"Today" newspaper launched in 1986 - it was the first newspaper that was printed in colour in the UK.

Many press photographers used B&W film since there was little point using (and paying more) for colour. Also, they likely bought their cameras and worked as media photographers for several decades beforehand when B&W was even more prevalent.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Today_(UK_newspaper)

Right. And also, the photographer likely wants high ISO film, to be able to take a very short, crisp exposure of the moment of impact, without needing to gamble on the amount of cloud cover, and hence available light.

ISO 1600 colour film will have been available at the time, but was probably pretty poor compared to B&W.

I'm guessing they are scans from the magazine, which probably didn't have all pages in colour.