London Tube Bomb Victims Describe 'Fireball'

Victims of a botched bombing on a London Underground train last September, which injured 30 people, on Thursday told a court how passengers screamed in pain after a fireball tore through the carriage.

Stephen Nash told jurors at London's Old Bailey that he was on his way to work when he experienced a "blinding flash" before being "engulfed in flames".

"I was thrown to the ground," he said at the trial of Ahmed Hassan, the 18-year-old Iraqi asylum seeker suspected of carrying out the attack.

"The flames were overwhelming," he added. "It was intense heat, I thought I had lost my ears, I thought my head was on fire."

Retired anti-terrorist police officer Alex Beavan described seeing a "rolling fireball coming over the ceiling at the back of the train".

"There was a woman," he recalled. "I could see her realize what was happening and she began screaming and some men were shouting 'Run'."

He told jurors that he took cover behind a wall, fearing a second blast.

Commuter Aimee Colville said she heard a "loud bang" and "cracking" before "a wall of glass came across."

"That morning I had curled my hair and I had put hairspray in my hair so when the flames came over me my hair immediately caught fire," she added.

Fellow eyewitness Victoria Holloway said people were screaming in pain as flames lapped around her.

"They were touching my legs, I could see them wrapped around my skin," she said.

Prosecutor Alison Morgan said it was only "luck" that prevented the bomb from fully detonating.

Hassan arrived in Britain in October 2015, saying he was in fear of the Islamic State group.

He told British authorities that the group had taken him by force and trained him "how to kill" when he was in Iraq.

He denies attempted murder and using the chemical compound TATP to cause an explosion on a packed Tube train on September 15.

The attack, claimed by IS, was the fifth time Britain had been targeted in six months.