Sky News ground to a halt minutes into the lunchtime show to issue a major breaking news update from Bristol. On Sunday (May 3), Mark Barbett returned to the airwaves to deliver the biggest stories hitting the headlines. It didn’t take long for the show to derail when he interrupted the usual programming to announce the deaths of two people following an explosion in the city.
Avon and Somerset Police confirmed the deaths of two adults at a house in Sterncourt Road, which they described as “suspicious” and a “major incident”. He began: “Breaking news coming from Bristol, an explosion at a house there has led to two adults dying this morning.
“Avon and Somerset Police say they’ve declared a major incident after an explosion at an address in Sterncourt Road. It happened around half past six this morning, and the cause, they say, is being treated as suspicious.
“The police do say that they are not looking for anyone else in connection with what happened, and they are not treating it as a suspected terrorist event.” Approximately 70 people living in the cordoned-off area are being evacuated by police to a temporary rest centre.
Officers are advising people to stay away from the area, and pictures taken from the scene show a heavy police presence. A bomb disposal unit vehicle is at the scene, supported by armed response and police dogs, with road closures in place.
It comes after the news show was halted on Friday (May 1) as correspondent Mark Stone shared US president Donald Trump’s true feelings about King Charles after the UK-US state visit. A banner flashed up at the bottom of the screen, reading: “Breaking news – US president speaks to Sky News about royal visit”, as Sone spoke live from Washington, D.C.
He explained: “Look, it’s worth pointing out that [Trump] picks up the phone and he does it quite regularly with reporters in the United States, and increasingly beyond as well – that is his nature. So we thought it would be a good idea to get his sense of how this state visit has gone. Just after he bid farewell to the King and Queen at the South Portico, I spoke to him.
“As he has said publicly and as his face demonstrates, he loves the Royal Family, and he loved this trip. He clearly thinks that every part of it went very, very well indeed. These are the images of the farewell that took place on the South Lawn an hour or two ago. I asked him about the trip itself, he said, ‘The King’s just left, he’s a fantastic guy’, and he heaped praise on the Queen as well.”
Stone confronted Trump on the King’s “pointed” speech to Congress, explaining: “I asked him about the speech to Congress, he said, ‘I thought it was fantastic, it was a brilliant speech, it was delivered beautifully with that beautiful accent that he’s got. From everyone there was a standing ovation, I thought it was fantastic in all respects’.”
