Passengers on a Virgin Atlantic Airbus A330 have been safely evacuated after the London-bound aircraft diverted to Boston Logan over a fire alert.

The crew of the aircraft, operating the VS138 service from New York JFK, had reported a fire on board.

"Smoke and flames were emanating from a passenger seat," says Massachusetts state police, adding that the crew had extinguished the fire.

After conducting an emergency approach and touching down on runway 15R at around 20:50 on 4 July, the aircraft came to a halt and 217 passengers were evacuated.

The police force says explosive ordnance disposal personnel carried out an inspection of the seat.

"Wires were protruding from the area of the fire," it adds. Examination resulted in the location of a device between the seat cushions which appears to have been a battery pack from an external phone charger.

Investigators from the state police are continuing their probe into the incident. Passengers were taken to Logan's terminal E6.

Source: Cirium Dashboard