Other NI News In Brief

Double Trouble Hits Air Passengers

A full-scale emergency was called last night as passengers were forced to use emergency chutes to disembark from a plane at Belfast International Airport after what was thought to be smoke was spotted in the cabin. The Easyjet flight from Liverpool on Thursday night had just landed when the emergency began. Earlier, a Flybe flight from Belfast City to Birmingham was evacuated due to an air conditioning problem. Sixty-three passengers and five crew members disembarked when a strange smell wafted into the aircraft. An Easyjet spokesman said the plane was evacuated as a precaution: "EasyJet can confirm it initiated an evacuation of flight EZY615 (Liverpool - Belfast) after landing at Belfast. During the taxi to the stand, smoke was spotted in the cabin by the crew and as a precaution, and in line with standard operating procedures, the crew initiated a slide evacuation from the aircraft."

Baby Saved From Blaze

A three-month-old baby was among four people rescued from a fire in east Belfast. A man and woman and the child were helped from a top floor flat in the Braniel estate by members of the fire service wearing breathing apparatus. The three were taken to the Ulster Hospital in Dundonald suffering from effects of breathing in smoke. An elderly woman was also taken from a ground flood flat - although she did not need hospital treatment.

Stone Stays Put

Michael Stone the convicted loyalist killer failed yesterday in his attempt to overturn further convictions for trying to assassinate Sinn Fein leaders Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness. The Court of Appeal upheld a verdict that his actions during a lone assault on Stormont in November 2006 were capable of constituting an attempt to murder the politicians.

Blitz Memorial Proposed

A solemn monument to commemorate victims of the Belfast Blitz of 70 years ago will be located in a park beside St Anne's Cathedral. Depending on a feasibility study, Belfast City Council is to back a proposal for the first civic Blitz memorial in the city. That location saw some of the worst bombing but although St Anne's Cathedral was in the middle of the danger zone, it managed to escape any direct hits. Almost 1,000 were killed and thousands more injured in two raids around Easter1941 - and outside of the city of London - this was the greatest loss of life. Two hundred Luftwaffe bombers attacked Belfast, leaving around 100,000 people - of a total population of 425,000 - homeless.

(BMcC/GK)