I kept telling myself, wake up

A TUBE passenger, who held a woman's hand as she died in his lap during the 7 July atrocity, said some sights had been so appalling he was forced to look away.

Recalling his first thoughts after the explosion, Bruce Lait told the inquest into the 52 deaths: "I just kept telling myself, 'Wake up, wake up, you're obviously alive, you're not dead. Wake up'."

Minutes later he found his concentration fixed on a severely injured woman who had fallen onto his lap, who was later identified as 29-year-old Fiona Stevenson, from Essex.

"She was definitely still alive at that moment, I could hear her gurgling," he said.

"I held her hand, tried to comfort her. I was not aware if she was conscious or not, although I did kind of feel her squeeze my hand and that said to me that she knows somebody is there."

Asked if her eyes had been open, he replied: "To be honest, I had a brief look at her face and the injury was so horrific that I didn't want to look much at all."