London police carry out controlled explosions over bomb scare

LONDON: UK police have carried out controlled explosions after one of central London’s busiest shopping areas was evacuated over a bomb scare.

The incident occurred on the afternoon when people were ordered to evacuate Regent Street after a car was left outside a toy shop.

UK police carried out several controlled explosions in the area as a precaution.

The cordon was extended to cover a larger area including other streets with traffic was diverted.

After the investigation, British police said, in a statement, that an earlier security incident involving a suspicious vehicle in central London was being stood down after officers carried out a number of controlled explosions as a precaution.

The vehicle was found to be non-suspicious, police said on social media platform X. An earlier post had said road closures were in place near Regent Street in central London.

Earlier last week in the USA, a Tesla Cybertruck exploded in flames outside the Trump International Hotel Las Vegas, killing the driver and injuring seven others.

Videos showed the vehicle exploding and flames pouring out of it, as it sat outside the hotel. The incident occurred just hours after a man drove a truck into crowds of New Year’s Day revellers in New Orleans, killing 15.

The Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas is part of the Trump Organization, the company of President-elect Donald Trump, who will return to the White House on Jan. 20.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk was a key backer of Trump in his 2024 presidential campaign and is also an adviser to the incoming president.

A person was found dead inside the 2024 model-year Cybertruck and seven people sustained minor injuries from the explosion, McMahill said. He added that both the Cybertruck and the vehicle used in the New Orleans attack had been rented through car-sharing service Turo.