Police Evacuate Part of Puerta del Sol Over Suitcase of Clothes
Police cleared part of Puerta del Sol and Calle Preciados on Saturday over an abandoned suitcase that held clothes, amid a week of false alarms in Madrid.
The Policía Nacional (Spain’s national police) cleared part of Puerta del Sol on Saturday evening, Nov. 14, after an abandoned suitcase was found next to an El Corte Inglés store. Bomb disposal officers examined it and found only clothes inside, and the square reopened the same evening.
The scare came during a week of repeated alerts across the Comunidad de Madrid (the Madrid region) over bags left in public places. According to El Pespunte, worry has grown since a backpack bomb exploded in Oviedo, killing a national police officer and injuring another.
How Saturday’s alert unfolded in Sol
El Pespunte reported that the operation started around 20:00, when an officer of the Policía Municipal (Madrid’s city police) noticed the unattended suitcase near the El Corte Inglés sports store. Okdiario gives the time as about 20:30 and describes the object as a backpack, while ABC and El Pespunte both say it was a suitcase.
Officers set up a security perimeter, emptied part of the square and closed access from Calle Preciados and Calle del Carmen, sending pedestrians to nearby streets. ABC said dozens of people were redirected and that the cordon also covered part of Preciados, the street running up from Sol toward Callao, around the El Corte Inglés building. Images shared on social media showed Spain’s kilómetro cero almost empty on what is normally the busiest evening of the week, ABC noted.
TEDAX checked the suitcase with dogs and cameras
Specialists from TEDAX (the police bomb disposal unit) arrived with dogs trained to detect explosives. They examined the suitcase with cameras so they could see its contents without exposing themselves to risk. Once they ruled out explosives, police reopened the area.
El Pespunte said the cordon came down around 21:15 and the affected streets gradually returned to normal. ABC put the return to normal at barely two hours after the alert.
An earlier scare on Calle Preciados
Saturday’s evening alert was the second of the day on the same shopping street. Okdiario reported that around 14:00 police responded to a suspicious package on Calle Preciados and found no explosive material in it.
Why it matters for people in Madrid
Madrid has had several false bomb alerts this week, each forcing police to activate anti-terrorism protocols, according to Okdiario. Preventive evacuations have hit Plaza de España, Calle Preciados and Calle del General Ibáñez de Íbero in the capital, along with shops in several towns in the region. TEDAX teams were also sent to the Guardia Civil headquarters on Guzmán el Bueno and to Calle de Félix Boix in Chamartín.
Okdiario said interventions also took place in Fuenlabrada, Vallecas and Arganda del Rey, and in Guadarrama specialists carried out controlled explosions as a precaution. ABC reported similar episodes in San Fernando de Henares and Galapagar, where the suspect objects turned out to be abandoned backpacks, and false alarms in Málaga, Sevilla, Córdoba and Cádiz in Andalusia.
For anyone who lives, works or shops in central Madrid, the alerts have meant sudden street closures and evacuations in busy areas. El Pespunte said security forces are keeping a close watch on any report of luggage or objects left in crowded places.
Threats against flights at Barajas
The alerts have also reached Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas airport. Okdiario reported that the police Brigadas de Información (intelligence units) are investigating threats made against eight commercial flights.
Sources: ABC, El Pespunte, Okdiario