Portsmouth and Southsea station: Area reopened and cordon lifted after "suspicious item" dealt with
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Police are lifting cordon around Portsmouth and Southsea railway station – fully reopening the area after a “suspicious” item was dealt with.
Officers have swarmed the station and restricted access to passengers this morning. A British Transport Police spokeswoman said the force was alerted at 7.40am.
Earlier today, a statement from BTP’s Hampshire division reported on Twitter: “Officers are currently responding to reports of a suspicious item at Portsmouth and Southsea station.
“The station is closed and cordons are in place to allow specialist officers to assess the item. Further updates will be shared here when we have them.”
The cordon which police set up was 100m wide. The public being blocked from certain routes. Trains were halted at Fratton station and made to turn round.
Surrounding roads were also closed off to traffic. Several streets around the station were evacuated. These included Stanhope Road j/w Willis Road, Commercial Road j/w Surrey Street, Station road j/w Slindon Street, Isambard Brunel Road j/w Greetham Street, and Guildhall j/w Isambard Brunel Road.
BTP Hampshire now report that the item was deemed “non suspicious” – lifting the cordon after a bomb disposal robot was deployed. The station has now been fully reopened.
The force said: “The item has now been confirmed as non suspicious and the cordons are in the process of being lifted. Please check with @SouthernRailUK and @SW_Help before you travel this afternoon.
"Thank you again for your patience while we’ve responded to this incident. Officers have now completed all enquires and the station is fully re-opened.
“Thank you to @HantsPolice for their assistance and @networkrail for supporting.”
You can follow events as they happened by looking through The News’ live blog below.