Brussels Airport attackers ‘forced to leave bomb behind after taxi mix-up’

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A mix-up by a Brussels taxi dispatcher may have prevented more carnage at the city's airport on 22 March, Belgium's DH newspaper reported, saying the cab firm sent a smaller car to pick up the bombers than the one ordered.

Citing unidentified sources, DH said Ibrahim El Bakraoui and two other men suspected of carrying out the attack had called for a minivan to take them to Zaventem airport, laden with bags, early on Tuesday from an apartment in the north of the city.

When the driver turned up in a saloon, the three found they could not fit all four heavy holdalls into the trunk. They left one behind.

Two men blew themselves up in the airport's departure hall and the third ran off, leaving the heaviest explosive device which security services later detonated.

After the taxi driver called police to relate the tale, they found a large nail bomb in the apartment in the borough of Schaerbeek and defused it. Police had no comment on the report.

"What would have happened if all the explosive devices found in the Schaerbeek search had been taken to Zaventem?" DH asked.

Reuters