THREE car bombs killed at least 62 people in Egypt's Red Sea resort of Sharm El Sheikh today.

The bombs went off in quick succession, ripping through two hotels and a coffee shop packed with European and Egyptian tourists.

The government said at least 62 people died and 119 were injured in the deadliest attack in Egypt in nearly a decade.

The reception hall of the luxury Ghazala Gardens hotel collapsed into a pile of concrete, sending terrified guests fleeing for safety.

Rescue workers said they feared more victims may be buried in the rubble.

The dead included Britons, Russians, Dutch, Kuwaitis, Saudis and Qataris.

At least eight Britons are believed to have been injured, said British Ambassador Sir Derek Plumbly.

Interior Minister Habib al-Adli blamed the attack on Islamic mili- tants.

"This is an ugly act of terrorism," he said in a statement carried on the government news agency.

"It has nothing to do with Islam. They are only acting under the slogan of Islam."

Holiday company Thomas Cook, which has about 1,500 holidaymakers in Sharm El Sheikh, said all its clients and staff there had been accounted for and were unhurt.

A spokeswoman said: "We didn't have any clients in the two hotels concerned. We have spoken to our reps there and everyone seems fine."

She added: "We'll make a decision later about what can be arranged for those still out there and others who are planning to travel there.

"The next fly-out and fly-back day is Monday."

The string of powerful blasts began at 1.15am, rattling windows miles away and raising flames and palls of smoke over Naama Bay, a main strip of beach hotels in the desert city at the southern tip of the Sinai Peninsula, also popular with Israeli tourists.

Through the night, dazed tourists milled about the streets as Egyptian rescuers searched for dead and injured. Bodies of the dead lay under white bedsheets or were loaded in plastic bags into ambulances, while other emergency vehicles sped away with the wounded.

At the Ghazala, guests huddled on a back lawn near the hotel pool.

David Stewart, on holiday from Liverpool with his wife and two teenage daughters, said: "The windows came blasting in.

"Somebody shouted `keep moving'. The lights were out. I couldn't tell what was happening."

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, which came nine months after simultaneous bombings hit two resorts further north in Sinai, killing 34 people.

The new bombings appeared well co-ordinated, happening within minutes of each other in locations as far as two-and-a-half miles apart.

One of the explosives-laden cars smashed through security into the front driveway of the Ghazala Gardens and detonated, said South Sinai province's governor, Mustafa Afifi - suggesting it was a suicide bomber, though he did not specify that.

The blast tore down the reception hall and shattered windows deep into the sprawling, 176-room resort complex.

Inside the hotel, bloodstains dotted the floors and tree branches and twisted metal lay flung around the grounds. As daylight came, workers were clearing debris as investigators picked through rubble.

A second car bomb exploded in a parking area near the Movenpick Hotel, also in Naama Bay, said a receptionist there.

The third detonated at a minibus park in the Old Market, an area just over two miles away where many Egyptians and others who work in the resorts live.

The blast ripped through an outdoor coffee shop, killing 17 people, believed to be Egyptians.