ARMED police swooped on a quiet York street after a man wielding a shotgun threatened three teenagers.

The youngsters were targeted by a neighbour during the attack in Manor Park Road, Rawcliffe, at about 7pm last night.

A 16-year-old girl who was approached by the man said her friends had been left terrified by the incident.

She said: "My friends were shaking. I knew they were really scared.

"We were just talking in the street - doing what any other normal people do - and then he just came out like that."

Her ordeal started when the man, in his late 50s or early 60s, charged out of his house and approached the three Canon Lee School students - a 15-year-old boy and two girls aged 13 and 16.

Witnesses said the man was waving a gun and aggressively shouting and swearing at the youngsters, who were chatting in the street. We were just standing by the lamppost talking and he came out and threatened my friend," the girl said. "He just turned around and clicked the gun and said to my friend to go away and not to say anything to him. But we were not even near his house. He said he had been waiting for someone for nearly two hours but they never turned up.

"He said my friend had thrown stones at his house in the afternoon, but he was actually at school with me.

"The man was drunk and he stunk of booze.

"It was totally scary. I came running in telling my dad and my other two friends ran off.

"He went into his garden and a lot of people were shouting at him saying: 'Why have you just threatened three kids?'"

Police sent three armed response crews and back-up teams to the scene. They arrested a man at a house in Manor Park Road and launched a search of the premises.

One neighbour said residents of the peaceful street had been left stunned by the attack.

He said: "I was shocked. This is a very good, quiet, normal area and the neighbours are friendly and we do not get much trouble."

Sergeant Keith Morrison, of North Yorkshire Police, said: "Officers went to the address and one man who fully cooperated with them was arrested and brought to Fulford Road police station.

"They then searched the premises with a view to finding if there was anything untoward."

Updated: 08:45 Friday, May 26, 2006