Sheffield: Roads remain closed amid fears over ‘man with weapons’

Roads remained closed in Sheffield city centre almost a day after concerns were raised about an allegedly armed man, police have said.

Transcript

00:00Morning Sheffield, it's Alistair again from the Sheffield Star. I'm speaking to you from

00:03Ponds Forge Sports Centre where it's quite an unbelievable scene. We've had scores of

00:08people sleeping inside the sports centre overnight at something of an evacuation centre. I've

00:14been speaking to people here so far, the understanding so far is quite a lot of the people inside

00:17here today are from the Gateway Student Accommodation on Broad Street, which is where a lot of the

00:22action has been centred today and indeed is on the other side of the roundabout where

00:25I'm standing right now. People were given the word about it first at about 7pm but were

00:31evacuated at around 8pm last night over reports of, I've been told by students living here,

00:36of a man in the top floor flat of the Gateway Student Accommodation threatening that they

00:43had weapons and explosives was the word they used. There's been very little in the way

00:48of rumours for people here, there have been very few updates by and large. In the meantime

00:52it really is all a sit and wait incident. I should say the people I've spoken to have

00:57really praised the volunteers and staff here at Ponds Forge. People have been staying here

01:01overnight but they've been fed airbeds, pillows, blankets, they've been treated really quite

01:05well. They still say they're sleep deprived obviously but they couldn't fault the volunteer

01:09service, the out of hours service. A lot of staff apparently came back from off their

01:13duty to come in and help last night as people were put up here at the sports centre. But

01:18the Gateway itself appears to be the centre of the action here, it's where a lot of the

01:22police scene that I've seen while walking around today has been focused and so far the

01:26ongoing rumour is a man in the top floors screaming that they had weapons. People were

01:32stood here on the plaza behind me last night and they could hear bellowing shouts from

01:38across the roundabout.

01:40We've had a lot of people screaming into the night is the best way of putting it. What

01:47sort of situation we have in our hands here, we've had no confirmation if any weapons have

01:50been found or if this is what the nature of this incident is but we'll be able to bring

01:54you more as it happens. But so far the city of Sheffield, certainly on this side, is currently

02:00at a standstill. There is traffic in all directions, people are unable to get to work or get on

02:04with their morning as they'd like to and the action seems to be centred here on the Gateway,

02:09the student accommodation and we'll bring you more information as it happens.