Security alert cripples motorway

And as police and emergency services raced to clear the road, an explosion rocked a car park in Leeds.

Trains across the North West were also disrupted in the alert and thousands of rush-hour motorists were caught up in the chaos.

A spokesman for Lancashire police said officers began clearing the M6 motorway at 7.40am today following "a major security alert". They would not confirm if there had been a coded warning. He said the carriageway between junctions 26 at Orrell on the Greater Manchester/Lancashire border and 29 at Bamber Bridge were originally affected.

The closure was later extended to junction 25 at Wigan, Greater Manchester.

Police were still trying to clear the residue of traffic from the motorway between the affected junctions at 9am.

The spokesman said it appeared "pretty chaotic."

Greater Manchester police issued advice for traffic on the M6 and M61 which joins it at junction 30.

The southbound junction of the M6 at Bamber Bridge was blocked by a large police van and motorway patrol cars were directing traffic coming from the Preston direction on to local minor roads. Many minor roads in the Leyland and Chorley area were gridlocked as diverted motorway traffic joined rush hour traffic.

The delays caused by the security alert left many motorists seething.

Roger Myerscough, from Leyland, said: "I don't think too much about the people responsible for this at the moment. They have caused problems for everyone and people are just getting angry."

Andy Armstrong, from Penwortham, was stuck in traffic outside Euxton at 9am when he should have been at work.

He said: "You wouldn't be able to print what I think of the people who have caused this. "

AA Roadwatch said traffic jams which were more than four miles long had already built up around each of the two closed-off sections of the M6.

Railway stations at Crewe, Stoke-on-Trent and Doncaster stations were also closed.

The alert at Crewe railway station was caused by a telephone call containing what appeared to be a recognised codeword, said Cheshire police. The bomb alert brought chaos for long distance rail travellers after Railtrack was advised not to let trains run on the West Coast Main Line.

The line, which takes thousands of passengers a day between Preston and London, goes through Crewe.

A Railtrack spokeswoman said: "On the advice of the police we have had to close Crewe and other stations and there are no services on the West Coast Main Line.

"At the moment we are in the hands of the police."

However, Regional Railways said most other services were running as normal today.

A spokesman for Virgin Trains, which operates West Coast and CrossCountry services through the three affected stations, said there were already serioushold-ups, and two trains had been cancelled.

On the West Coast line, officials were attempting to find alternative routes to avoid Crewe and Stoke stations, which had been evacuated. Trains operating cross-country routes between the South Coast, South West and the North East via the Midlands, were also hit - they were being diverted via Leeds until the situation at Doncaster was resolved.

"We are asking people to stick with us at the moment. There will be delays and we urge people to check before setting out on their journey," he added.

GNER later confirmed that Leeds railway station was evacuated following reports of an explosion.

Police said officers were currently investigating "some kind of big bang", but were unable to confirm that it was an explosion.

A Railtrack spokesman said: "There have been reports that people have heard a bomb go off but we are not able to confirm that at the moment."

In Leeds, staff and guests were evacuated from the four-star 72-bedroom Queen's Hotel at the back of the station, in City Square.

The Doncaster station closure severely disrupted morning rush-hour services on the East Coast main line, now run by Great North Eastern Railways. "From the south we cannot run anything further north than Retford in Nottinghamshire and from the north we can only get as far south as York," said a GNER spokesman.

Doncaster was one of the stations closed in a similar alert which hit rail and road travel just before Easter.

Today's closure comes just two weeks after the IRA threw the Midlands into chaos by planting two bombs - each containing 2lbs of Semtex - under a flyover near Junction 9 on the M6, Europe's busiest stretch of road, near Walsall.

One detonator exploded but did not trigger the explosives. The second bomb was made safe.

The warning led to the closure of 30 miles of the M1 and the M6 and huge traffic hold-up in the West Midlands.

The IRA struck again just two days later, when the Grand National, was thrown into disarray by a coded bomb warning delivered less than an hour before the start of the race.

The Grand National was finally won on the following Monday.

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