He was was not known to the police for terrorism-related activities, Van Der Sypt said.
"We have to see in what kind of society we want to live in", said Belgian Interior Minister Jan Jambon. He said the man was from the Molenbeek neighborhood, the home and transit point for numerous suspects linked to attacks in Brussels and in Paris in November 2015.
"Yesterday, someone with explosives entered central station".
Belgian authorities have been reacting to the incident and a spokesperson from the federal prosecutor's office, Eric Van Der Sypt said, "This is considered as a terrorist attack". "He is dead", he added. Associates of that group attacked Brussels itself four months later, killing 32 people.
The man was from the Molenbeek neighborhood, the home and transit point for numerous suspects linked to attacks in Brussels and in Paris in November 2015.
Pierre Meys, a fire service spokesman, told RTL that some kind of explosion has happened in the station, but it is unclear what caused the blast.
Witnesses spoke of a man who shouted Islamist slogans, including "Allahu akbar" - God is greater - in Arabic, in an underground area of the station still busy with commuters making their way home and seemed to set off one or two small blasts that filled parts of the building with smoke.
There were no other casualties in the attempted attack.
How the Heat Can Impact Flights
And if it tries to land when the air is too thin and hot, that's not good either because it can run out of runway, McNally said. Bigger jets like Boeing 737s and Airbus A320s have higher operating thresholds, 52 deg C and 53 deg C respectively, he said.
"Then he cried "Allahu Akbar", and he blew up a wheeled suitcase", Nicolas Van Herringer, a railway sorting agent, told reporters.
"I saw two policemen coming towards me and telling me in French to "get out, get out and go up the stairs", she told the Daily Record.
The attacker planned to carry out a bigger explosion and had a powerful explosive device, but failed to do so, Jambon added.
Belgian soldiers shot a terror suspect after an explosion rocked the central train station in Brussels in the latest attack to hit Europe.
Brussels police said via Twitter that there was "an incident with an individual at the station".
Belgium's Crisis Centre, which monitors security threats in the country, says based on initial information it doesn't see a need to raise the terror threat in the country to the highest level.
Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel said a "terrorist attack has been prevented" in the city that hosts the European Union and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation headquarters. A police spokesman told Reuters: "There was an incident at Central station".
"In three years we have been confronted with several attacks or attempts and we say the zero risk does not exist", Prime Minister Charles Michel said after a specially-convened security meeting.
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