Phone chargers spark Blackpool town centre bomb alert

A man who put a rucksack containing three phone chargers in a Blackpool town centre bin sparked a bomb scare at the weekend.

The act, which police believe was innocent and not a purposeful hoax, saw officers called to Market Street at 6.45pm on Saturday.

It was spotted by eagle-eyed door staff at Yates’s, with a spokesman for Lancashire Police saying: “There were wires coming out the bag.”

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One witness said the Army’s bomb squad was called out before being stood down.

And the police spokesman said officers established the bag had nothing explosive in it at all – just chargers.

Residents and businesses have been asked to be on the lookout for any suspicious circumstances after the UK was hit by three terror attacks in 10 weeks.

The country’s threat level was raised to ‘critical’ – which means a further attack is ‘imminent’ – after 22 people were killed at the Manchester Arena on Monday, May 22.

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Soldiers were put on the streets of London and armed police officers stood guard at key locations, including at attractions in Blackpool.

The threat level was later lowered back down to ‘severe’ – which means an attack is ‘likely’ – before three men carried out an attack in the capital using a van and large knives on Saturday evening.

The attack, which cost seven people their lives and left 21 in a critical condition, saw a number of arrests made and addresses raided by police.

Two of the London Bridge terrorists were named by Scotland Yard as Khuram Shazad Butt and Rachid Redouane.

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Butt, a 27-year-old British citizen born in Pakistan, and Redouane, who claimed to be Moroccan-Libyan, both lived in Barking, east London.

Assistant Commissioner Mark Rowley said Butt was known to security services.