An incident has occurred at Oxford Circus tube station in London with reports of shots fired and police responding “as if terrorist related”.
Armed police have evacuated the station amid reports of “an incident”.
The Metropolitan Police have issued the following statement:
“Police were called at 16:38hrs on Friday, 24 November to a number of reports of shots fired on Oxford Street and underground at Oxford Circus tube station.
Police have responded as if the incident is terrorist related. Armed and unarmed officers are on scene and dealing along with colleagues from British Transport Police.
If you are on Oxford Street go into a building and stay inside until further direction. Avoid travelling to the Oxford Street area.
At this stage police have not located any causalities.”
British Transport Police did not immediately confirm the cause of the alert, which came as shoppers flocked to central London on Black Friday.
Oxford Circus is the busiest rapid-transit station in the United Kingdom, with 98.51 million entries and exits in 2014
Police have told people to take cover inside buildings.
@BBCNews @BBCBreaking Oxford Circus is closed police shutting off street to pedestrians! pic.twitter.com/cvTNcv8omi
— James Horton (@Horton_James1) November 24, 2017
We continue to respond to an incident at Oxford Circus. The station is currently closed, please avoid the area at this time. Officers are on scene.
— BTP (@BTP) November 24, 2017
More updates as they come.
Islam once again demonstrating it’s essential contributions to modern society by keeping us all on our toes and alert at all times
We don’t know that Levi. Let’s stay cool.
Thanks Levi for those pearls of wisdom, so far police have found no evidence of gunshots. People like you are part of the problem of extremism.
snowflakes !!
What was telling was how quickly a relatively harmless row (it seems) between two men led to panic among the crowds – with all the injuries stemming from that rather than anything else.
I was not far away in a restaurant on Euston Road at the time, meanwhile a friend was shopping on Oxford Street and was ushered into the back room by staff.
I was disappointed at the response of folks around me.
Unnecessary panic and alarm very much in evidence.
I told the ladies at the next table to carry on enjoying their evening: trawling through Fb wouldn’t help anyone.
It was very quickly established that it hadn’t been as folks feared/assumed.
For balance, later that evening, 2 guys got in a fierce altercation on the Tube. The Asian guy got very physical with a white guy and physically threw him off the train(as in he landed on his arse on the platform).
Folks immediate thoughts turned to the events of earlier that evening.
However, it transpired the Asian guy has remonstrated with the white guy, as he was pushing himself onto a women. Obviously, she didn’t want his advances. I hope others on the train had their preconceptions challenged by his actions.