‘A simple mistake on 7/7 cost my son his life’

Examining the London tube map, Graham Foulkes offered his son David some advice for navigating the underground system. The 22-year-old had just started a new job as a media sales manager in Manchester and was needed in the capital for a meeting. 

‘It was David’s first time travelling that far on his own, and he was so excited,’ Graham, 73, tells Metro.

‘I gave him the usual dad advice – whether he should bother trying to find a seat or not, and I told exactly which way to go.

‘Work had booked for him to stay in a fancy hotel for the night and had told David they would expense a few alcoholic drinks with his meal, so I joked they didn’t know how much a young northern lad could drink and warned him not to make a nuisance of himself.’

However, on the morning of July 7 2005, although David ended up on the right line he ended up going in the wrong direction on the Circle line – and stood just a few metres away from one of the bombers, who set off an explosion at Edgware Road.

It was one of four devices to be detonated in quick succession across London transport that day, killing 52 people and injured nearly 800 more.

‘We were left with nothing but the news for a week’

Graham was at work when David’s boss rang him to tell him he hadn’t turned up to the meeting. At the same time, a TV in the office was turned on to show the chaos unfolding in London.

‘His work told me they were going to call the police as I was watching the scenes of the bombings on the screen in front of me,’ Graham recalls. ‘It was only when a colleague came up to ask me if I was worried that the seriousness of the situation dawned on me. I froze.’

For the next few hours, he and his wife Janet clung onto any information they could find on news channels. 

‘We tried to console ourselves by saying he had probably made his way to a pub somewhere and was watching it all unfold,’ adds Graham.

After a sleepless night at their home in Saddleworth, the couple began ringing around hospitals and dedicated information lines – which were at premium rate, which ended up costing the family hundreds of pounds – but were told nothing.

‘We did consider going down to London, but we were worried that someone would call us on the landline and we would miss it,’ he explains.

Two days later a plain clothed police officer arrived at the house, asking Graham and Janet for cheek swabs. When the worried parents asked what was happening, the officer said he knew nothing – only that he had been asked to come over and collect the swabs. 

‘We were reading every newspaper for clues to see if David had been killed,’ remembers David. ‘By Monday, we still hadn’t been to bed, but then we got a phone call asking for David’s dental records.’ 

‘When it’s your son’s body, you look’

Six days after the attack, the family received call from a police officer. ‘He asked us if we were home and if he could come over, and I knew straight away David was dead,’ Graham remembers.

‘That night, we spent the night crying but finally got some sleep.’

The family say they were then left at home for the week with nothing but the news, until officers drove the couple four hours down to London to identify David’s body in the mortuary.

They were warned not to look under the blanket as he was so close to the bomb. ‘I know they wanted to spare us the horror of seeing those injuries. But when it’s your son, you look,’ says Graham.

‘They couldn’t even provide us with a cup of tea’

The grieving dad then had to make one of the most difficult phone calls of his life, to tell his daughter Jill, who had just moved to the US to study, that her brother had died.

The next few weeks were a blur for the family, spent travelling back and forth to London trying to find answers and meeting the loved ones of other victims.

‘Everything had just become a battle, from getting legal aid to even asking for a cup of tea at the inquest,’ Graham explains.

David’s mum Janet felt like she was left with no choice but to retire from her job after work became too difficult under the stress of grief.

Meanwhile, from her college dorm room, Jill wrote to the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown, asking to secure funding for the memorial in Hyde Park.

‘We’d initially been told no to a memorial, but after my amazing daughter wrote to Gordon Brown, he responded very quickly offering £1 million.’

‘I am extraordinarily proud of him’

20 years on from the attack, David’s friends and family still get together to celebrate his life.

This included holding two separate funerals in the months after his death, to organising a 40th birthday party for him.

For the anniversary memorial today, one of David’s old friends has even flown in from New Zealand to help mark the day.

Graham said: ‘David was just one of those people who had lots of friends – he was empathetic and kind.

‘Before his death two of his friends were in hospital at the same time, and David was the first to see them, invite them over and take them to the pub.

‘I was extraordinarily proud of him that day.’

Their grief is still everpresent, however.

‘David’s room was left untouched for a number of years. Walking past his empty bedroom, even after 20 years, gets to you. Every single morning,’ says Graham.

Today’s anniversary is set to be even sadder for the family this year, with David having died nearly as long ago as he lived. ‘I mean it has almost been as long without him as we had with him,’ his dad adds.  

‘After 20 years, there’s a whole generation that have to live in a world where the risk of a terror attack is a part of everyday life. The new generation are now the age of many of the victims, and the bombers.

‘We must be the ones to stop terror ourselves – the government is incapable of doing it themselves. We need to respect each other, it’s up to us.’

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