up and went through all that, and nowhere is safe any more," he said.
Mongan was on holiday in London when four bombs exploded on underground trains and a city bus, killing dozens and wounding some 700.
But Mongan said his second brush with death did not make him feel jinxed, rather the opposite.
"I think I am pretty damn lucky. A lot of my friends and family have said tell us where you are going on holiday because we are not going to go," he said.
"I think the exact opposite - if you are going to go on holiday, you better come with me, because you are going to survive."
Mongan said the chaotic scenes in London after the bombings reminded him of the aftermath of the Bali attacks, bringing back painful memories.
"(Bali's) Sanglah Hospital and Kings Cross station were one and the same, there were the same injuries, people with burnt skin, burnt faces, burnt hair," he said.
"Bali cost me my marriage because I could not cope with it very well," said Mongan. "I'm dumbfounded, I'm shocked, amazed, upset, angry."
The official British death toll from Thursday's attacks stood at 37, but Australian Prime Minister John Howard said he was told 52 people had been killed and the toll was expected to rise.
About 700 people were injured in the coordinated rush-hour attacks, including eight Australians.
The attacks were widely blamed on Islamic radicals linked to the al-Qaeda network, which also carried out the Bali bombing.
- AFP