Anti-knife metal detector appears at London Tube station in crack down on gangs

Anti-knife metal detectors were in place at a busy London station as police continued their crackdown on the gang violence that has plagued the capital.

Travellers are Vauxhall, south London, walked through the arches to get to their trains under the watchful eye of a police officer.

The capital has been hit by a wave of knife crime this year with the youngest victim a 13-year-old, who was knifed in Manor Park, east London, an area plagued by warring gangs.

The epidemic of knife crime saw six teenagers stabbed within 90 minutes of each other in a night of carnage across London.

There have been 70 killings in London this year – many of them stabbings – and at one point the capital’s murder rate was higher that New York’s for the first time.

Earlier this year more than 250 knives and swords were seized across London in just one week where 283 people, many of them teenagers, were arrested for carrying them.

They included 3ft ‘zombie’ blade found in Lewisham, which was also among the weapons grabbed by brave officers who can take up to 35 of these weapons off the capital’s streets every day.

The Metropolitan Police said the tactic was a ‘tried and tested one’ designed to disrupt young people who wished to carry knives

Referring to the measures in place at Vauxhall station, a spokesman said: ‘The Met Police is committed to tackling knife crime and uses a number of tactics to disrupt young people who wish to carry knives.

‘The use of knife arches at key locations is a tried and tested tactic.

As well as stations, knife arches we installed at branches of McDonalds in Croydon and Woolwich.

​In Croydon, the knife arch was set up temporarily in the restaurant’s doorway for two hour periods.

It was manned by a team of around six police officers, on hand to distribute leaflets, offer advice and confiscate weapons.