Today's Daily Star splash headline. The accompanying picture is taken from a TV reconstruction of an incident 28 years ago. Click for full front page
Copies of today's Daily Star have been removed from airport newsagent shelves today over fears that its splash, headlined "Terror as plane hits ash cloud" with an image of a 747 with engines ablaze, could cause panic among travellers.
Richard Desmond's red top was removed from shops at Gatwick and Manchester airports after today's edition was published, with a front-page story claiming to feature "dramatic pictures as jets get OK to defy volcano".
However, the image used in the splash was taken from a TV reconstruction of an incident 28 years ago in which a BA 747's engines were knocked out by a volcanic ash cloud. The documentary, previously broadcast on the National Geographic channel, is to be shown on Channel Five tonight.
Gatwick airport's director of communications, Andrew McCallum, said: "We thought it was inappropriate at this point in time after six days of disruption and as people were anxious to get to their holiday destination or to return home to have these sort of computer-generated images on the front page.
"We had a discussion with other airports having seen the Daily Star's front page today and decided to remove it. It was in our view not appropriate."
Gatwick bosses also asked a Daily Star reporter and photographer to leave the premises today. The airport said it was unrelated to the paper's front-page story and was part of its management of media coverage of the travel disruption story.
The Star story, which featured four images from the documentary, described how a "stricken British Airways jumbo jet is engulfed by 'flames' after flying into a deadly cloud of volcanic ash".
"The dramatic pictures show the horrifying reason why flights were grounded for five days. The images are part of a gripping TV reconstruction tonight of a near disaster when BA Flight 009 flew into volcanic dust in 1982," the story continued.
"Last night the TV show's images were given a new relevance. Planes finally got the go-ahead to fly into ALL of Britain's airports from 10pm last night, despite the ash still being present."
A source at Gatwick airport said the story was "outrageous and irresponsible" as the ban on flights was lifted after the volcanic ash cloud was no longer judged to be a danger to air travel.
"There was no explanation on the front that this was a TV mock-up of an incident from 1982," added the source.
"Anyone who saw that front page would have naturally assumed these were images from a flight that had gone thrown a volcanic cloud after the restrictions were lifted last night. It was clearly designed to sell papers by inducing panic which is the last thing any of us need right now."
Russell Craig, head of communications for Manchester Airport, said the Daily Star splash had the potential to cause "absolute panic" among passengers and said the airport was considering a permanent ban on the paper.
"We felt that having spent an awfully long time in this airport over the last six days with some very frightened people, publishing something like that whether intentional or not would cause absolute panic among our passengers," he said.
"We didn't feel it was appropriate to have that on display in an airport full of people who were very happy that they were able to fly again.
"We have had so much negative feedback from passengers that we are considering whether the Daily Star will remain off the shelves on a permanent basis."
The Daily Star had not responded to a request for comment at the time of publication.
(Maybe Mick Jogger had it pulled so people wouldn't read about the size of his dick LOL!)
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