MANILA — Three Filipinos were among the hundreds of people injured in the coordinated terrorist attacks in the London subway system last July 7 that left at least 52 people dead.

The first Filipino victim was identified by the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs as Catherine Tantoco-Daniel.

Philippine ambassador to the Court of Saint James Edgardo Espiritu said embassy representatives met with Tantoco-Daniel’s British husband, Tim Daniel, who confirmed that she is confined at the Royal London Hospital and is being treated for burns and lacerations resulting from glass splinters.

On the evening of July 7 British Standard Time (early morning of July 8 Manila time), Tantoco-Daniel underwent surgery for the removal of glass fragments from various parts of her body.

Quoting doctors at the Royal London Hospital, the embassy described Daniel’s injuries as “superficial and non-threatening though she may take a few weeks to completely recover.”

Tim Daniel informed the Philippine Embassy that Catherine was calm and lucid, although a bit shaken and under shock, resulting from the trauma of the blast. Espiritu reported that “the Filipino national...was injured at the train carnage where a bomb exploded near the Aldgate East tube station shortly before 9 a.m., July 7.”

Meanwhile, Espiritu identified only one of the two other Filipino victims as the other had requested that “no details of the circumstances of this experience be disclosed to the public” except that the Filipino was admitted to the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead and released on the same day and that the Filipino’s family has been informed of the developments.

Espiritu said Gracia Hornigos, a housekeeper from Iloilo, was riding the subway train on the Piccadilly Line on her way to work when it was bombed between the stations of King’s Cross and Russell Square.

Hornigos, who suffered bruises and scratches on her left leg and left arm, told consular officers that the bomb went off in the same carriage she was in, the train’s first carriage, just as it left the King’s Cross station. She said she was at the tail end of the packed train but heard a very loud bang and felt as if her body was being electrocuted.

Because she still experiences strong ringing in her right ear and recurring pain in her left leg and arm, Hornigos has been advised by doctors to recuperate.

Quoting the London Metropolitan Police, Espiritu said that as of July 11, no Filipinos were among the list of fatalities. He also said that the Casualty Bureau of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office has not received reports of missing persons identified or described as Filipino.

Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo condemned the terrorist bombings and expressed sympathies for the families of the victims.

“The terrorist bombings were cowardly crimes that targeted not only the British people but also the rest of the world,” Romulo said in a statement.

“The Filipino people shares in the pain and sorrow of our friends in the United Kingdom,” he said. “We are not strangers to terrorist attacks and we can empathize with the British as they go through the painful protest of coming to grips with this naked act of senseless violence.”

British investigators have mounted a worldwide manhunt for the suspected bombers.

(INQ7.net)