This Exploding Bus Scared the Living Hell Out of Unsuspecting Londoners
It wasn’t terrorism, but citizens are still rattled.
Anyone worried about the exploding bus on Lambeth Bridge just now? It was just for a movie. pic.twitter.com/1ypWZZ6jPp
— Nigel Huddleston MP (@HuddlestonNigel) February 7, 2016
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When a double-decker bus exploded while crossing the Lambeth Bridge in London on Sunday, unsuspecting bystanders feared the worst: a repeat of the 7/7 terrorist attacks on the city’s transportation network that left 56 dead in 2007.
Luckily for them, it wasn’t real.
The explosion was a controlled stunt as part of the production of the movie The Foreigner, which stars Jackie Chan and Pierce Brosnan. The movie, based on the 1992 novel The Chinaman, involves Chan’s character’s daughter “being killed by rogue Irish terrorists,” according to social media newswire Storyful.
Not everyone knew this sequence was part of a movie, though. The Guardian reports on the anxiety that spread through London shortly after the bus explosion:
Children in a nearby park “freaked”, according to author Sophie Kinsella, who saw the top deck of the bus blow up as it travelled towards Westminster on Sunday morning.
…The blast created a huge fireball that ripped off the top of the bus as it crossed the bridge, leaving what another onlooker, Chris Cheeseman, described as “a grim aftermath” with dummy bodies visible on the top deck.
Kinsella tweeted: “Hey film types next time you blow up a bus on Lambeth Bridge maybe tell us first so children in park aren’t freaked?” She added: “I was freaked too. Looked very real.”
New rule: If you’re going to blow up a bus in the middle of a major city, please give everyone a heads up beforehand.
h/t The Guardian