The day terror came to Liverpool - and why brutal blast remains shrouded in mystery

Inside story of how detectives are piecing together incident which shocked city and caught security services by surprise

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At just before 11am on Sunday, a black people carrier pulling up outside Liverpool Women’s Hospital blew up. 

Extraordinary CCTV footage, obtained by The Telegraph, shows the taxi trundling into view, before arriving at its final destination - the drop-off point for the front reception desk at the hospital close to Liverpool city centre. 

But before the taxi had even come to a halt, there was a huge, dramatic explosion. Plumes of grey smoke billowed instantly into the air and bits of parts of the car, including the windscreen, were scattered in all directions. 

Luckily on a Sunday morning, the hospital drop-off was almost empty of passers-by and nobody, amazingly, seems to have been hit by the flying shrapnel. 

In the seconds that followed, a man in a high-visibility jacket - possibly a security guard - raced from the bottom left of the screen in the direction of the explosion. As the guard reached the car, the taxi driver threw open his door and ran for his life. The smoke cleared for a fraction of a second as the two men sprinted to safety. 

Inside the car, the bomb-maker - named by police on Monday night as Emad Al Swealmeen - remained seated. He was about to die. 

Emad Al Swealmeen has been named as the bomber in the incident
Emad Al Swealmeen has been named as the bomber in the incident

A little over 30 seconds after the initial explosion, a small orange flame flickered from what appeared to be the front passenger seat of the car. An ominous black cloud began to billow from the taxi, believed to be a Toyota Prius-Plus. Within seconds, flames enveloped the car. 

Experts suggested Swealmeen, 32, an asylum seeker from the Middle East, who had converted four years ago to Christianity, would have burned to death. The initial explosion, almost certainly the detonator going off - rather than the bomb itself - would not have been in and of itself fatal, they said.

The taxi driver, bar a few minor injuries, miraculously escaped almost unscathed. “There was a large explosion which blew out all of the windows and sent the windscreen flying into the air,” said an eyewitness, adding: “It is extraordinary that the driver managed to survive, let alone escape.”

‘Not clear what the motivation for this incident is’

Just as the car was going up in flames, just under a mile away at Liverpool’s Anglican cathedral, a Remembrance Sunday service was under way. The event normally takes place at St George’s Hall in the heart of the city, but had been switched to the cathedral because of road and building works in the centre. 

The service remains a huge event in the Liverpool calendar, attracting a crowd of 1,200 - among them military veterans and dignitaries. At the end of the service, just as a “poignant poppy drop” was being planned, the taxi went boom.

Counter-terrorism police and security services are working on the “logical” theory that Swealmeen had intended to walk from the hospital and into the crowds as they departed from the cathedral. 

The motivation for the attack remains unclear, however, and intelligence sources insisted that they retained an open mind. Not least because Swealmeen had suffered from mental health issues and because - far from being the obvious jihadist - he had previously converted to Christianity

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Improvised explosive devices are one of the weapons of choice for jihadists. The inquiry will focus on where Swealmeen had learned to make a bomb - possibly from the internet, possibly abroad. It is understood he had a Syrian father and an Iraqi mother, and was born in Iraq. 

What makes the picture complex for investigators is that Swealmeen had converted to Christianity in 2017, having arrived in the UK some years ago. He had spent most of his time in Liverpool and was known to the police, having been arrested in 2014 for brandishing a knife in the city centre.

The incident, which came after his asylum claim was rejected, resulted in his being detained for several months under the Mental Health Act, according to the Daily Mail.

Swealmeen had also taken the name Enzo Almeni while living in the UK - choosing Enzo in deference to Enzo Ferrari, the founder of the famous sports car brand. Swealmeen converted to Christianity in March 2017 at Liverpool’s Anglican cathedral, reinforcing the theory he may have been targeting the Remembrance Sunday service. Liverpool’s then bishop, the Right Reverend Cyril Ashton, conducted the confirmation ceremony. On Monday, the bishop said he could not recall the young man pictured at his side.

The same year, under his Westernised name of Enzo Almeni, he posted photographs of the area, including the cathedral. He even declared a takeaway restaurant “soooo cheap!” He also  remarked on his first “skin fade haircut” at a hairdressing salon in nearby Aigburth.

He was said to be "very interested in art" and a keen pizza chef, the Daily Mail reported.

Swealmeen spent eight months living with Malcolm and Marian Hitchcott, committed Christians, in their home in Aigburth in 2017, prior to his conversion. 

“He first came to the cathedral in August 2015 and wanted to convert to Christianity,” Mr Hitchcott said on Monday. 

“He took an Alpha course, which explains the Christian faith, and completed it in November of that year. 

"That enabled him to come to an informed decision and he changed from Islam to Christianity and was confirmed as a Christian by at least March 2017, just before he came to live with us. He was destitute at that time and we took him in.” 

On Facebook at the time, Mr Hitchcott posted: “What we had no idea of then was that within three days Enzo would be living with us. He stayed for a period of months. He was a real blessing to us at our times of worship and teaching around the dining room table at 9.30pm each evening.”

Detonator went off, but main charge did not

At about 10.50am, the taxi - driven by David Perry - picked up Swealmeen from a semi-detached Victorian house in Rutland Avenue, a tree-lined street off Sefton Park, where many of the large properties have been subdivided into bedsits and flats. Swealmeen had “recently rented” the address and is believed to have used it as his factory to make his bomb.

He was previously living at a taxpayer-funded hostel for asylum seekers, run by private contractors Serco, the Daily Mail reported on Monday night.

Swealmeen had called the cab firm and asked to be taken to Liverpool Women’s Hospital, a 10-minute drive away. Swealmeen clambered into the taxi, his bomb carried in a bag, and began the short journey to his death.

Speaking to the media at 11am on Monday, 24 hours after the attack, Assistant Chief Constable Russ Jackson, heading up counter terrorism policing in the North West, said: “As the taxi approached the drop-off point at the hospital, an explosion occurred from within the car, which quickly engulfed it in flames.

“Remarkably, the taxi driver escaped from the cab. He has been treated for the injuries he sustained and has now been released from hospital.”

Liverpool taxi driver David Perry is said to have been lucky to survive the attack
Liverpool taxi driver David Perry is said to have been lucky to survive the attack

Emergency services raced to the scene and firefighters extinguished the flames “when it quickly became apparent that the passenger remained in the vehicle and was deceased”, said Asst Ch Con Jackson.

One former counter-terror officer, with an expertise in improvised explosive devices, said the footage obtained by The Telegraph suggested the detonator had gone off in the taxi, but the main charge had not. 

The source said the device was likely to have been built using Triacetone triperoxide (TATP) - the same substance that was used in the deadly Manchester Arena suicide bomb four years ago. TATP includes hydrogen peroxide, which is readily available and can be found in hair bleach and some disinfectants. Videos posted online by terrorist organisations in the past have shown step by step instructions how to construct such a device at home.

Despite efforts by the police and security agencies to remove the videos from the internet, they are known to be still available on the dark web. New checks introduced after previous terrorist outrages were intended to make it more difficult to purchase and stockpile precursor chemicals in order to build bombs. And hydrogen peroxide has become increasingly difficult to obtain during the pandemic, because it is used in hospitals as a sterilising disinfectant.

Using the materials discovered in the suspect's flat and evidence recovered from the scene of the bombing, forensic specialists will now be attempting to understand how Swealmeen had been able to obtain the materials to construct the device.

The source explained: "An IED consists of a battery, a detonator and a charge containing the explosives and shrapnel. In order to set the detonator off, the suicide bomber press a trigger that completes a circuit and sets off a chain reaction.

"It is likely the bomber has been attempting to do that when the detonator has gone off in the cab, killing him and injuring the driver.

"But mercifully, the charge for some reason has not gone off. It could be that the chemical mix was wrong or that the device had not been constructed properly."

An Army bomb disposal squad attended the hospital “and made the area safe”. After investigation, it was “able to confirm that this is being treated as the ignition of an explosive device”, said Asst Ch Con Jackson. “Our enquiries also indicate that the device was brought into the cab by the passenger,” he added.

No record of bomber on watchlists

MI5 can find no record of Swealmeen on any of their watchlists, either under his real name or his Westernised alternative. They cannot rule out that he may have used other identities, but so far can find no evidence of him being on their radar. 

As police were officially declaring the planned bomb attack a terrorist incident, the senior officer in charge admitted: “It is not clear what the motivation for this incident is.”

Asst Ch Con Jackson said: “Our inquiries indicate that an improvised explosive device has been manufactured and our assumption so far is that this was built by the passenger in the taxi. 

"The reason why he then took it to the women's hospital is unknown, as is the reason for its sudden explosion.

"We are of course aware that there were Remembrance events just a short distance away from the hospital and that the ignition occurred shortly before 11am. We cannot at this time draw any connection with this but it is a line of inquiry we are pursuing.”

Police raids in aftermath of attack

In the hours after the hospital explosion, armed counter-terror police raided two properties that the dead bomber had lived in - the house in Rutland Avenue, where the terrorist is believed to have most recently lived, and another in Sutcliffe Street in the Kensington area  of the city, north of the women’s hospital. 

Police cars block the road as a control centre is set up in Rutland Avenue
Police cars block the road as a control centre is set up in Rutland Avenue Credit: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

On Sunday evening, three men, aged 21, 26 and 29, were arrested in Sutcliffe Street under section 41 of the Terrorism Act. On Monday morning a fourth man, aged 20, was also detained in the Kensington area. 

Sharon Cullen told how she and her husband, 22-year-old daughter and two-year-old grandson were evacuated from their home at about 9.45pm on Sunday. "The police pounded on my door and an officer said: 'We need to get you out of the house as soon as possible,’” she said.

"They said: 'Whatever is going on at the back of the house, it could blow the block.' It was really frightening."

Alarming photographs showed police officers, in full battle dress and armed with powerful semi-automatic weapons, climbing ladders to peer over the back wall of the house in Sutcliffe Street.

Matthew Heitman, 26, who lives opposite the raided house in Sutcliffe Street, said: "Two of the men were marched out at gunpoint and they had them up against the wall. 

"There wasn't any kind of struggle, they just walked out of the front. The people living there had not long moved in, maybe weeks or months."

At just after 4pm on Monday, police carried out a controlled explosion in the middle of Sefton park, a few hundred yards from Rutland Avenue. Eyewitnesses described a “bang” and a “puff of smoke”. 

Forensic teams moved in to search the houses, with great care at Rutland Avenue - where police said “significant items have been found” and that more searches will be needed “potentially into the coming days”. Sources suggested this included bomb-making equipment, making the search dangerous and time consuming. 

A cordon was put in place in the street and eight families evacuated for their own safety. The hospital remained cordoned off as investigators combed through the wreckage.

Liverpool remained on high alert on Monday. Terror had come to the city on Remembrance Sunday. What is still unclear is why.

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