Bombs found in alert near school

Army bomb experts were sent to the scene

A security alert near a primary school in Ballymena, County Antrim, has ended.

Police said an Army explosives team defused three viable pipe bombs found at Casement Place in the Harryville area at about 1000 BST.

More than 140 pupils at Harryville Primary School were sent home on Monday morning because of the alert.

Forty homes near Casement Street were also evacuated. Principal Lesley Meikle said the children were first taken to a nearby park.

She said the alert was disguised as a fire drill to avoid worrying them.

"There was no panic at all - it was only later that the older children realised that something was wrong. We had quite a lot of tears and quite a bit of work to calm the children down," she said.

"It makes me very cross that somebody can leave something at the side of a school. They have no concern for life whatsoever."