Blazing Car Crashes into UK Airport

The car was on fire before crashing into the building. (BBC Photo)

"The police have been called at about 3:15 (pm) (1415 GMT) at Glasgow Airport. A car had crashed inside the terminal. It was on fire," a police spokeswoman told Agence France-Presse (AFP).

She added that she did not know if it was a terrorist attack or if there were any victims.

Witness James Edgar said there was "absolute chaos" at the airport.

"I was in the airport building trying to book a holiday and people were running past us and then suddenly they told us all to get out of the airport," he told Sky News television.

"When we went out the main building there was a 4X4 (four-wheeled drive vehicle), as if it was rammed into the building. It was on fire and at that point everybody was just in a panic."

Edgar added that police and security scuffled with an Asian man.

"They later took him away. The fire is now out. As you can imagine there is absolute chaos in the airport."

BBC television meanwhile showed a still image of the terminal's exterior engulfed by a ball of fire.

Arrests

Two people were arrested by police immediately after the incident, police sources told AFP.

"Two people have been arrested at Glasgow Airport, which has been completely closed," a police spokeswoman said.

Two days after Prime Minister Gordon Brown took office, explosives experts on Friday defused bombs comprising gas canisters and nails in two Mercedes cars found in the heart of London's entertainment district.

One car, a pale green Mercedes, had been left outside the Tiger Tiger nightclub in Haymarket.

A second, a blue Mercedes, was left a few hundred yards away in Cockspur Street, a busy thoroughfare close to Trafalgar Square. This vehicle was towed away on Friday afternoon to a car pound on Park Lane by unsuspecting parking officials.

Only the vigilance and courage of ambulance-men and police officers prevented massive loss of life.