Suspicious packages found, Manhattan subway evacuated

NEW YORK (AP)

Two abandoned objects that appeared to be pressure cookers prompted an evacuation of a major lower Manhattan subway station during the morning commute Friday before police determined they were not explosives.

The bomb squad cleared the items found at the Fulton Street station, New York Police Department Counterterrorism Chief James Waters said on Twitter.

Waters posted photos of the objects, which looked like pressure cookers or crock pots.

“The suspicion is that they were placed there to suggest that they were electronic devices and possible bombs,” Gov. Andrew Cuomo said on WCBS-AM.

The station is a busy transit hub a few blocks from the World Trade Center, and the proximity to the site of the Sept. 11 attacks served to heighten anxiety before the all-clear was given.

“This is a frightening world we live in, and all of these situations have to be taken seriously because God forbid one day ... it’s a real device,” Cuomo said. “We learned the hard way after 9/11, and we are prepared.”

In 2017, a would-be suicide attacker set off a homemade pipe bomb in an underground passageway at the Times Square subway station during rush hour, seriously injuring himself.