Edinburgh airport evacuated after security alert

An airport was evacuated and hundreds of passengers delayed after a suspected breach of a security fence last night.

Eleven planes had to wait on the tarmac while around 500 people in the terminal at Edinburgh airport were evacuated.

Those who had been waiting in the departure lounge were then reprocessed through security following the incident at around 10.30pm yesterday.

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Passengers on one flight were told that a hole had been discovered in the perimeter fence.

Lothian and Borders Police said they are investigating a security breach at the airport.

Edinburgh Airport said they followed "usual procedures" to deal with the incident.

Airport spokesman Gordon Robertson said: "We followed exactly the normal procedure. There were no cancellations and minor delays to outbound flights."

The 11 planes had to wait on the tarmac for around an hour.

Mr Robertson said that everything was back to normal by around 1am.

SNP MP Pete Wishart was on a 10pm British Airways flight from Heathrow and was caught up in the disruption.

He was originally meant to be on an 8pm flight but that was rescheduled because of the stormy weather.

He said: "We landed at Edinburgh airport at about 12 o'clock and were told we could not leave because the pilot said a hole in the perimeter fence had been discovered.

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"We looked around and saw other planes on the tarmac and no passengers were being allowed to disembark at all.

"It was about 2am when we were allowed to disembark and go into the airport.

"Many people had suffered a whole series of disruptions, so there was a great deal of frustration about what was going on."

A Lothian and Borders Police spokesman said: "Police were made aware of a security breach which we are looking into."