British authorities are characterizing yesterday’s small explosions in the London underground system a failed attempt to replicate the July 7th bombings. They say that attackers tried and failed to detonate explosive devices at three Tube stations and on a double-decker bus two weeks to the day after more than 50 were killed in coordinated bombings. As police and other law enforcement hunt for clues and suspects, one man was shot at the Stockwell underground station by armed plain-clothes police officers. It is unclear why he was shot but the BBC is quoting another passenger on the train as saying the man had been wearing a “bomb belt with wires coming out.” The BBC is also reporting that armed police surrounded a mosque in east London that was evacuated after a bomb scare. Police say they are now hunting four would-be bombers. The British authorities say the bombers fled after detonators went off, causing small blasts, but failed to detonate the bombs themselves. The Guardian newspaper reports that at least one of the bombs was being carried on an underground train in a rucksack by a man who shouted in surprise when it failed fully to explode. The paper says the man appears to have then vanished in the scenes of panic and confusion that followed. A second device was allegedly carried on to a tube by a man who dodged fellow passengers and fled when its detonator apparently went off. It is believed police have recovered four viable bombs, one from each of the four scenes. Three of these were of a similar size and one was smaller. One is believed to have contained nails. They were all in rucksacks and police say they bore similarities to those used by the four suicide bombers in the July 7 attacks. Here is British Prime Minister Tony Blair, speaking Thursday shortly after the underground stations were evacuated: “We can’t minimize incidents such as this. They’re done to scare people, to frighten them and make them worried… We can’t minimize the incidents but we have to react calmly.”