There were incredible scenes on GB News as Tory MP and sometime presenter Jacob Rees-Mogg was broadcasting from outside Buckingham Palace when the police carried out a controlled explosion.
A bang could be heard live on-air following the former cabinet minister and royal commentator Michael Cole taking their show to a portable cabin after a security alert.
The Metropolitan Police is questioning a man after suspected shotgun cartridges were thrown into the grounds of the palace, days before the King’s coronation.
Police carried out a precautionary controlled explosion which could be heard live on GB News, while cordons were put up in the area.
Rees-Mogg said on his show: “I’m very sorry to say it is good evening from me for the time being – as I think that was a controlled explosion in the background, that what it sounded like to me, we will no doubt find out later.”
He then attempted to riff with a foreign language about his apparent coolness as he suspected more might be about to come, suggesting “perhaps my sangfroid has been unduly ‘sang’ and not enough ‘froid’, if I’ve got my French right”.
Cole pushed back harder on an apparent evacuation order, insisting he had been in “many, many war zones under pressure, beaten up, covered civil wars, great disturbances, all out wars around the world. Beirut for 10 years, civil war”.
He added: “Can we just find out because overreaction is not what the British are about. We do have a certain amount of decorum on occasions like this. And so I want to hear the final word. I want to see a policeman or woman here telling us that we can no longer broadcast.”
That appeared to come fairly promptly.
The suspect was detained at about 7pm on Tuesday after he approached the palace’s gates in central London and threw a number of items, the Metropolitan Police said.
He is being held on suspicion of possession of an offensive weapon after a knife was found, the force said.
Scotland Yard say they are not treating the incident as terror-related. It is understood it is being treated as an isolated mental health incident.