A bomb alert brought Skegness to a standstill today.Police cordoned off part of the sea front and Tower Gardens when a suspicious package was thrown outside the Litten Tree pub on Grand Parade.Eye witnesses said that two men of Asian origin threw the package to the ground and ran away shouting “Bomb!”.

The incident occurred around 2.30pm.

A policeman said that a suspected bomb had been found. The anti terrorist bomb disposal experts had been informed and were expected on scene around 3.45pm.

below: police cars block off Grand Parade in Skegness.

A spokesman for the Skegness Fire Service said that the police had requested that they be on standby. The fire engines were positioned on South Parade Skegness.

Police cordoned off part of Tower Gardens.

Staff from the Skegness Tourist Information Centre (the building directly above the pushchair in the photo below) gathered in Tower Gardens.

Lynne, a local resident, pictured below with granddaughter, Amy, gave an eye wittiness report.

The suspected bomb (blue bag) can be seen in the next photo. It is directly below the © character.

The anti terrorist bomb disposal team arrived on scene around 3.45pm. They sent a remote controlled robot in to investigate the package. A controlled explosion was carried out which can be seen and heard on the video.

below: photo of the moment of the explosion. The flash happened too quickly even to appear on a captured camcorder frame. It can be clearly seen on the video.

The robot drags the contents of the suspicious package into the open pavement.

After the controlled explosion, an army bomb disposal expert moves in to inspect the contents of the package.

He holds up a garment which appears to have a large hole in it.

The army bomb disposal expert checks the surrounding area including inside the Litten Tree pub.

Satisfied that all is safe, he picks up the remote control to steer the robot back to its transport vehicle.

The surrounding area was declared safe and the public were allowed to move closer to the scene of the incident. The immediate area where the contents of the suspicious package was lying remained cordoned off.

The photo below shows the contents of the suspicious package on the pavement outside the Litten Tree pub.

A close up picture reveals that the package contained child’s clothing and a (now fragmented) baby’s blue plastic trainer drinking cup.

Wearing protective gloves, a member of the bomb disposal team collected each item, putting them into separate brown paper bags.

The suspicious package was lodged behind this blue pole.

The explosion caused damage to the gray door threshold.

Eye witness account 1

“We walked down the sea front. We saw some police cars come down.
We sat in that shelter there [pointing towards the Embassy Pool Grand Parade].
A couple came down and they said somebody had left a bag over there [pointing to the Litten Tree pub].
The next thing we knew, the police came and they just cordened everything off. They [the police] just said there was a suspect bomb”.

Account 2

“Two Pakistanis dropped a bag and ran off. They [the police] don’t know what’s in it. It could be a bomb or anything. So that’s why they’ve closed it all off. They’ve closed all the arcades down”.

[interviewer] “Where did they leave the bag?”

“In the Litten tree, well, behind the door of the Litten Tree”.

Video: bomb disposal experts controlled explosion

Before you view the next two videos, please keep in mind that these images are maximum optical zooms from the Clock Tower.

IMPORTANT – the video contains some swear words from the spectators, particularly at the explosion!

Video: Aftermath of controlled explosion

Explosion terrified children

Children on scene were terrified by the boom of the explosion.
A young girl named Amy (above) talked about how she felt after the explosion.