Siena alumnus rode terror train

A delay in getting his dry cleaning put a Siena College alumnus in the path of terror last week.

Benjamin Velazquez, a New York City banker and a 1993 graduate of Siena, was riding one of the London trains that were bombed on July 7. A member of the college's Associate Board of Trustees, he was aboard the train attacked near the Liverpool Station.

"I had to pick up my dry cleaning and was delayed, so I was taking a train I wasn't supposed to be taking," he told The Evangelist.

Time and terror

Once on board, Mr. Velazquez checked his neighbor's watch and saw that it was 8:40 a.m. He was listening to his mp3 player when the train was rocked by a blast in the cars in front of him.

He heard the roar through his earphones, and remembers the car skipping off the track and the roof of the train scraping the wall of the tube in which the trains travel.

The lights went off in every car but his, and he heard screaming all around him.

Thoughts of death

"I knew immediately it was a bomb," Mr. Velazquez said. "We started to ask if everyone was okay, if anyone was injured -- and I could hear the people in the next car screaming.

"White smoke came in, and black smoke was coming in front of me. I thought I was going to die from suffocation. My first thought was for my son, who just graduated from elementary school, and I thought of my mother in Puerto Rico and who was going to tell her, and I thought about who I wronged and whose forgiveness did I need.

"And then I said to myself, 'I've got to remain calm and pull through and get out of this, because it's not my time.'"

Exit strategy

Mr. Velazquez and other riders pried open a car door and opened the windows to vent smoke. A man from the car in front came back, searching for a doctor to tend the wounded in his car.

Mr. Velazquez and the other riders were trapped on the train for about 25 minutes before rescue teams arrived.

Uninjured riders stood on seats to make way for the injured to exit, who were "all ages, anywhere from the late twenties to 60 or 70 -- all kinds of people," he said. "We were communicating at all times: 'Mind your step here...look out...the cover on this is loose...be careful."

Among the dead

The riders then had to walk through the subway tube to reach an exit. The right side of the car ahead of his had been blown open, and the seats could be seen.

"I walked right through the scene of the blast," Mr. Velazquez recalled. "I saw body parts on the train, and I could see people sitting on the seats of the train and on the floor, motionless. I was telling the women not to look that way. One of them did, and she broke out crying. There were two dead men on the track next to our car."

The survivors emerged onto the streets to see "literally 100 policemen" and "bomb-sniffing dogs," he recalled. The police were taking names and information. Mr. Velazquez gave them his business card and ducked into an alley to call his mother in Puerto Rico.

"She thought that I was injured," he noted. "I said, 'I'm okay, I'm okay.'"

Impressions

Mr. Velazquez said that he was "very impressed with the bravery of people, the human reaction, how people pulled together. As time went by, we were all talking to calm each other's nerves. The best in humanity came out at that point in time. It was great to see people coming together to survive."

Mr. Velazquez, a Catholic, said that he was on the phone with his aunt in Puerto Rico the night before the blast, directly after "what could have been my last meal. She is a very traditional Catholic and blessed me, saying, 'May God be with you.' I think that's what carried me through."

This week, Mr. Velazquez was back at work in New York. On his first attempt to take the subway, he said he "started shaking. I'm taking taxis wherever I go now. It was a horrible experience."

Muslims

Mr. Velazquez said that he will not allow the incident to alter his views on Muslims.

"Even after [going through] this horrendous act, human nature is not evil," he declared. "I don't have anything against Muslims, and I am not going to give up and let this define who I am."

However, the experience has prompted him to take another look at how he lives his life.

"I'm a blessed guy," he said. The experience has "made me savor every minute. I realize that I've been lucky and blessed, and it's made me realize that life is more than just work. You've got to live your day like it's your last one. I tell people, 'Now, I have two birthdays.'"

(7/14/05) [[In-content Ad]]