welcome to bbc news, broadcasting to viewers in north america and around the globe. my name is mike embley. our top stories — teachers and students are among at least 17 people shot dead at a high school in florida. a 19—year—old former student, who'd been expelled and was not supposed to be allowed back on site, has been arrested. south africa's governing anc welcomes president zuma's resignation. he says he wants to prevent violence being perpetrated in his name. and the moment a young toddler fell onto the train tracks at a station in italy — we'll tell you about his heroic rescue. at least 17 people have been killed in a school shooting in florida. many others have been wounded. two right now are critically ill. a 19—year—old man is in custody.

he's a student who'd been expelled from the school. the latest from the bbc‘s bill hayton. running for their lives. students flee classrooms in panic. inside the 3—storey building, hundreds of others lay hiding from a gunman on the loose. as they fled out of school, some were still clutching their valentine's day balloons. kids were freaking out. some kids froze, some kids were on their phones. they thought it was a joke and it wasn't. students freaking out, students. you hear about this all the time but you never expect it to happen right here. everybody knows around here is a safe place and you don't expect this to happen here. but when it happens, you're just taken aback. dozens of police cars sped to the scene. paramilitary units moved in to confront the shooter. they carried out a wounded student,

improvising emergency transport, and a street corner became an emergency room. the more badly injured were stretchered away, and then, a suspect, handcuffed by police on the roadside. he was taken into custody i believe about an hour after he left stoneman douglas, after he committed this horrific, homicidal, detestable act. he's been identified as a former student, nikolas cruz, apparently expelled for disciplinary reasons. his social media profile showing an obsession with guns and violence. school authorities say they had no warning of danger and they've dredged to repair the damage done. we are dealing with it and we are going to deal with it as a community, we will pull through it and my prayers and sorrow goes out to the families in this entire

community. as relatives wept and aggrieved, some reflected on a wider social problem. this is the 18th of school shooting in the united states this year. that is on average one every three days. bill hayton, bbc news. earlier, i spoke to steven osher. he's a teacher at stoneman douglas high school where the shooting took place. as you know, the primary objective and we have an incident is to get the students out of harm ‘s way so we pull them into wherever we can and locked down, make sure they are safe. it is tough. we are in locked down for a couple of hours. we didn't know what was going on. we didn't know what was going on. we did hear sirens. didn't know what was going on. we did hearsirens. eventually, didn't know what was going on. we did hear sirens. eventually, we were freed by swat teams taken for

processing to a local hotel where we we re processing to a local hotel where we were kind of asked a few questions, did we see anything, do we know anything, and so forth, and then we we re anything, and so forth, and then we were released not long ago, about an hour ago. the day unfolded in the morning, we did have a fire drill, so morning, we did have a fire drill, so it is interesting that we had a fire drill towards the end of the day, we'll know exactly what to do, we grab ourthings day, we'll know exactly what to do, we grab our things and really, and that's what we did. there was an announcement to evacuate. but 30 seconds later while we were outside, we heard shouts, code red, code red, which means locked down, and we had to just which means locked down, and we had tojust run which means locked down, and we had to just run back to the nearest possible room that could be locked. and grabbed the students, pull them inside and make sure they were safe. and that's more less as much as i know. the students you have been de— briefing tonight, what have they been telling you?

ican been telling you? i can only tell you what i saw. 0n my way to the de— briefing centre, all the students were gathering around their phones, they are very into the social media and i actually saw a clip of what was going on inside the classroom where the shooting happened. a very short clip. idid shooting happened. a very short clip. i did tell one of the officers and they said, yes, we know, and that's what we're trying to get as much information as we can about the incident. this is from hearsay, the student said, we know about the student, he was a bit weird, and he was a dropout, and some of the stu d e nts was a dropout, and some of the students even new his name. i knew that guy. so you knew him or you didn't know him? and if he didn't know him, what are you hearing about it? we are told he had been flagged as a campus threat, that staff had been warned to look out for him. he had some sort of motive to harm students and wasn't supposed to be allowed back

on the site with a backpack. what do you make of that? i don't know about that because i don't know the students, but the stu d e nts don't know the students, but the students i was without the time told me they knew of him because we were watching it streaming live through oui’ watching it streaming live through our cellphones, and when they said that they had a suspect, then one of the students said, i think i know who that is, and so forth. but i don't know, i've never heard about that student, i did hear he was a dropout and i didn't know that there was some sort of warning out there asa was some sort of warning out there as a threat for the student to coming on camels or not. dreadful day for you and so many other people. so many other —— thank you so much for giving us your time. and my condolences to the families own tunes that have gone through this tragic incident. thank you. absolutely, yes to that. david willis is our correspondent in washington. he says that, unlike the previous

administration, there will be little talk of gun control after the latest shooting. president trump did tweak today. he said, no child, teacher or anyone should ever feel unsafe in said, no child, teacher or anyone should everfeel unsafe in an american school. but if you think that that's going to provoke any sort of debate about gun control in this country, i think you would be disappointed. somebody made the point today that the sandy hook massacre, in which 20 young children we re massacre, in which 20 young children were gunned to death in their classroom, failed completely to turn the dial as far as this whole debate is concerned. that didn't do anything, then what will? we had one congressman today, he said simply, this country is an trawl to the nra. by this country is an trawl to the nra. by that, he means the national rifle association, one of the most powerful pressure groups in the

united states. you will be used to dealing with baffle m e nt you will be used to dealing with bafflement from outside the states, people saying surely the polls suggest americans as the population overwhelmingly support background checks, they support closing loopholes, it seems congress and the white house just don't. absolutely, and it is interesting that barack absolutely, and it is interesting that ba rack 0bama absolutely, and it is interesting that barack 0bama interviewed not long before his term in office came to an end, so that one of his main regret was not being able to do more to clamp down on this issue of gun, of guns and a proliferation of guns. it is extraordinary. 300 million weapons are said to exist in this country, and we are getting to the stage where, as you heard, there's roughly one school shooting in this country every single week. so despite all the people may say, there really isn't the will, perfectly on the part of the politicians it would seem, to

actually close very many loopholes. somebody else has said on social media there is a standard sequence. thought and pray. 0utrage, silence, sadness and absolutely nothing. absolutely. i might point out one thing that seems to be emerging from all this, and that is to do with the details surrounding today's horrific incident, and that is that a p pa re ntly incident, and that is that apparently a loss of the pupils at the school were adhering to a fire alarm that had gone off. they thought that it was just a drill, so they were basically leaving the school in a quite composed manner, and that's when the shooting started. now, there is speculation and it is just speculation at this time, that the gunmen, nikolas cruz, may have attempted to set off this fire alarm deliberately in order to drive people effectively into his path. it's been a torrid few weeks for south africa's politicians. but they appear to have

finally forced jacob zuma to resign as president. he's stood down with immediate effect after mounting pressure from his party the anc to go. he faced persistent allegations of corruption and will now be formally succeeded by cyril ramaphosa, the new leader of the anc. 0ur africa editor fergal keane has more. the moment of decision came late when the former guerrilla fighter at last recognised he could not win. president jacob zuma addressed the south african nation and faced reality. i was just yards from him when he said the decisive words. the anc should never be divided in my name. i have, therefore, come to the decision to resign as president of the republic with immediate effect. and with that statement, jacob zuma has brought to an end the most controversial period in the history of post—apartheid south africa.

history, happening in a late—night statement, after a day in which it seemed he might still fight on. in pretoria, the seat of the presidency, rumours of an imminent resignation had rippled all afternoon. yet when he made his first appearance of the day on state television, he was defiant and defensive — zuma the victim. what have i done? i have explained many times that this process... there's nothing i've done wrong. this is policy. what people are suggesting is a new phenomenon. what is the problem? at the same time, in cape town, anc mps were meeting to decide whether they'd support a motion of no—confidence to drive jacob zuma from power. the decision came quickly and was decisive. we are now proceeding with, as the chief whip, to proceed with a motion of no—confidence

tomorrow so that president zuma is then removed so that we can proceed to elect president ramaphosa. a populist, a crowd—pleaser, he appealed to the anc grassroots, and with their backing, he became party leader in 2009, even though he already faced serious corruption charges. i interviewed him just as he was about to become state president. a lot of people think you're a crook. is that so? (laughs) i want to see those people so they can tell me why they... are you a crook? me? what? i don't know. unless i have to go to the dictionary to learn what a crook is. it was his relationship with this family, the guptas, indian immigrants, which created the public outrage that finally forced the anc to act. the guptas are accused of using their connections

with the president to acquire state enterprises and assets worth millions of pounds. so powerful, it's alleged, they could hire and fire cabinet ministers. today, they, too, felt the pressure. this was a police raid on their compound in johannesburg. seemingly untouchable until now, criminal charges may be imminent. if ever you wanted proof of the changed political temperature, this is it. the police seem at last to have found their courage. by the end of this dramatic day, jacob zuma seemed friendless, politically isolated, resigning before he could be humiliated in parliament. fergal keane, bbc news, pretoria. the former zimbabwean prime minister and long—time 0pposition leader, morgan tsvangirai, has died in south africa, where he'd received treatment for cancer. he was 65. mr tsvangirai and his movement for democratic change repeatedly challenged robert mugabe during the ex—president‘s long years in power. stay with us on bbc news.

still to come — it's a long road for athletes to get to the olympics, but what about the parents? i'll have the story of the father who travelled 12,000 kilometres on a bicycle to see his son compete in south korea. nine years and 15,000 deaths after going into afghanistan, the final soviet troops were going home, their withdrawal in good order, but the army defeated in the task it had been sent to perform. malcolm has been murdered, and that has a terrible effect on the morality of the people. i'm terrified of the repercussions on the streets. one wonders who is next. as the airlift got under way, there was no letup

in the eruption itself. lava streams from an event low in the crater slow down into the sea east of the island, away from the town for the time being, but it could start flowing again at any time. the russians heralded their new generation space station with a spectacular night launch. they've called it mir, the russian for peace. the headlines: at least 17 people have been killed and at least 20 people were injured after a shooter opened fire in a florida high school. the gunman is now in custody and has been identified as a former student. south africa's embattled president jacob zuma, says he will resign effective immediately. it follows days of defying orders from the country's ruling anc party to leave office. 0xfam's director in asia has told the bbc she is aware of past cases

of misconduct involving some of the charity's workers in the philippines, bangladesh and nepal. senior 0xfam officials in the uk have met the charity commission which is investigating how the organisation handled abuse claims against former staff in haiti in 2011. angus crawford has the latest. a scandal made in the poverty of haiti's shanty towns, where a small number of aid workers became exploiters. it continues to send shock waves through the entire sector. and today, new revelations from 0xfam about other under—reported cases involving its workers. there were cases in the philippines. there were also cases in bangladesh. there were whistle—blowers coming forward in bangladesh, as far as i know. there was also a case, i think, in nepal. abusers exploit the chaos and confusion of natural disasters, like here in 2013 during

typhoon haiyan in the philippines. and lan mercardo says even if they are caught and disciplined, charities are not warning each other about unsuitable staff. not yet. but that's a practice that we need to start. because... you know, the funny thing about cases like this is we always see them as reputational risks, no? but the way to manage reputational risk is not to keep silent. but in disaster zones, speed is key. charities scale up their efforts within hours, employing thousands of new staff in what can be a lawless vacuum. when the first crisis passes, sometimes within days or weeks, many move on to a new emergency, and possibly a new employer. so a problem for the whole sector, but one the international development secretary wants tackling now.

unless you create a culture that prioritises the safety of vulnerable people, and ensures victims and whistleblowers can come forward without fear, we will not work with you, and unless you report every serious incident and allegation, no matter how damaging to your reputation, we cannot be your partners. she's looking at the possibility of setting up a worldwide register of aid workers, and tomorrow meet officers from the national crime agency, which says it's closely monitoring events. this british charity today dismissed a member of staff accused of sexual misconduct while at 0xfam in haiti in 2011, something he failed to tell them when he applied for the job, and tonight 0xfam has revealed that last year it sacked its country director in haiti for mismanagement and inappropriate behaviour. let's take a look at some of the other stories making

the news. at least 19 people have died after a truck carrying hundreds of illegal migrants crashed in libya. those on board were mainly eritrean and somali nationals and the victims included three women and a child. more than a hundred people were also injured when the truck overturned near the town of bani walid. a french court has acquitted a man accused of providing assistance to the jihadists who attacked paris in november 2015. jawad bendaoud had rented out his flat to two of the attackers but the court found he didn't know who they were at the time. two other defendants were jailed for five years each. let's bring you some amazing footage from the italian city of milan. it involves a young toddler who was travelling with his mother on the underground. they were waiting for a train at one of the stations — when the little boy took a tumble on to the tracks. the bbc‘s tim allman takes up the story. the scene to happen in just a few

moments. you can see a young boy suddenly stand up, run across the platform and fall onto the tracks. his mother sees him disappear, as do some of the other passengers at this underground station. 0ne some of the other passengers at this underground station. one of them, a young man, runs down the platform. he takes off his rucksack and dump ——jumps down he takes off his rucksack and dump —— jumps down after the small child. picking him up, handing him back to his mother, and he clambers back onto the platform, all the time looking to see the train is coming. that young man was 18—year—old lorenzo —— lorenzo pianezza. he says he is no hero, hejust did what anyone would do. translation: the child was shocked, he cried. i waited for some time until he died —— she calmed down. if you see a child on the tracks, you must go. the other hero of the hour, the station operator who was watching

this all happened from the control room. translation: understood something wasn't right so i immediately pressed a button to stop the arrival of the metro. afterwards, the city's mio took to facebook, saying: later, he thanked them both in person, describing it as a moment of great joy. and when person, describing it as a moment of greatjoy. and when you look at these images again, you realise that this could have been a terrible tragedy. instead, thanks to some courage and quick thinking, it was a tragedy averted. tim allman, bbc news. heart stopping stuff. now, we hear a lot about thejourney athletes take to compete at the olympics, but what about that of their parents? 0ne swiss couple decided that rather than flying to see their son compete, they'd prefer to travel almost all the distance by bicycle instead. katie silver reports.

the end of an olympic sized journey. guido and his wife rita arrive in the ski card of the olympic village in pyeongchang. they have travelled 12,000 kilometres over lound to be reunited with their son, mischa, an aerial skierfrom reunited with their son, mischa, an aerial skier from switzerland. translation: he has always been a crazy one and done a lot of crazy things. i wasn't too surprised to hear about the trip. guido and rita started their bike to last year in 0lten, switzerland. their journey took them through 20 countries, through the balkans and central asia. their toughest challenge was the pamir highway, a road that tra nsfers the pamir highway, a road that transfers as mountains from afghanistan to transfers as mountains from afg ha nista n to kyrgyzsta n. translation: we were exhausted. after 2005 -- 2500

translation: we were exhausted. after 2005 —— 2500 kilometres on gravel roads, and altitude, it was cold and we are limited food. the pairare cold and we are limited food. the pair are planned to bike the entire journey but because of these issues, ended up breaking theirjourney and ended up breaking theirjourney and ended up breaking theirjourney and ended up flying over china to the capital of south korea. from here, they bathe —— braved freezing temperatures on bikes. the past two nights we spent in our inside of the tent was all white, everything was frozen. the water in the coffee pot and the milk were both frozen, great! but the journey was worth it. translation: i think it's great, just super, that he's made it to the 0lympic just super, that he's made it to the olympic games. they will watch him compete in the freestyle skiing heat this saturday. katie silver, bbc news. the year of the dog in the chinese zodiac begins on friday and we went to see how some of them will be seeing it in. china has been criticised for poor animal welfare and dog meat festivals. but in beijing, people can take their dogs to a luxury hotel for dogs, that has a cinema

and a swimming pool. let's take a look. 0ur our dog has probably already made a booking. and you can get in touch with me and most of the team on twitter — i'm @bbc mike embley. thanks forjoining me. time we updated you on the weather prospects for the whole of the british isles for the next few days or so. wednesday started in a pretty wild and woolly way across the north—western quarter of scotland. as ever, our weather watchers were there to capture the evidence for us, but things improved dramatically. come a little further south, not far really, troon beach and ayrshire. the difference, you had to get rid of this big old weather front which really made a difference. started dry enough across the eastern side of the british isles but, as that moved in from the west,

it brought quite a bit of cloud and rain. thankfully that's moved away. thursday starts on a brighter note for many, a drier note, though not necessarily, because certainly across western spots, particularly the north—western quarter of the british isles, there will be showers. elsewhere, bright enough and breezy sort day. quite a few isobars on that chart, and it makes a difference whether you are in the northern half of the british isles or the south, because further north, you are in the circulation of the big area of low pressure — there's quite a bit of wind, and it's got quite a bit of northerly in it, which makes it feel that much cooler. come a little bit further south, and a little ridge of high pressure is trying to calm things down. still breezy. there's a lot of isobars on that chart. the wind an ever—present right across the british isles. i think the bulk of the activity found across the north, if you are spending the day across southern parts, and here i'm showing you the real detail — it's almost like, if you need reading glasses, we've just put them

on to see exactly where those showers are, and you can see them peppering through western scotland and northern ireland. bigger picture, yes, we know there are words page, but take those glasses off and we get the overall sense of what's going on. the temperatures. five, six, seven in the north, ten, 11, possibly 12 in the south. out of thursday, pushing on towards friday, not a great deal changes, but greater influence from this little ridge of high pressure coming across the southern half of the british isles, killing off what showers there may have been on thursday. less breeze, butjust not enough influence from that ridge of high pressure to keep rain away from the western side of scotland, maybe into the fringes of northern ireland, but the temperature differential just beginning to ease up here — seven or eight in the north, ten or 11 in the south. the weekend? starts off none too badly. not wall—to—wall sunshine, but keep that little area of low pressure in mind, it may on sunday give some parts some rain. otherwise, not a bad weekend. this is bbc news. the headlines —

at least 17 people have been shot dead at a high school in florida. a 19—year—old former student, who'd been expelled and was not supposed to be allowed back on site, has been arrested. president trump tweeted that no—one should ever feel unsafe in an american school. south africa's governing anc has welcomed president jacob zuma's announcement that he's resigning. he said he was stepping down to prevent any violence being committed in his name. he's faced allegations of corruption. the anc‘s new leader, cyril ramaphosa, is likely to be voted in as his successor. morgan tsvangirai, zimbabwe's main 0pposition leader, has died. the 65—year—old former prime minister had been suffering from cancer. mr tsvangirai and the party he founded, the movement for democratic change, repeatedly challenged robert mugabe during his long grip on power. now on bbc news, click.