Thames the stage as police play out boat drama
Armed officers in mock hostage battle as Scotland Yard prepares itself for major attack on London
ARMED police have played out the chaos of a “pleasure boat” terrorist attack on the Thames in a unique exercise to test the emergency response to gunmen.
A sightseeing vessel became the scene of a fierce mock gun battle between armed officers and police volunteers posing as terrorists shortly after 11am yesterday, close to the Docklands area.
The exercise marks the first time the Metropolitan Police has enacted a liveaction, water-borne exercise of its kind, with more than 200 officers involved. Armed officers boarded the moving vessel in a hail of gunfire, just over two hours after a simulated hijacking in which a group of around five officers posing as gun-wielding terrorists assumed command of the boat in a role-play hostage scenario.
At least one “body”, played by a police volunteer, was cast overboard and officers were deployed in a bid to assess the effectiveness of rescue operation tactics in life-like conditions.
Yesterday’s exercise was a response to Lord Harris’s review of London’s readiness to deal with a major terrorist attack published in October 2016.
Lord Harris reminded readers that “in addition to the Underground, rail and road network in London, a major transport artery runs right through the city used by business, tourists and citizens every day: the River Thames.
“The river, as well as supporting business and tourism, is subject to significant development along its banks as new apartments, retail and business premises are built in support of the modern desire to live and work along the water.
“Heavily populated areas with major landmarks can … become a draw to terrorists … such as the Palace of West- minster, the London Eye and Tower Bridge, along with potential targets such as the MI6 building and the new US Embassy being constructed”.
Lord Harris also made direct reference to the 2008 Mumbai attacks carried out by members of Lashkar-eTaiba, “when 10 attackers used inflata- ble speedboats to access their targets”. He reminded security forces of the 2016 “incursion” at London City Airport by the Black Lives Matter group, when protesters gained access to the runway via the river. Lord Harris said the incident raised “serious questions about the perimeter security” and rec- ommended a full review take place. The multi-agency operation was carried out by the Met, the Port of London Authority, London Coastguard, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, London Ambulance Service and London Fire Brigade.
It was designed to test the emergency services’ effectiveness in a riverbased terrorist attack in the capital, from the moment an incident is reported to the conclusion of a rescue operation.
Commander BJ Harrington, head of the Met’s public order command, said the exercise was not planned in response to any “specific intelligence” about an impending marine attack.
But he noted that recent terrorist incidents on the Continent showed how would-be attackers have diversified their means of inflicting harm to the general public. He said: “It’s important to point out that the exercise has not been designed in response to any specific threat.
“There’s no information that we have that we’re preparing for. Of course, we have seen a number of incidents abroad in the past few years: Nice, Berlin. We have seen different methodologies developing and, of course, the river runs right the way through London, so why wouldn’t we prepare for that?”
The exercise comes two weeks after the Met’s most senior counter-terrorism officer, assistant commissioner Mark Rowley, revealed that security services have foiled 13 potential terrorist attacks in the UK in less than four years.
Mr Rowley said that up to 500 counter-terror investigations were in operation at any one time, with investigators making arrests at a rate of close to one a day on average since 2014.
The official threat level for international terrorism in the UK has stood at severe – meaning an attack is “highly likely” – for more than two years.
Commander Harrington said the exercise was the first time all the involved agencies have come together to test their inter-operability and effective-
‘The river runs right the way through London, so why wouldn’t we prepare for that?’
ness as a group, and hoped it would act as a deterrent to any would-be attackers.
He said: “Most importantly, we give the people who are going to have to do this tricky and difficult and dangerous stuff the opportunity to have confidence that they can do it, and hopefully, above all, give confidence to people who live and work and visit London to say the police, the agencies, blue-light agencies and other public service agencies, are in a really good position to protect them and keep them safe.
“I do hope there is a deterrent effect in this when they see how effective our people are.”
A previous major inter-agency exercise in June 2015, Operation Strong Tower, brought hundreds of officers together to respond to a simulated terror threat in a disused London Underground station.
This was just five days after 30 Britons were killed when a gunman attacked holidaymakers on a beach in Tunisia.