Posted on 06/30/2007 1:59:05 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
GLASGOW, Scotland - One suspect from the Glasgow airport crash was in critical condition Saturday with severe burns, police said, adding that a "suspect device" was found on him.
A Jeep Cherokee trailing a cascade of flames rammed into the airport earlier Saturday, shattering glass doors just yards from passengers lined up at the check-in counters. Police linked the crash to two terror plots in London.
Britain raised its terror alert to "critical" — the highest possible level — and the Bush administration announced plans to increase security at airports and on mass transit.
Both suspects were arrested at the airport, Scotland's largest. One, his body engulfed in flames as police pulled him from the still-burning vehicle, was hospitalized.
The attack comes a day after police foiled a car bomb plot in central London, discovering explosives packed into a Mercedes outside a nightclub near Piccadilly Circus and another Mercedes parked nearby.
The new terror threat presents Prime Minister Gordon Brown, a Scot who took office on Wednesday, with an enormous challenge and comes at a time of already heightened vigilance one week before the anniversary of the July 7 London transit attacks, which killed 52 people.
"I know that the British people will stand together, united, resolute and strong," Brown said Saturday in a televised statement.
The green Jeep barreled toward Glasgow's main airport terminal shortly after 3 p.m., hitting security barriers before crashing into the glass doors, witnesses said.
Police subdued the driver and a passenger, both described by witnesses as South Asian — a term used to refer to people from Pakistan, Afghanistan and other countries in the region — arresting them and taking one to the hospital. Witnesses said one of the men was engulfed in flames and spoke "gibberish" as an official used a fire extinguisher to douse the fire.
The previous round of terrorist activity in Britain, in July 2005, was largely carried out by local Muslims, raising ethnic tensions in Britain.
"The car came speeding past," said Scott Leeson, a witness. "Then the driver swerved the car around so he could ram straight in to the door. He must have been trying to smash straight through."
Passengers fled running and screaming from the busy terminal, Margaret Hughes told the British Broadcasting Corp. "There was black smoke gushing out where the car had obviously been driven into the airport," she said.
The airport was evacuated and all flights suspended. Flames and black smoke rose from the Jeep outside the main entrance. It did not appear there were any injuries aside from the suspect who had been set afire.
The apparent attack left passengers shaken and stranded on the first day of summer vacation for Glasgow schools. All flights from the airport were suspended. At the time of the crash, the airport was bustling with families heading out on vacation.
Meanwhile in London, police were gathering evidence from closed circuit television footage, as forensics experts searched for clues into the foiled bombings. The two Mercedes cars had been loaded with gasoline, gas canisters and nails in one of the capital's busiest areas on a night when Londoners like to go out and party. Security officials and police denied an ABC News report that they had a "crystal clear" picture of one suspect from CCTV footage.
The vehicles were found abandoned in the early hours of Friday in what police believe was an attempt to kill scores or even hundreds of people. Detectives said they were keeping an open mind about the bombers' identities, but terrorism experts said the signs pointed to a cell linked to or inspired by al-Qaida.
One car was abandoned outside the Tiger Tiger nightclub on Haymarket in the heart of London's entertainment district. The other had been towed after being parked illegally on nearby Cockspur Street and was discovered in an impound lot about a mile away in Park Lane, near Hyde Park.
One former top British security official said she had no doubt the London and Glasgow incidents were connected.
"One has to conclude ... these are linked," Dame Pauline Neville-Jones, former head of Britain's joint intelligence committee, told Sky News television. "This is a very young government, and we may yet see further attacks. ... We are seeing a pattern of attack in the early days of a new government."
Brown came to office pledging to win back the support of voters disenchanted over the Iraq war. But he backed Tony Blair's decision to send troops to Iraq in 2003 and has shown support for greater anti-terror measures that have angered Britain's some 1.8 million Muslims.
A British government security official said there had been no direct intelligence linking the incident to Friday's thwarted plot in London but that police and MI5 "are keeping an open mind," the official said. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information.
Police and MI5 would be examining any potential links between the three incidents in London and Scotland, as they all involved vehicles, the official said. He said there had been no intelligence warning of a potential plan to attack Scotland.
Police did not say whether the SUV that struck the airport was carrying explosives, but one witness reported seeing a gas canister in the vehicle.
President Bush was being kept informed of the situation, the White House said. "We're in contact with British authorities on the matter," said Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the National Security Council, in Washington.
Lynsey McBean, who was at the terminal, said one of the men took out a plastic gasoline canister and poured a liquid under the car. "He then set light to it," said McBean, 26, from Erskine, Scotland. She said the Jeep struck the front door of the airport but got jammed.
"They were obviously trying to get it further inside the airport as the wheels were spinning and smoke was coming from them," she said.
AP photographs from the scene showed the car hit the building at an angle and was poking into the terminal. The Jeep struck the building directly in front of check-in counters, where dozens of passengers were lined up, police said.
Leeson said bollards — security posts outside the entrance — stopped the driver from barreling into the bustling terminal at Glasgow's airport. "If he'd got through, he'd have killed hundreds, obviously," he said.
The incident carried reminders of a foiled plot in December 1999 to attack Los Angeles International Airport, when customs agents stopped an Algerian-born man in a car packed with 124 of explosives. He was jailed for 22 years and prosecutors said he was intent on bombing the Los Angeles airport on the eve of the millennium.
Do they mean something more suspicious than a flaming car that they were trying to drive into the airport?
Green Benz and a green Jeep. Green is their favorite color, isn’t it?
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