Passenger on bombed 7/7 bus saved by size of her laptop bag

Another commuter spoke of seeing teenage terrorist Hasib Hussain looking nervous and with sweat dripping down his face as he boarded a bus after his fellow suicide bombers detonated their devices on Tube trains.

Hussain, 18, from Leeds, killed 13 innocent people when he blew himself up on a number 30 bus in London's Tavistock Square on July 7 2005.

The inquest for the 52 victims of the attacks has heard that his backpack bomb apparently failed to go off on the Underground as planned.

Hussain emerged from the Tube at King's Cross station and initially boarded a number 91 bus.

Passenger Anita Dybek-Echtermeyer was struck by his "bad manners", recalling that he blocked the way and knocked other travellers with his large bag.

Describing the backpack, she said: "It looked very heavy and very properly packed – full, I think around 60 litres. It had to be heavy because he had a strap on to carry the whole thing.

"Also, he himself looked very exhausted and he was sweating on his chin, and that was horrible to look at."

Paul Rekret, another passenger on the number 91 bus, recalled that a woman in her 20s tapped the bomber on the shoulder and asked him to be careful but he made no reaction.

Mr Rekret told the inquest: "At the time I thought he was a lost and anxious tourist, and perhaps a foreigner."

Disruption caused by the earlier blasts on the Tube meant that the bus terminated early at Euston station and everyone had to get off.

Hussain then boarded the number 30 bus and, after finding a seat at the rear of the upper deck, blew himself up in nearby Tavistock Square at 9.47am.

Lisa French got on the bus at the same time as the bomber and followed him upstairs but sat down four rows in front of him because there was not enough space for her large laptop bag.

"I made the decision not to go and sit next to him because I was aware we both had very big bags and that he, we, you know, would be taking up a lot of room," she told the inquest.

She could not remember the blast but recalled waking up to find a gaping void behind her where the vehicle had been blown apart.

"There were no seats left behind me attached to the bus. There was literally no bus left. It just dropped down behind our seats," she said.

Ms French, who in 2005 was a BT employee living in Newcastle upon Tyne, travelled to London on the morning of July 7 to attend a business meeting. She broke down as she described how a police officer stopped her going to help the people lying in the wreckage of the bus.

She said: "He just shook his head at me and the look in his eyes, and he just guided me off the bus and I just knew then there was no hope for any of them."

Ms French, who escaped with perforated ear drums, broken teeth, cuts and bruises, described herself as "very lucky".

The attacks by Hussain, Mohammed Sidique Khan, 30, from Dewsbury, Shehzad Tanweer, 22, from Leeds, and Jermaine Lindsay, 19, were the worst single terrorist atrocity on British soil.

The inquest at the Royal Courts of Justice in London continues tomorrow.