Musical cast and audience flee in bomb alert
A bomb planted outside a packed Northern Ireland civic centre had the potential to kill, police said today.
More than 350 members of the cast and audience at a performance of a musical at the Lagan Valley Island Civic Centre in Lisburn, Co Antrim, were forced to flee when an anonymous warning of a device was made last night.
Army bomb disposal experts worked on the suspect vehicle, a white Volkswagen left in the centre’s car park, for several hours before returning today to complete defusing the device.
Local police commander Chief Superintendent Ken Henning said the bomb had been “crude but viable”.
He said it had “the potential to cause serious injury or worse to any member of the public at the centre”.
He added he condemned utterly those responsible for planting the bomb, saying they had nothing to offer the people of Lisburn apart from “inconvenience, disruption and the potential to maim and kill”.
No claim of responsibility has been made, but the finger of suspicion was pointed at dissident republicans by police.
A local theatre group was halfway through a performance of Carousel when the evacuation was ordered last night.
Mr Henning said there were a number of events in the centre as well as the performance and all had been disrupted.
“It’s an absolute disgrace,” he said, and appealed for anyone in the area who saw anything suspicious to contact police.
Roy McIlwrath, of Lisnagarvey Operatic Society, which was putting on the show, said: “It was a bitterly cold night and the cast had to go outside in costume.
“Some of them were out in their bare feet, with very little on but the costumes they were wearing – it became a priority to look after them."
