'Heroic' Taxi Driver Locks Suicide Bomber In Car Before Explosion

The taxi driver who survived an explosion outside a hospital in the English city of Liverpool over the weekend has been praised by officials after he reportedly locked the suicide bomber inside his vehicle and reduced the damage inflicted by the attack.

David Perry, 45, was dropping off 32-year-old Emad Al Swealmeen outside Liverpool Women's Hospital in Crown Street shortly before 11 a.m. Sunday when the latter detonated an improvised explosive device inside Perry's taxi, The Telegraph and the BBC reported.

Perry was able to get out of the vehicle 10 seconds after the explosion, surveillance footage of the incident showed.

It wasn’t immediately clear when, or how, Perry became aware his passenger was carrying the bomb.

The father of two, who was reportedly left with a few minor burns and had shrapnel in his body due to the explosion, was taken to a hospital and treated for serious but non-life-threatening injuries, according to The Guardian. He was discharged Monday.

Al Swealmeen died at the scene, another report by The Telegraph said. He was reported to have been a refugee from Syria who converted to Christianity in 2017, but some papers are suggesting he was from Iraq.

Police later declared the explosion a "terrorist incident," but the motives behind it were unclear, according to The Independent.

The attack happened on Remembrance Sunday — a day when Britain pays tribute to its war dead by observing a national two-minute silence at 11 a.m. Thousands of people observed the event at Liverpool Anglican Cathedral, which was near the site of the explosion, Yahoo News reported.

Police arrested three men, aged 21, 26 and 29, under the Terrorism Act hours after the bombing. A fourth man was also arrested, but police did not release his age.

Liverpool Mayor Joanne Anderson applauded Perry for reducing the damage from the bomb by apparently locking his taxi's doors and trapping Al Swealmeen inside.

"The taxi driver in his heroic efforts has managed to divert what could have been an absolutely awful disaster. We knew the taxi driver had stood out; the taxi driver locked the doors," Anderson was quoted as saying.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, for his part, praised Perry for his "incredible presence of mind and bravery."

Assistant Chief Constable Russ Jackson, head of Counter Terrorism Policing North West, said Monday evening that he could not confirm reports that Perry had locked the doors of the taxi before the explosion and had yet to receive his full account of what happened.

The taxi driver's wife, Rachel Perry, later addressed her husband's encounter in a post on social media, but she neither confirmed nor denied the claims that he locked his taxi’s doors.

“There are a lot of rumors flying around about him being a hero and locking the passenger inside the car. The truth of the matter is, he is without doubt lucky to be alive. The explosion happened whilst he was in the car and how he managed to escape is an utter miracle," Rachel was quoted as saying in the post by The Telegraph.

Rachel also thanked staff, doctors and nurses for treating her husband, whom she said was "extremely sore" from the incident.