I am a junior neurologist working at the National Hospital in London. On 7th July 2005 at 9:45am I had just completed a night shift at the hospital and was trying to get home on the tube.

Russell Square tube station was closed by the time I got to it: not particularly unusual; I adopted my backup plan of walking the short journey to King’s Cross. By the time I arrived – about 5 minutes later – the street outside was full of people, some whose faces were covered in soot. I phoned my mother to ask her to look on the internet for any news stories about a fire. The pedestrians were oddly confused but I managed to find out King’s Cross was closed. I decided to walk to Euston, only to find that it was also closed. By this time, there were a lot of police officers stopping traffic. They weren’t telling people much, but I asked one of them whether, as a doctor, I should be reporting to nearby University College Hospital. She told me that was a good idea.

A Major Incident had been declared and I identified myself to the receptionist who was taking a roll call of available staff. There were lots of doctors milling round in reception, and a consensus was emerging (by about 10:30) that it was a series of bombs on the tube, and probably several on buses as well. Lucky to have this inside information, I hastily sent text messages to everyone I could think of in London telling them to steer clear of public transport. At this time it was officially still a “power surge”.

I was sent up to the admissions unit where we would be receiving casualties. They would be triaged on arrival downstairs, and the more seriously injured patients sent straight to theatre. The stable but wounded patients would come to us. Almost every empty bed was surrounded by at least one nurse and there were dozens of medical students eager to help. Boxes upon boxes of emergency equipment – IV needles, bags of fluids, bandages, suture kits – were open on the floor.

For the first hour, we received no casualties – I dread to think what it was like on those tube trains during this time – and our main task was to discharge or move elsewhere all the patients currently on the unit. I was initially looking after a woman with bowel obstruction, an overdose case and a recovering drunk. Very glamorous. The atmosphere was one of barely suppressed terror at the prospect of what was about to start arriving.

The casualties started to arrive but there had been such a good turnout that there was never a shortage of willing hands to help. One of the terrorists’ great mistakes had been to make it impossible for NHS night shift workers to leave London – so they’d all simply gone back to work. We were never overwhelmed, but steadily dealt with lots of burns and lacerations, giving out painkillers and antibiotics and moving patients to the empty wards as soon as they were stable. Every hour, the doctors would all gather and report on the status of their patients and whether they had enough spare time and staff to accept more. We worked steadily throughout the day, and someone (not the NHS) provided a welcome pizza lunch.

Our main source of information was the BBC web site. Nobody quite knew whether the attack was over, and whether to expect fresh waves of casualties. By 5pm the Major Incident had been “stood down” and I thanked the consultants, nurses and medical students for their help, and strolled out of the hospital. It took me an hour to walk home.

The following Monday I returned to work to find that my colleagues at the National Hospital had been helping at Russell Square tube station – some of them dragging injured commuters from the carriages – long before any ambulance crews arrived. Their horrific stories made my experience seem tame by comparison. But nobody I spoke to thought twice about helping out.

There was no anger from me or anyone I met at University College Hospital that day; that came later. Mostly I was glad that my profession had made me useful on such a day. I’m not sure what my experience says about terrorism, except that it seemed to do the opposite of its intent: it brought out the best in people and made people determined not to change.