At 15.55, half an hour after the bomb had gone off, an operator happened to see the yellow note lying on the unit leader’s desk. Twenty minutes had passed since Andreas Olsen reported his information. Now, they rang him back and asked him to go through it all again.
‘And that was before the explosion?’ asked the operator after Olsen had once again explained what he had seen.
‘Five…’
‘What did you say – it was?’
‘It was five minutes before the explosion.’
‘Are you sure he was in police uniform?’
‘There was a police badge on the sleeve. I can’t say whether it was a genuine police uniform. But I thought police, because I saw a helmet with one of those glass visors in front and he’d got a pistol out. So I wondered if there was some operation going on, because I thought the whole thing was… that is, something made me react.’
‘But that was five minutes before the explosion?’
Olsen confirmed this again and gave a description: European appearance, in his thirties, about 1.80 metres tall. The operator became convinced that this was an important lead. ‘Good observation. What was the registration number of that car?’
By the time they rang off, it was 16.02.
After the call, the operator marked the report as Important in the operation log and made sure it was accessible to all. She also filled in the on-scene commander, who asked her to pass the report on to a patrol from the emergency response squad. It was impossible to get through on the communication radio, so she found their mobile number and rang them.
At 16.03, Breivik passed the police station in Sandvika, on the E18. If the officers had been looking out of the windows, they would have seen the silver-grey van driving past on the main road. Sandvika had men ready and waiting, but did not know what to do with them and was awaiting a request for assistance from Oslo.
At 16.05 the operator in Oslo made a mobile phone call to the emergency response unit informing them of the man in a dark uniform driving a Fiat Doblò. She also gave them the registration number. The patrol said the description was too vague for any action to be taken.
At 16.09 the chief of operations in Asker and Bærum, the district through which Breivik was now driving, finally got through to Oslo police district to offer assistance. She was informed about the van and the possible perpetrator. At that point in time, the station at Asker and Bærum had three patrol cars at its disposal; the chief of operations rang the closest one and gave the description. This patrol was on its way to Ila prison to pick up a prisoner who was to be taken to Oslo. The chief of operations asked them to postpone the prisoner transport because of the bomb in Oslo. She also alerted the two other patrols and read over the radio the type of vehicle, registration number and description. Then she once again contacted the patrol at Ila prison, which by then should have been free, and commanded it to go out on observation along the E18.
But the two policemen in the patrol car had chosen to ignore their orders. They had picked up the prisoner from the prison after all and were now on their way into Oslo. They had wanted to ‘get the job out of the way’, they said. In the operation log, the prisoner transport was marked Priority 5, the lowest level. The country’s seat of government had been blown up yet the patrol decided to act on its own whim. Asker and Bærum’s second patrol had been busy with a psychiatric assignment and had been given orders to leave it. That order was not obeyed either.
And this at the very moment Breivik was driving through their district, in a light-coloured Fiat Doblò VH 24605, just like the one the chief of operations had described to them over the radio. Two police patrols could have been positioned along the E18 and could have followed him. Nobody did. Breivik pushed on westwards.
To judge by the way the Oslo police was behaving, little indicated that Norway had just been the target of an act of terror, with an acute risk of secondary attacks. When other districts offered support, their offers were largely declined, even though many potential targets around Oslo remained unsecured. The Parliament requested reinforcements as there were no armed officers outside the main building. You will have to make do with your own guards, the head of the Oslo operational centre informed them. Just close off some of your buildings, the head of security at the Parliament was told. The Labour Party offices at Youngstorget asked for police guards; the House of the People asked for police guards. Their requests were turned down, with the advice to evacuate their premises.
Norway owns a single police helicopter. And in July, the helicopter service was on holiday. As a consequence of new savings measures, there was no emergency crew cover at the height of the summer. The first pilot nonetheless reported for duty right after hearing about the bomb on the news. He was told he was not needed.
Yet the emergency response unit requested use of the helicopter twice in the hour that followed. The squad was informed that the helicopter was unavailable, even though it was on the tarmac, fully operational and ready to fly. Nor did the police take any steps to mobilise military helicopters or make use of civilian helicopter companies.
After the bomb in Oslo, no immediate nationwide alert was sent out. A nationwide alert is issued to communicate information considered important to all the police districts in the country. When such an alert goes out, all police stations follow a standard procedure. In Asker and Bærum, this would have involved setting up a police roadblock on the E16 at Sollihøgda, towards which Anders Behring Breivik was currently heading.
When the duty manager at Kripos, the National Criminal Investigation Service, contacted the chief of operations of the Oslo police to ask if they could help in any way, the exchange ran as follows:
Oslo: Well, er, you could, that is, it might be interesting to maybe issue a warning, send out a national warning.
Kripos: Yes. What do you want it to say?
Oslo: No, that is, well it’s interesting now because a van was spotted here, uh-huh. A small grey delivery van. VH 24605. So if you could send out, that is, a national warning that there’s been an attack here, and then that the police districts are bearing it in mind.
Kripos: The van?
Oslo: Yes, and any other activity, because it could be interesting on routes to border crossings. Mmm, maybe alert the customs service, which is at most of the borders at least.
The conversation ended without the chief of operations clarifying that the van could be the vehicle of a potential perpetrator, that the individual driving it had been observed at the scene, and that he was wearing a police uniform and was armed.
The information provided by witnesses was not read out over any general communication wavelength, nor was it passed on to the media so that alerts could go out on radio and television. The Public Roads Authority in Oslo, which has a comprehensive network of cameras, was not alerted either. Despite the fact that the government quarter – Norway’s most important seat of power – had been blown to smithereens by a bomb, the terror-response plan was not implemented.
Nobody pressed the big button.
The resources available were not exploited.
Meanwhile, Breivik drove calmly on towards Sollihøgda. He kept to the speed limit. He did not want to overtake anyone, or be overtaken. He had to avoid anyone who might look into the van and think there was something not quite right about him.
At 16.16 he passed Sollihøgda. Down to his left lay the Tyrifjord.
Soon, he would be able to see Utøya.
You had to put your best people in defence.
And these last few summers on Utøya, Simon had been the workhorse of the Troms football team. Among the activists he was the fittest and most experienced team player; he was good at countering attacks, getting the ball and kicking it away up the pitch. He was also the one who got most annoyed with the slowcoaches. ‘Get a move on!’ or ‘Run faster’ he would shout. He did not approve of halfhearted efforts – that was no fun. You were here to win.