UK Police Make 'Significant' Arrest in Hunt for London Train Bomber

An injured woman is led away after the terrorist attack at Parsons Green underground station in London, Britain, September 15, 2017. REUTERS/Luke MacGregor
An injured woman is led away after the terrorist attack at Parsons Green underground station in London, Britain, September 15, 2017. REUTERS/Luke MacGregor
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UK Police Make 'Significant' Arrest in Hunt for London Train Bomber

An injured woman is led away after the terrorist attack at Parsons Green underground station in London, Britain, September 15, 2017. REUTERS/Luke MacGregor
An injured woman is led away after the terrorist attack at Parsons Green underground station in London, Britain, September 15, 2017. REUTERS/Luke MacGregor

British police hunting those behind a homemade bomb attack, which injured 30 people on a London underground train on Friday, said they had arrested an 18-year-old man in a “significant” move.

"We have made a significant arrest in our investigation this morning," Neil Basu, Senior National Co-ordinator for Counter Terrorism Policing, said in a statement. "Although we are pleased with the progress made, this investigation continues and the threat level remains at critical."

The man was arrested by Kent police under the Terrorism Act in the southern port area of Dover on Saturday morning.

Thirty people were treated in hospital after the improvised device detonated in the packed train at Parsons Green station in southwest London on Friday morning, in what was Britain's fifth terror attack in six months.

The toll was revised upwards by one early Saturday.

Images from inside the train car after the blast showed that the device was contained in a bucket with wires hanging out of it and that it was concealed in a plastic shopping bag.

Police are combing through closed-circuit TV images and have extensively studied the remains of the device without giving details about it.

The train hit by the bomber had video cameras in each car, and the London Underground network has thousands of cameras at the entrances to stations and along the labyrinth of subterranean and aboveground passageways leading from the entryway to the trains.

Saturday's “arrest will lead to more activity from our officers," police said.

"For strong investigative reasons we will not give any more details on the man we arrested at this stage.

ISIS said a group "detachment" had been behind the bombing.

Prime Minister Theresa May announced late Friday that the threat level had been raised to "critical -- meaning another attack could be imminent -- and said troops would take over guarding key sites to free police officers for deployment elsewhere.



Typhoon Gaemi Weakens to Tropical Storm as It Moves Inland Carrying Rain toward Central China

 In this photo released by the Taiwan Ministry of National Defense, Taiwanese soldiers clear debris in the aftermath of Typhoon Gaemi in Kaohsiung county in southwestern Taiwan, Friday, July 26, 2024. (Taiwan Ministry of National Defense via AP)
In this photo released by the Taiwan Ministry of National Defense, Taiwanese soldiers clear debris in the aftermath of Typhoon Gaemi in Kaohsiung county in southwestern Taiwan, Friday, July 26, 2024. (Taiwan Ministry of National Defense via AP)
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Typhoon Gaemi Weakens to Tropical Storm as It Moves Inland Carrying Rain toward Central China

 In this photo released by the Taiwan Ministry of National Defense, Taiwanese soldiers clear debris in the aftermath of Typhoon Gaemi in Kaohsiung county in southwestern Taiwan, Friday, July 26, 2024. (Taiwan Ministry of National Defense via AP)
In this photo released by the Taiwan Ministry of National Defense, Taiwanese soldiers clear debris in the aftermath of Typhoon Gaemi in Kaohsiung county in southwestern Taiwan, Friday, July 26, 2024. (Taiwan Ministry of National Defense via AP)

Tropical storm Gaemi brought rain to central China on Saturday as it moved inland after making landfall at typhoon strength on the country's east coast Thursday night.

The storm felled trees, flooded streets and damaged crops in China but there were no reports of casualties or major damage. Eight people died in Taiwan, which Gaemi crossed at typhoon strength before heading over open waters to China.

The worst loss of life, however, was in a country that Gaemi earlier passed by but didn't strike directly: the Philippines. A steadily climbing death toll has reached 34, authorities there said Friday. The typhoon exacerbated seasonal monsoon rains in the Southeast Asian country, causing landslides and severe flooding that stranded people on rooftops as waters rose around them.

China Gaemi weakened to a tropical storm since coming ashore Thursday evening in coastal Fujian province, but it is still expected to bring heavy rains in the coming days as it moves northwest to Jiangxi, Hubei and Henan provinces.

About 85 hectares (210 acres) of crops were damaged in Fujian province and economic losses were estimated at 11.5 million yuan ($1.6 million), according to Chinese media reports. More than 290,000 people were relocated because of the storm.

Elsewhere in China, several days of heavy rains this week in Gansu province left one dead and three missing in the country's northwest, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

Taiwan Residents and business owners swept out mud and mopped up water Friday after serious flooding that sent cars and scooters floating down streets in parts of southern and central Taiwan. Some towns remained inundated with waist-deep water.

Eight people died, several of them struck by falling trees and one by a landslide hitting their house. More than 850 people were injured and one person was missing, the emergency operations center said.

Visiting hard-hit Kaohsiung in the south Friday, President Lai Ching-te commended the city's efforts to improve flood control since a 2009 typhoon that brought a similar amount of rain and killed 681 people, Taiwan's Central News Agency reported.

Lai announced that cash payments of $20,000 New Taiwan Dollars ($610) would be given to households in severely flooded areas.

A cargo ship sank off the coast near Kaohsiung Harbor during the typhoon, and the captain's body was later pulled from the water, the Central News Agency said. A handful of other ships were beached by the storm.

Philippines At least 34 people died in the Philippines, mostly because of flooding and landslides triggered by days of monsoon rains that intensified when the typhoon — called Carina in the Philippines — passed by the archipelago’s east coast.

The victims included 11 people in the Manila metro area, where widespread flooding trapped people on the roofs and upper floors of their houses, police said. Some drowned or were electrocuted in their flooded communities.

Earlier in the week, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. ordered authorities to speed up efforts in delivering food and other aid to isolated rural villages, saying people may not have eaten for days.

The bodies of a pregnant woman and three children were dug out Wednesday after a landslide buried a shanty in the rural mountainside town of Agoncillo in Batangas province.