London Needs Four-Runway Airport

Britain needs to build a four-runway airport in west London or north of the capital if it wants to compete with other European hubs, a report by UK think tank Policy Exchange has found.

Bigger and Quieter: The right answer for aviation examines all of the options for increasing airport capacity in the UK. It supports placing four runways immediately west of the current Heathrow site. This would double the existing capacity to 130million passengers, cementing it as Europe’s premier hub. If this was politically unfeasible, then a four runway airport at Luton would be the next best option.

The report says that the UK needs a new hub airport located in the South East which has spare capacity to accommodate the likely increase in demand, especially to cope with the rise in middle class travellers from emerging markets.

It doesn’t rule out the current proposal to build a third runway to the north of Heathrow, but claims that less people would be affected by aircraft noise if the four runways were instead located 3km to the west of Heathrow.

Congo Fever Case In Scotland

A man is said to be in a critical condition after being diagnosed with Crimean-Congo Viral Haemorrhagic Fever.

The 38-year-old man has been put into isolation in Glasgow in the city's specialist Brownlee unit.

He was admitted to hospital less than three hours after returning to Glasgow on Emirates flight EK027 from Dubai.

A spokesman for the health board said: "Given the fact that this man went into the care of the NHS within three hours of his flight arrival in Glasgow and travelled directly home via private transport from the airport we are confident that his close contacts subsequently within the city were minimal.

"We have also identified all NHS staff, airport and airline staff who have had contact with the patient and any necessary follow-up action will be taken."

"Viable" Bomb Found In Ardoyne

A "substantial and viable" explosive device has been defused by the bomb squad in north Belfast.

More than 30 houses were evacuated in Jamaica Street in the north of the city following the discovery by the PSNI of a device at the back of a house.

Police are unclear as yet whether the bomb, which was found in the predominantly nationalist area of Ardoyne, was intended for security forces or was intended for use at a different location.

Ch Insp Andrew Freeburn has described the bomb as "intended to murder."

He said: "Once again the community of north Belfast have been disrupted and the lives of residents put at risk by an element intent on causing as much loss of life and disruption as they can.

"The people who carried this out showed a callous disregard for the lives of everyone in our community.

"This is a residential area and we could have been looking at serious tragedy here."

(GK)