ARMED police swooped on Heathfield with an extensive search made of the area.

Specialist firearms officers, together with colleagues carrying Tasers and searching gear, pored over the Lower Cannon Road area late on Friday afternoon.

Patrol cars, riot vans and other police vehicles were parked up as Tactical Aid Group officers and others checked the immediate surroundings.

Police were being coy about reasons for the heavy-duty response which included officers kitted up in protective, anti-stab vests.

Local whispers suggested they may have been on the trail of an armed drugs dealer, but a police spokeswoman would not be drawn.

All she could say was that the operation was linked to a similar exercise earlier, the details of which were not forthcoming.

One witness at the scene said: ‘It looked a bit serious from where I was standing. They were searching for something or someone. One officer was using a billhook to look through a lot of undergrowth.’

Another said: ‘Police were all over the place. There must have been at least 30 of them in and around Battle Road and in the housing estate behind it.

‘I asked one officer what was going on – and he told me to mind my own business.’