Explosions rocked the main airport terminal and a subway station in
Brussels, Belgium on Tuesday, a day after authorities said a suspect in the Nov. 13,
2015 Paris terror attacks -- possibly the bomb-maker -- was likely loose in the city.
At least 26 people were believed to have been killed in what
Belgian federal prosecutor
Frederic Van Leeuw said were "terrorist attacks" in the city which has remained on high alert since the
Paris carnage.
U.S. officials told
CBS News they believed
Americans had been injured in the blasts, but there was no confirm on the number or condition of the casualties, and the
State Department was still trying to track down families.
Belgium's public broadcaster
RTBF said at least one suicide bomber was behind the explosions at the airport.
A U.S. official told CBS News that at least 11 people were killed and dozens injured in the blasts in the departure hall at
Brussels Airport.
Some witnesses told
Sky News the blasts struck near the
American Airlines desk in the departures hall.
Belgian media reported that gunshots were heard, and shouting in
Arabic, before the explosions. CBS News could not independently verify those reports.
About an hour after the explosions at the airport, there was a blast at the
Maelbeek Metro station in central
Brussels, very near the
U.S. Embassy and
European Union headquarters.
The Metro system was shut down.
Emergency workers could be seen treating several injured people outside the metro station at Maelbeek.
A spokesman for the company that operates Brussels' transport system said at least 15 people died in the Maelbeek
Metro attack and 55 more were wounded.
"The Metro was leaving Maelbeek station for Schuman when there was a really loud explosion,"
Alexandre Brans, 32, told the AP as he wiped blood off his face. "It was panic everywhere. There were a lot of people in the Metro."
All flights in and out of Brussels Airport were cancelled, and all public transport in the Belgian capital was also shutdown. Eurostar trains in and out of Brussels from the rest of
Europe were also cancelled Tuesday.
CBS
News correspondent Charlie D'Agata said the Belgian royal palace, home to the king and queen, was evacuated.
Belgian
Interior Minister Jan Jambon raised the nation's terror alert to its maximum level in the wake of explosions at the airport, indicating authorities believed a terrorist attack to be imminent.
"What we feared has happened,"
Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel said, urging his nation to "be calm and show solidarity."
It was atrocious. The ceilings collapsed," traveller Zach Mouzoun, who flew in from
Geneva just minutes before the first explosion at the airport, told
The Associated Press. "There was blood everywhere, injured people, bags everywhere
... We were walking in the debris. It was a war scene."
Police arrested one of the prime suspects in the
Paris attacks,
Salah Abdeslam, on Friday in the now-notorious Brussels neighborhood of
Molenbeek. On Monday, officials said they were still searching another man, identified as
Najim Laachraoui -- who may have been group's bomb-maker.
CBS News correspondent Charlie D'Agata reported that, according to Belgian authorities, Laachraoui's
DNA was found on the explosives used in the gun and suicide attacks in Paris. The carnage in Paris is believed to have been planned largely in Brussels, where a handful of the attackers lived or had links. That attack was blamed on the
Islamic State of Iraq and
Syria (
ISIS), but the attackers were "home-grown" militants, from Europe.
His whereabouts are unknown, and prosecutors admitted Monday they weren't close to solving the puzzle.
CBS News correspondent
Elizabeth Palmer notes that in
2015 alone, Belgium convicted 33 people of joining or supporting ISIS -- some of them in absentia as they were believed to be in Syria. That, said
Palmer, may just have been the tip of the iceberg.
Belgium's prime minister said there was no information immediately available to suggest a link between Tuesday's attacks and the arrest on Friday of
Abdeslam.
However, a U.S. official told CBS News that the attacks have all the hallmarks of ISIS, and the fact that it could happen just shows how "relentless" the terrorists are in attempting to pull off attacks. The official said the attacks in Brussels exposed weaknesses in airport security as well as on subway systems worldwide.
Video and photos from Brussels Airport, which is located in Zaventem, a suburb just northeast of the capital, showed windows of the main terminal blown out with smoke rising from the shattered panes.
SOURCE :
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/reported-explosions-at-brussels-airport-in-belgium/
- published: 22 Mar 2016
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