- May 6, 2024
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The Borough Market area of London was filled with people as this photo, taken the evening before the attacks, illustrates. Photo courtesy of Karen Duffy
Heathrow Airport on Sunday. Photo Courtesy of Karen Duffy
Karen Duffy, a reading teacher at Ormond Beach Middle School, started her summer vacation in London. Photo Courtesy of Karen Duffy
On the evening of Saturday, June 3, Ormond Beach resident Karen Duffy sat at a picnic table in Borough Market enjoying her take-away fish and chips. She had no idea that in four short hours the area where she had been sitting would be broadcast around the world as the one of the sites of terrorists attacks in London that killed seven and left 21 in critical condition.
Duffy, a reading teacher at Ormond Beach Middle School, left for London on May 31. She had been planning the trip as an end-of-the-school-year treat and worked the weekend before at the Country 500 Fest at the Daytona International Speedway to make some extra money for the trip.
Photos of her adventures were posted on Facebook and included a trip down the River Thames, the Pink Floyd exhibition at Victoria and Albert Hall, Princess Diana’s Fashion exhibit at Kensington Palace, London Bridge and Borough Market — all typical tourist activities.
“l remarked earlier that I felt as safe on the streets in London as I do in Ormond Beach,” Duffy, who was born in London, said. “I’m still in shock that the attack happened mere hours after I had been there. I sat at a picnic table and enjoyed my meal, leaving around 6 p.m. to board the underground at London Bridge. The weather was perfect Saturday night, and the city was filled with people.”
Back at her lodgings, sleep wasn’t easy. She let her Facebook friends know she was safe. Her mother, Julianne Smith, also of Ormond Beach, wrote what every mother would want their child to do: “Get out of Britain now.”
“l remarked earlier that I felt as safe on the streets in London as I do in Ormond Beach.”
KAREN DUFFY
Ormond Beach Middle School reading teacher
But of course that wasn’t practical, and Duffy waited for daylight. Logging onto Facebook at 4:20 a.m., she said the birds were chirping outside. Perfectly normal — except nothing was perfectly normal.
Her plans were to fly out of Heathrow Airport to Amsterdam Sunday night, after another day of sight-seeing. Instead she checked into a hotel at the airport with hopes of getting some sleep while she waited for her 8:25 p.m. flight.
“I had planned to do two walking tours. One of Hampstead Heath, the other of the Regent’s Canal area,” she wrote. “I decided it wasn’t a wise idea and frankly, I just wanted to leave the area.”
Duffy said there wasn’t a heavy police presence at the airport. One man she spoke said of terrorist attacks, "It happens all the time.”
“The desk clerk at the Hilton was from Sri Lanka and she shook her head and said, 'We had terrorism for 32 years in my country, and it just destroyed the country,” Duffy recalled.
“Keep Calm and Carry On,” a slogan created for a motivational poster produced by the British Government in 1939 to raise the morale of the British public, seems to still be practiced 78 years later.
Duffy, who left the UK as a child, said her grandparents have been on her mind.
“My grandparents survived living in the London area during World War II … and I definitely thought about that this weekend,” she said.
