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| The '''London Event''' was the later official name for the takeover of [[London]] and [[London Underground|its underground rail system]] by [[robot Yeti]] controlled by the [[Great Intelligence]]. ([[PROSE]]: ''[[Downtime (novel)|Downtime]]'') There were multiple accounts as to when it happened. It either took place in [[August]] [[1966]], ([[PROSE]]: ''[[Who Killed Kennedy (novel)|Who Killed Kennedy]]'') [[1968]], ([[PROSE]]: ''[[Downtime (novelisation)|Downtime]]'', ''[[Revolution Man (novel)|Revolution Man]]'', [[HOMEVID]]: ''[[Global Conspiracy? (home video)|Global Conspiracy?]]'') [[February]] [[1969]], ([[PROSE]]: ''[[The Forgotten Son (novel)|The Forgotten Son]]'') or [[March]] [[1975]]. ([[PROSE]]: ''[[The Enfolded Time (short story)|The Enfolded Time]]'') | | The '''Battle of [[Covent Garden]]''' was a fight that took place between the [[British Army]] and the [[robot Yeti]] of the [[Great Intelligence]] around 40 years after [[1935]]. |
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| == History ==
| | The battle was the result of a two-pronged operation with the intent to retrieve the [[Second Doctor]]'s [[The Doctor's TARDIS|TARDIS]] from the web fungus in the [[London Underground]]. Colonel [[Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart|Lethbridge-Stewart]] and seven other soldiers were ambushed by Yeti at Covent Garden as they attempted to reach the TARDIS from the surface. Although they managed to destroy a number of the robots, the soldiers were vastly outnumbered and soon ran out of ammunition. Only Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart, having lost all seven of his men, including [[Blake (The Web of Fear)|Corporal Blake]], made it back to [[Goodge Street tube station|HQ]] alive. ([[TV]]: ''[[The Web of Fear (TV story)|The Web of Fear]]'') |
| The event began with mist across London, causing a rash of disappearances; central London was evacuated and cordoned off. Two days later, a web-like [[fungus]] infected the Underground, causing that to be closed off. Two days after that, the Yeti began cutting [[telephone]] lines. | | [[Category:Conflicts]] |
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| The [[British Army]], from a command hub based in a [[Second World War]] transit camp at [[Goodge Street tube station]], tried to hold back fungus and Yeti.
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| [[File:Coming of Salamander.jpg|left|thumb|[[Ramón Salamander]] materialises in the deserted London. ([[COMIC]]: ''[[The Heralds of Destruction (comic story)|The Heralds of Destruction]]'')]]
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| Three weeks after the British Army established their command base in the Underground, the Intelligence brought the [[Second Doctor]]'s [[The Doctor's TARDIS|TARDIS]] to London after ensnaring it in [[space]]. ([[TV]]: ''[[The Web of Fear (TV story)|The Web of Fear]]'') [[Ramón Salamander]] was caught in the temporal wake of the TARDIS and brought to London as well. ([[COMIC]]: ''[[The Heralds of Destruction (comic story)|The Heralds of Destruction]]'')
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| The arrival of the Doctor also saw a massacre of troops at [[Holborn]], a sustained attempt by the Intelligence to cut off the transit camp, and the arrival of the [[Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart|new commander Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart]]. The Doctor severed the Intelligence's connection to Earth, but almost the entire Army platoon had been wiped out in the operation. ([[TV]]: ''[[The Web of Fear (TV story)|The Web of Fear]]'')
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| === Aftermath ===
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| The cover story for the event was that there had been a major [[nerve gas]] leak. While the government claimed this had been an industrial accident, journalist [[James Stevens]] later reported it was more likely an attack by an undisclosed foreign power. ([[PROSE]]: ''[[Who Killed Kennedy (novel)|Who Killed Kennedy]]'')
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| The London Event directly led to the creation of [[UNIT]]. ([[PROSE]]: ''[[Who Killed Kennedy (novel)|Who Killed Kennedy]]'', [[TV]]: ''[[The Invasion]]'')
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| A battered cardboard file containing a full [[Ministry of Defence]] report on the London Event was discovered by Sergeant [[Beagles]] in the security vault at UNIT H.Q. Being pre-UNIT, the report was not known to exist except on hard copy. [[Charles Crichton|Brigadier Crichton]] had hoped the file would be of help during the Great Intelligence's fourth attempted invasion of Earth in [[1995]]. However, before the information contained therein could be acted upon, the file was stolen by [[Douglas Cavendish|Captain Cavendish]]. ([[PROSE]]: ''[[Downtime (novelisation)|Downtime]]'')
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| [[New Jupiter]] had some knowledge of the attack, with replica Yeti walking around the [[EarthWorld]] museum's Twentieth Century Zone. ([[PROSE]]: ''[[EarthWorld (novel)|Earthworld]]'')
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| [[Category:London history]] | | [[Category:London history]] |
| [[Category:20th century Earth-based conflicts]]
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| [[Category:Human conflicts]]
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