fire is burning out of control at a chemical plant in texas which flooded in the wake of hurricane harvey. the area has been evacuated. the plant's owners have warned that its cooling systems have failed. president trump will head back to the area affected by flooding on saturday. it is now believed more than 1,400 people have died after catastrophic flooding across several south asian countries. this year's annual monsoon season has been particularly heavy. in all, around 41 million people have been affected. many have been displaced or left homeless. newswatch will be here in 15 minutes‘ time. now on bbc news, time for click. believe it or not, modern nursing as we know it only dates back

to the 1800s, to the time of florence nightingale and other pioneers. the royal college of nursing, here in london, is now in its 101st year. for all the life—saving technology that we've seen, the actual act of nursing itself is one relationship that so far has remained uniquely human. but our population is ageing. 20% ofjapan is over the age of 60. and in the uk, a quarter will be over 65 by 2045. this all means that the pressures on nursing are increasing, and looking after elderly people is becoming a pressing issue around the world. kat hawkins travelled to helsinki, in finland, to discover whether one of these could become the new one of these. i'm here in helsinki,

visiting the home of marja roth sopanen. hello! hello, how are you? nice to meet you! nice meeting you! she is an ex—air hostess, who likes to keep active at the age of 73. look at the hat as well. that was ages ago! but, after a skiing accident a few years ago, she developed epilepsy. ifell down, backwards, hit my head. i was unconscious for a little while, then got up and skied, and that's when it started. her epilepsy means she needs daily medication and that her family, who live in new york, want to make sure she's 0k. they get this reassurance from her daily nursing visit, over on the living room table. do you think that this is as good as a nursing visit? it's better because they see,

actually physical, see me, and then i don't have to wait for somebody to come. they want to check basically that i — ask if i took my pill, and... and just see how you are? howi... yeah. face, actually, to see the picture, to see that i'm 0k. at the other end of the line is tuomo kuivamaki. he is one of the nurses here in helsinki's first virtual nursing centre. here, teams of trained nurses each make up to 50 video calls per day to people around the city who need support. so you've still got that kind of real human... yeah, yeah. and especially some of the older customers, that's like a highlight of the day for them, to have sort of a small chat with a friendly nurse. the hope is that this will cut down on the number of home visits that nurses have to do to people who don't need physical support, freeing up more time for those that do. the software itself, called video visit, works much like any video call.

so, while the tech isn't that new, helsinki is unique in how wisely the government is using it, and that can mean big savings for them. an in—person nursing visit can cost around a0 euros, but this new type of checkup costs as little as five. and what really comes across, watching this call, is that they do have a relationship. they're chatting away. and itjust shows that that nursing element, that real human connection, is still there, even though it's a video call. people do hesitate at technology, and especially in nursing. we have virtual home care. we are actually taking care of people. it's scary that the robots are coming and taking ourjobs. actually, the robots are in here already, but they are easing ourjob, and actually giving us the freedom to focus on people who actually need our physical help. that was kat.

now, medical technologies, of course, are improving across—the—board. one example is the use of wearable technology for tracking facial muscles. now, this can be transformative for people with conditions like facial palsy, parkinson's and autism, allowing them to control devices remotely, or even just smile naturally. my name is bethan robertson—smith, and i'm doing my daily routine. it's a series of exercises to flex the muscles in my face. in 2008, when i was at university studying to be a veterinary nurse, i had a serious car accident. i had a fractured skull, an acquired brain injury, and i was left with facial palsy, also known as facial paralysis. it meant that every one of the a0 muscles that gave expression in my face had been paralysed. years later, i had an operation that allowed me to smile like a mona lisa, using just two of the chewing muscles that were unaffected by the accident.

it's very hard to know exactly what muscles i need to move to help me smile. i came down to brighton today to try out a new piece of technology that's going to help people like myself, who have got facial palsy. one of the surgeons who operated on me is part of a team of experts developing technologies with sensors to read the muscle activities of people with facial paralysis. so, when you were first diagnosed, you had an examination called the needle emg, where the needle is put into the skin, into the muscles, to read the tiny electrical signals that the muscles emanate. with this technology, what we're using is these sensors that are noninvasive. so the same kind of reading, but without the pain, like none of the...? that's right. you have some degree of crossover between the muscles, and that's why you need the machine learning and the artificial intelligence, to interpret which

muscle is activating. i'm sarah healey, and 30 years ago, i had a brain tumour. try to raise both eyebrows symmetrically. raise them both together. together, and relax. the operation to take it out left me with paralysis on the right—hand side of my face. ok, now smile with lips together. i am certainly not alone, as there are about 100,000 people in the uk who have had facial paralysis for years. so each one of these dots represents the position on your face. 0k. and so, for example, if you were to try and do a left—sided smile... just smile. and relax. and the darker the red, the bigger the signal. so because my left side is better and stronger... that's right. ..it‘s showing up as stronger on the screen. that's right. this is great because for the first time, i'm getting accurate information about what is going on with my face. i tend to overwork this side of my face, so this really is giving me feedback that i have

to dampen down the movements i don't want, and this isjust so good at doing that. i sort of try and practise in front of a mirror. it's not quite as subtle as this, is it? and also, i'm not that keen on looking in mirrors, to be quite honest. but it doesn't end there. this headset takes all the information from sensors, just like in the goggles, but now translates it into real—time expressions on a 3—d cartoon. yeah, so i'm trying really hard to make her do a full smile... yes. but it feels funny on my face. yes. doing it to a mirror, you kind of tell yourself what it looks like. that's right. whereas she is like, oh, no, that's not what it looks like. it might sound strange to say, but for the first time

since my accident, i'm able to see what my smile actually looks like. not to make it sound like, i dunno, a strange way, but you're kind of doing it with somebody else. yes. and it's not such a lonely thing. my biggest aim for this would be to be able to help me smile symmetrically. that's been one of my aims for the last 30 years. huh... hey, how you doing? you all right? yeah, man, i'lljoin you in a bit. have you heard the one about the alien who walks into a bar and says... mmm, i'll have a blue milk. hmm... put it in a dirty glass... now, as impressive as this bizarre setup looks, these motion—capture suits and stages are actually the standard way that industrial light & magic uses actors to give realistic movements to computer—generated principal characters. thank you very much. no worries! you were very frightening. ah, good. i mean, he's a nice

dad, i think, jalien. even the fact that jalien here is being rendered in real time for the director to see during the performance is not in itself new. what is brand—new here is the live rendering ofjethro's facial expressions. you know, our big focus was around the face and being able to capture the face at the same time as the body. and we can determine what expressions are happening each frame, and then directors can see that live and make decisions on if the character is working as a character, whether his expressions need to change in terms of the model. in order to process an actor's expressions quickly enough, only one face cam and a few mo—cap dots are used. this simplified live data is then compared to a higher—resolution 3—d capture of the actor's face that's taken beforehand on a rig called... ..the medusa. now, unlike other facial—ca ptu re

systems we've seen, which take still images of the actor's face, here they're shooting video of my face moving into and out of each emotion. that means that the facial recreation and the animations will look a lot more natural. the live, high—quality rendering of both face and body can also become a magic mirror on sets, to help the actor to get into the part. and i guess it really does make you move differently when you're on set, if you're playing a half—tonne alien, to you being a svelte young man. it totally does, as long as i engage my imagination. because if you can see, i'm totally beautifully... he laughs. you know, in a way that jalien can't, my wetsuit moves in a way that maybe that arm and that outfit doesn't move. it's good showing you my, er, my stuff. well, that's it for this week.

don't forget, we live on facebook and on twitter... thanks for watching. thanks for having us at your place, jalien. hey, no worries, man. hmm... now, get out of here! yeah. hmm... out! move, scoot, mm! huh... jackass, huh? yeah. i've gotta go, bye. huh. hello. welcome to newswatch with me, roger bolton, standing inforsamira. coming up on the programme... the other flood. around a0 people have died in hurricane harvey but around 1200 have been killed in the floods

of south east asia. shouldn't that disaster have been given greater prominence? we will also ask if the 20th anniversary of princess diana's death has prompted an outpouring of what one bbc editor called "mawkish drivel." but first, the reputation of august as being the silly season for news isn't entirely justified. it is a month which has had its fair share of cataclysmic events over the years. the outbreak of world war i, the partition of india, and the soviet invasion of czechoslovakia, for example. this summer hasn't exactly been quiet on the world's stage with north korean missiles flying over japan and president trump twittering several times a day. but with many politicians and others on holiday, there has been the odd longeur in the news cycle. back in the dog days of early august, news presenter simon mccoy could barely bring himself to introduce an item of, shall we say, less than ea rth—shattering importance. just bear in mind it is august.

this doesn't look like a walk in the park. dog owners and their pets in california have hit the waves in the second annual world dog surfing championships. here are the pictures. there is style, confidence, the size of the wave. some events have really big waves, some have small waves. there is a lot of style and techniques. it is really interesting. the competitors‘ main challenge is to stay afloat on the board. this is in pacifica near san francisco. there are also prizes for the best dressed and tandem surfing dogs. the winner of course being crowned top dog. that's a shame. we've run out of pictures. simon mccoy became something of a folk hero after his lukewarm introduction. that video went viral with judy hutchinson describing: but a canine twitter user

complained that simon fails but a canine twitter user complained that simon fails to show: it reminds me of a skateboarding duck who appeared on an early