Silence will speak volumes as London recalls darkest hour - the morning of July 7, 2005

The bomb damaged Circle Line train stopped between Liverpool Street and Aldgate staions in London - AP Photo/Takayuki Kawashima

London will fall silent today in memory of the 52 people killed by the terrorist attacks on July 7, 2005.

The period of reflection – to take place at 11.30am during a service at St Paul’s Cathedral attended by the Duke of York – will be observed across the capital’s public transport network.

Announcements will be halted and bus drivers asked to bring vehicles to a stop if they can do so safely.

Transport for London said Tube services would run as normal but passengers would be asked to observe the silence and platform and other announcements would be halted for the duration.

The number 30 double-decker bus in Tavistock Square in central London. Photo: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images/Pool/PA

Survivors, relatives of the dead and members of the emergency services have been invited to the commemorative event.

Wreaths will be laid beforehand at the permanent Hyde Park memorial to the outrage, where a second service, to be attended by the Duke of Cambridge, will take place later, featuring music, a series of readings and the laying of flowers.

July 7, 2005 had dawned with London still elated from learning the previous day that it had won the 2012 Olympics, but the euphoria was short-lived.

Suicide bombers Mohammed Sidique Khan, 30, Shehzad Tanweer, 22, Hasib Hussain, 18, and Germaine Lindsay, 19, met at Luton station that morning.

They took a train to King’s Cross in London, then hugged and separated to carry out their deadly missions.

Within three minutes of 8.50am, Tanweer detonated his bomb at Aldgate, Khan set his device off at Edgware Road and Lindsay blew himself up between King’s Cross and Russell Square.

Hussain detonated his device on board the number 30 bus at Tavistock Square at 9.47am.

Twenty-six died in the bombing at Russell Square on the Piccadilly Line, six in the bombing at Edgware Road on the Circle Line, seven in the bombing at Aldgate on the Circle Line and 13 in the bombing on the number 30 bus at Tavistock Square. Hundreds more were injured.

The inquest into the 7/7 attacks heard astonishing testimony from survivors and extraordinary stories of courage by rescuers.

There were also new insights into the warped psychology of the terrorists, two of whom exchanged text messages pretending to be members of the A-Team on the eve of the attacks

After 73 days of hearings and evidence in person from 309 witnesses, in May 2011 the coroner Lady Justice Hallett said all 52 victims of the 2005 attacks were unlawfully killed.

She rejected claims that security agency failings caused or contributed to their deaths and ruled that the emergency services could not have saved any of those who died in the attacks.

However, she raised serious concerns about how MI5 investigates and prioritises suspects, warning that poor record-keeping could allow flawed decisions to slip through with “dire consequences”.

The security service came under fire after a clear colour photograph of Khan, the plot ringleader, was cropped so badly it could not be shown to an informant. MI5 later committed to enhancing its working procedures.