Istanbul airport attack: 13 arrested in raids after suicide blast in Turkey

Police officers patrol the airport following the attack
Osman Orsal/Reuters
Tom Marshall30 June 2016

Turkish police have arrested 13 people over the gun and bomb attack on Istanbul’s main airport.

Three foreign nationals are among the group of suspects, who were detained as police mounted simultaneous raids at 16 locations across Istanbul.

At least 42 people were killed and hundreds more were injured when three suicide bombers carried out the massacre at Ataturk Airport on Tuesday.

They stormed the airport and sprayed travellers with bullets during a murderous rampage before blowing themselves up.

The dead included at least 13 foreigners, while more than 230 people were wounded in the attack at one of the world's busiest airports.

Turkey's president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has blamed Islamic State.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility by IS, which did not mention the bloodshed on its social media sites.

One attacker detonated his explosives downstairs at the arrivals terminal, one went upstairs and blew himself up in the departure hall, and the third waited outside for the fleeing crowd and caused the final lethal blast, according to Turkish officials.

As the chaos unfolded, terrified travellers were sent running, first from one explosion and then another.

Airport surveillance footage showed a panicked crowd of people, some rolling suitcases behind them, stampeding down a corridor, looking fearfully over their shoulders.

Other CCTV footage posted on social media showed one explosion, a ball of fire that sent terrified passengers racing for cover.

Another showed an attacker, felled by a gunshot from a security officer, blowing himself up seconds later.

Eyewitness Will Carter, who was inside the terminal, said he heard explosions as the attack was carried out.

Speaking to Radio 5Live, he said: "I saw a fireball and some of the ceiling came down - just before there was panic and people running."

Paul Roos, 77, said he saw one of the attackers "randomly shooting" in the departures hall from about 50 metres away.

"He was wearing all black. His face was not masked," said Roos, a South African on his way home after a holiday in southern Turkey.

"We ducked behind a counter but I stood up and watched him. Two explosions went off shortly after one another. By that time he had stopped shooting," he told Reuters.

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