London’s ‘One Long Day’ that changed the capital and the Olympic Games

“After the victory in Singapore, Londoners were celebrating the prospect of…new energy and creativity; those computer-generated images of futuristic wonderlands rising out of derelict quarters and poisoned industrial wastelands were actually going to be built. The echoes of rock ‘n’ roll in Hyde Park and its wave of warm and fundamentally decent emotions were only just fading when the bombs went off”, British author and novelist, Ian McEwan.

As London remembers the July 6-7 bombings and Olympic bid victory 20 years ago on this week, Games adviser Michael Pirrie reveals new insights and details into the key events, figures, and moments that would shape future directions for the capital and the Olympic Games.

Few modern sporting events have captured both the triumph and tragedy of a city like London’s successful bid for the 2012 Olympic Games—and the 7/7 bombings that followed just a day later.

Now, two decades on, the coordinated attacks that killed 52 innocent Londoners still cast a long shadow over what should have been a purely celebratory moment in the city’s history.

The anniversary of the bombings remains a defining point in time—a rare “Where were you When?” moment that reminds us how joy can turn to grief in an instant, and how no city, no matter how strong, is immune from sudden tragedy.

At the time, I was in Singapore as part of the London 2012 Olympic bid team. We were preparing to make our final pitch to the International Olympic Committee (IOC), going up against some of the most iconic cities in the world—New York, Paris, Moscow, and Madrid.

The competition was fierce. Within the Olympic movement, it was known simply as “The Great Race.”

As we filed into the room where the decision would be announced our greatest fear was letting down the millions of Londoners who ‘backed he bid.’

And in a premonition perhaps of what was to come, I remember Sir Bobby Charlton—England’s beloved World Cup hero and one of our most respected ambassadors—leaning over and whispering to me:

“This could be one of the best or one of the worst days of our lives.”

He couldn’t have known how prophetic those words would be.

In that moment, it was the best of days.

Against the odds, London won. Our team’s years of planning, passion, and persuasive storytelling had prevailed. Across the city, celebrations erupted. There was music in the streets. Cheers from offices. Tears of joy. It felt like London was on top of the world.

We were elated almost beyond words. Like Heather Small and her iconic song for the bid, we felt we had made London Proud.  

But within hours, London was on its knees.

The city’s transport system – still proudly carrying bid posters swirling in the Olympic colours that had become a familiar part of the London landscape –  had become unimaginable tunnels of death.

Dozens were killed. Hundreds wounded. A city united in celebration was suddenly united in shock, mourning, and fear.

London was falling.

Meanwhile, as the capital was struggling to comprehend the scale of the threat, a highly coordinated security operation was underway in Singapore after the London 2012 Olympic security chief, Andy Amery, was informed in confidence by Scotland Yard that the bombings were suspected terrorist attacks.

For Amery and his team, the unprecedented security operation that followed was two-fold – ensuring the safety of bid staff back in London and other parts of the UK as well as security of the entire bid team in Singapore.

This involved VIPs, sponsors, including British Airways and Virgin, athletes, and the east London school children who featured in London’s Olympic Games bid winning presentation the previous day.

London’s high-profile delegation in Singapore also included bid ambassador David Beckham, accompanied by wife Victoria. The highest profile couple in the world at the time, the pair was due to fly out for holidays after the bid team’s final IOC pitch but had asked to stay on to attend the final host city decision announcement before departing later in the evening. 

The highly sensitive security mission included the evacuation of the late Dame Tessa Jowell, Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, London Mayor, Ken Livingstone, and other senior political figures as soon it had been established that it was safe to fly and London’s air space was open.

“As the full scale of the atrocity became clear, those of us representing the UK in Singapore could think about just one thing. We had to get home,” Jowell later said.

It was an almost unbearable juxtaposition—victory and violence, hope and horror, pride and pain—all within the span of a single day.

 “The mood of a city has never swung so sharply”, observed the author and novelist Ian McEwan,”

Twenty years on, and the roles and decisions of key government and Olympic figures involved at the time continue to evolve and come into sharper focus and understanding.

Jowell, who was popular and well liked in Olympic circles, played a key role  in London’s recovery and Games preparations following the bombings.

Much admired and missed, Jowell, who succumbed to brain cancer in 2018,  was vital in maintaining critical Government support for the Games in an era of growing geopolitical and economic uncertainty highlighted by the Global Financial Crisis.

While London and its rivals shared deep aspirations to host the world’s biggest event, all final cities in the 2012 bid cycle – New York, Paris, Moscow and Madrid as well as London – were also terrorist targets. 

Jowell would become a tireless, passionate and eloquent advocate for London in mourning and during its phoenix like rising from the ashes of the bombings. 

The July 7 victims, survivors, and their families remained a constant presence in Jowell’s thoughts and background preparations for the Games and what the London Olympics would symbolise to the world.

“I thought about 7th July especially during the 2 minutes silence at Danny Boyle’s brilliant opening ceremony,” Jowell recalled in her powerful 2015 July 7 Tavistock Square Memorial Trust lecture.

 “I saw the forward-looking, expansive, optimistic vision of Britain that the opening ceremony represented, and I thought again that this was something the bombers and their supporters would have hated – all those nations, with their different views, their different cultures, their different traditions, coming together in a spirit of peace and play,” she said.

Jowell’s writings and observations also provide compelling new insights into the connections between the Olympic Games and London’s post-bombing recovery and society. 

“There has never been a better exhibition of the tolerance, diversity and openness which makes this city what it is than that great (Olympic) festival of sport, nor anything to gainsay more emphatically the deadly message of the bombs,” Jowell  expressed in her memorial lecture

“The bombs brought fire and death; but I recall that one of the Olympic symbols is a torch…which London will carry forever, and in whose flickering light the names of those who died will live for evermore.”

Seldom has the fate and future of a city and the Olympic Games seemed so entwined around a single day – and whether, amidst the fear, chaos and doubt that filled its streets, London, in the immediate aftermath of the 7/7 terrorist attacks, would host the Olympic and Paralympic Games 

Government and Olympic leaders determined the London Games would be a testament to the power of sport and the city’s recovery, and a tribute also to those who lost their lives, drawing on the resilience of Londoners who united behind the capital’s Olympic vision of change for young people and communities lacking urgently needed services and facilities.

More than 20 years on also, the early foundation work done by Sir Craig Reedie, former leader of the British Olympic Association and senior IOC member, along with Livingstone and Jowell on London’s Olympic Games  concept continues to produce significant outcomes.

The London 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic have produced innovative and far-reaching legacies and change in sport and society.

The benefits from the London Games are regarded as among the most successful in Olympic history. 

These include new planning and delivery models for the Olympic and Paralympic Games and meaningful positive change for young people in sport and communities. 

While the 2012 Games cost £8.8 billion to stage, the event had already delivered £14.2 billion in economic value by 2014, a significant return on investments that continues to grow.

The Olympic Park complex has developed rapidly around London’s needs,  expanding into a diverse, multi sector hub with modern, accessible  services and facilities for new housing, business, technology, entertainment, and elite and community sport, with abundant transport connections.

This has improved the welfare, health, education and employment opportunities for countless Londoners, enhancing their lives, families and communities.

Olympic organisers and teams, led by London 2012 chair Seb Coe, delivered a new approach for staging the Games, taking sport into the heart of the city and existing venues and public spaces with iconic backdrops, providing the model for last year’s wildly successful Paris Games.

London 2012 also provided new sports-based programs for young people, linking sport to education and wider social support and opportunities.

Known as ‘International Inspiration,’ the pioneering program – led by the British business and marketing entrepreneur, Sir Keith Mills, CEO of the London bid and deputy chair of the organising committee – has reached more than 50 million young people around the globe.

The innovative program provided new ways of reaching and engaging with youth, improving education outcomes and lives.

The program has also been adapted and modified by leading world sports governing bodies and international youth development agencies.

CONCLUSION

That week in July 2005 revealed so much about London: its vulnerability but also its resilience, character and spirit.

And it set the tone for what the 2012 Games would ultimately become: not just a celebration of sport, but a powerful symbol of unity, defiance, and renewal, as Jowell and so many across London, the UK, and the world had hoped.

That one long day spanning 6-7 July is now 20 years old and has become a milestone diary date connecting London’s history with its future

The impacts of decisions and actions on and flowing from July 6-7 have touched countless lives and influenced countless events and outcomes.

Perhaps, however, the meaning of everything that happened across that one long July day and since can be distilled into a single chance encounter; a single conversation or even sentence. 

It happened, providentially, perhaps, on the tube system targeted by the bombers, and involved London’s iconic Olympic figure, Seb Coe, who uniquely led the Games bid and organising committee. 

It also involved a Games volunteer, who approached and thanked Coe for the events. Coe was somewhat puzzled and surprised, and said he should be the one thanking the volunteer.

The Games volunteer politely insisted it was he who needed to express his gratitude, explaining to Coe that he helped to treat victims of the July 7 bombings.

“I saw the worst in humanity that (July) day. I have seen the best of humanity at these Games,” he said.  

Michael Pirrie was Executive Advisor to the London Olympic Games Organising Committee and led the London bid’s global media campaign