good afternoon. national grid has said it will "learn the lessons" after nearly a million people across england and wales lost power yesterday. it confirmed to the bbc that although two power stations had failed simultaneously, it's not thought to have been the result of a cyber attack. the regulator ofgem has demanded an urgent report into what went wrong. thousands of train passengers were stranded, ipswich hospital lost

power and homes throughout the country were plunged into darkness. simon jones has more. plunged into darkness but now the uk energy regulator is demanding that the national grid shed some light on what went wrong. described as an incredibly rare event, it caused chaos especially on the railway network. this was the message for passengers on a train that finally got into king's cross at two o'clock this morning. for many it was a waiting game. the storm had started outside and it was pitch black and we tried to sit together to piece together what was going on. the announcements failed because of the lack of power and then we had to walk to the end of the carriage on the pitch black. four and half hours later one of the guides came to open the door and we just jumped later one of the guides came to open the door and wejustjumped out later one of the guides came to open the door and we justjumped out onto the door and we justjumped out onto the track and walks down the track

back to the station. some services have continued to face problems with trains out of position. so what went wrong, the gas—fired power station at little ba rford wrong, the gas—fired power station at little barford in bedfordshire failed at liz54pm yesterday afternoon and blamed a technical issue. almost simultaneously once the offshore wind farm disconnected from the grid. the power loss was so large that back—up systems kicked in the national grid says it is working with generators to find out way and admitted many questions need to be answered. we need to do a detailed technical examination of the event and we were send that report through to ofgem and build the analysis in the coming days and weeks. then from that i'm sure we will learn lessons and want to review how this works to avoid some significant impact on

future. the consequences were widespread, some traffic lights went out at newcastle airport experienced power issues and at ipswich hospital the back—up generator failed. power issues and at ipswich hospital the back—up generatorfailed. even when power was restored many great northern trains remain stuck because the drivers could not restart them and had to wait for specialist engineers. the national grid has ruled out a cyber attack for the failure but if the regulator is not happy with its explanations it could be fined 10% of its annual turnover. simonjones, bbc be fined 10% of its annual turnover. simon jones, bbc news. our correspondent greg mckenzie is at king's cross station for us this lunchtime. it was badly disrupted yesterday and closed at one point. presumably a lot of questions passengers would like answered 7 lot of questions passengers would like answered? many questions being asked today and the trains are running here at normal service from king's cross station and network

rail have said that most services up and down the country are running as normal. some reported delays on inbound trains to london of 30 minutes to an hour and many passengers have been asking if they will be compensated and would that be by the railway companies ought national grid. there were no trains leaving you last night to everything is now back to normal but there are questions and 0fgem already asking the national grid for details into why and how this happened. the family of a 15—year—old british schoolgirl have made a new appeal for information after she disappeared whilst on holiday with her family in malaysia. a team of 200 rescuers are scouring the dense forest searching for nora quoirin, who has learning difficulties. howard johnson reports.

it has been a week since her daughter went missing, a teenager with serious learning difficulties who disappeared while on holiday suspected missing in thejungle. we are extremely impressed with the effort, your expertise, your dedication. and we hope that you find nora, thank you so much. the nation authorities have used drones, sniffer dogs and thermal scanning technology to try to find nora but in the last few days they've tried a different tactic. the 15—year—old was born with a condition limiting the development of her brain and that means that she needs help with simple everyday tasks. the family have stressed that given her learning difficulties, it is very unlikely she would have walked off alone. they believed she may have

been abducted. but today the police say they are continuing to treat her disappearance as a missing persons case. this is the seventh day of search and rescue efforts. as you can see some commandos here and other search and rescue workers are coming down into this area, around 30 of them exploring an area about a kilometre away from the design resort. they're looking in a riverbed to see if there are any traces that might help with this investigation. this time last week nora's family arrived for a luxury break but to date they are wracked with emotion and not knowing the fate of their much loved daughter. howard johnson, bbc news. a new report has found that many people on average incomes are earning less, in real terms, than they were nine years ago. the tuc says that people in middle—earning jobs — such as construction and admin

workers — had seen their real wages fall by around 1% since 2010. the government says it has increased the national living wage and cut income tax for 32 million people. a powerful typhoon that has struck the coast of china near shanghai, has killed at least thirteen people and forced more than a million from their homes. typhoon lekima — the region's worst storm in five years — is making its way through the south—eastern province of zhejiang after coming ashore early on saturday. laurie margolis has the story. the storm made landfall south of the city of shanghai, bringing with it apocalyptic skies. the chinese authorities graded typhoon lekima as a super typhoon red alert storm. with winds approaching 120 miles an hour. though this was downgraded to orange later. but although the winds have abated slightly, intense rainfall threatens many heavily populated areas, increasing the risk of floods and landslides. with torrential rain

and winds flooding streets, a million people were moved from their homes, 300,000 in the shanghai area alone. one area was hit with six inches of rain in three hours. at least 30 people were listed as dead or missing as the storm brought devastation. buildings were wrecked by the floodwaters. here a woman and her baby were rescued. and this man was trapped and later rescued at his home collapsed. the storm disrupted all forms of transport, thousands of flights were cancelled across eastern china. ferry and rail services were suspended. china's commercial centre, shanghai, was battered with wind and rain. the storm will continue across other regions of china over the next two days. laurie margolis, bbc news. with all the sport now, here'sjohn watson at here's john watson at the bbc sport centre. good afternoon. the new premier league season's under way and after liverpool's victory in the opening game last

night, the champions, manchester city, have begun their title defence at west ham. manager pep guardiola left striker sergio aguero and bernardo silva on the bench at the london stadium. and his replacement, gabrieljesus, has given them the lead. i—nil, the score. in the scottish premiership, the champions celtic are up against motherwell, leigh griffiths' free kick giving them a 2—1 lead in the first half. a win will maintain their perfect start. as the season begins for those premier league sides, the fa cup final at wembley in may seems a long way off but for hundreds of non—league clubs, theirjourney in the world's oldest cup competition starts this weekend. the bbc will have a live match from every round. and today, we're beginning our live coverage at the extra preliminary round match between punjab united and broadbridge heath. it's on the bbc red button right now and on the bbc sport website. at it remains goalless as you can

see in the first half. and the tokyo 0lympics is just a year away. this time next week, england's hockey teams take on the continent's best at the eurohockey championships. win that, and they'll secure a place for great britain at next year's games. gb's women, gold—medal winners in rio, have been training injapan and the historic city of hiroshima, as preparations begin. 0ur 0lympic sports reporter david mcdaid has been with them. gong sounds great britain's hockey players taking time to pay their respects. they had been guests of the city best known for its atomic bomb passed. as well as learning about japan cosmic history they wanted to learn more about their summer and the conditions that they could encounter at the tokyo games next year. for a lot of the girls they probably had not even played in

anything hotter than what the uk can throw at us let alone the humidity and just the change of scenery and diet, it is so important going forward for us. but before the much changed squad can put in practice in tokyo what they've learnt here in hiroshima they need to know that they can get to the games. the first chance to do that is to win the upcoming euro hockey championship but the new look team have struggled under new management winning just three of 16 and recent events. we are a bit inconsistent but the girls have stayed positive even though we did not get the results, they still have belief and i definitely have belief we can do well at the euros. as current 0lympic champions the pressure to qualify as real. that is that bit on the back of the mind of what if it doesn't happen but we are at the stage where we are trying to knit everything together. and i think it is starting to come and hopefully the results will come with that. we are realistic about what we are at but that the same time i think the world of hockey is showing

people can beat anyone at any moment. we were seventh in the world and no one would have put money on us and no one would have put money on us to win. with a history lesson of their own in us to win. with a history lesson of theirown in mind us to win. with a history lesson of their own in mind do not write them off just yet. david their own in mind do not write them offjust yet. david mcdaid, bbc news. justin rose is three shots off the lead at the halfway point of the northern trust in newjersey. and easy to see why. look at this. on his way to making six birdies, to move to nine under par. dustin johnston heads the field on i2—under. there's more on the bbc sport website, including plenty of build—up to the three o'clock kick—offs in the premier league. but for now, from the bbc sport centre, it's back to you, sean. you can see more on all of today's stories on the bbc news channel. the next news on bbc one is at 5:25pm. bye for now.

hello. you're watching the bbc news channel. let's get more on our top story and the effects of yesterday's widespread power cuts. many hundreds of passengers stranded on trains without power last night faced long and frustrating journeys home. the national grid said yesterday's blackout was a ‘rare and unusual event‘ caused by the ‘almost simultaneous' loss of power at a gas station and off shore wind farm. david hunter is director of market studies at schneider electric — he told me why a power cut of this magnitude is very rare. it isa it is a very rare event. the first time in some years that we have seen a blackout as severe as this. as you have already mentioned, two power stations dropped off the system in a very short space of time. that took the national grid by surprise, it is a very rare event and in this case they were not able to maintain sufficient frequency across the whole system and so had to make

selective blackouts in order to maintain quality for the vast majority of customers. should they have been able to? that is the big question and i suspect there will be a detailed investigation as a result of this. it is not unheard—of to have two power stations drop off. it is quite rare. it has happened, i can think ofa rare. it has happened, i can think of a case in the last two or three yea rs of a case in the last two or three years and i know that this happened and the national grid was able to manage that by having other power stations work harder to compensate and bringing on alternative sources of supply and working with businesses to reduce demand, so it is demand and supply. but in this case 5% of energy supply dropped off within two minutes unexpectedly and they were not able to make up that shortfall so that is when the safety systems to protect the overall systems to protect the overall system kicked in. as to how the safety systems operated, we are told by the team there that these are programmed in

already so that itjust kicks in, does not need any human intervention but i suppose the question then is are they prioritising the right things to those mechanisms? some people may be surprised, i think a lot of people would be surprise for example if hospitals were cut off. many people would think that hospitals would be a very long way down the chain before you contemplated a cutting power to them? i think there are controls. you have to ask the national grid for the detail but i think there are controls on the local distribution networks as there are controls up to a point but they must make decisions very rapidly on a systems basis in terms of where and what to cut. with regard to hospitals they are designed with back—up power generation capacity so there are fail safes that are meant to be in place of though i do know that in the case in ipswich there was the outpatients department back—up power did not work so obviously, that is something that they need to look at.

and that is certainly an issue generally. this is a wake—up call for us whether we are looking at critical infrastructure, whether we are looking at businesses, are we fit for situations where these are very rare, very unlikely to happen but it has happened, how did we respond? and by the back—up system is robust enough to maintain the kind of critical infrastructure that we need? and that i am sure will be a focus over the next few days. and that i am sure will be a focus over the next few dayslj and that i am sure will be a focus over the next few days. i suppose the other question that will come into a lot of peoples minds is whether or not the system itself is robust enough. whether our infrastructure is robust enough to deal with some of the consequences of, you know, the way the world is changing, not least in terms of ways of generating energy and it wasn't in itself significant but it was a wind power plant and one might suspect that those plants does make you can tell me if i'm wrong on this, more inclined to drop off than

things like electricity plant gas plants? they are more inclined to variability of supply but the grid monitors forecasts and managers that. you know, it knows in the wind is blowing and when it is scheduled to drop. so we recognise already that renewables are intermittent and actually, the grid has evolved quite actually, the grid has evolved quite a lot keep with the intermittency of renewa bles a lot keep with the intermittency of renewables to have back—up power available. and that is a rather different question than saying at the any more likely to drop off for other reasons such as loss of connection to the grid as happened yesterday. and it is probably not the case but what is interesting is that yesterday we saw a very high level of wind generation as a percentage of the energy mix and one of the challenges for grids around the world as renewables grow, it is quite technical but it is about inertia. basically the gas and coal—fired traditional thermal power stations have more flexibility and inertia, they keep spinning so that

when one drops off their abysmal capability for others to pick up the slack. there are technical reasons why that is not quite as up to matic for the likes of wind generation. is too early to say whether that was a factor yesterday but the national grid has been adding to its arsenal of tools in terms of frequency of response. i mentioned the demand side, industrial responses and companies that have self generation on side exporting to the grid at short notice make up the shortfalls. so it is designing systems that are designed to be able to cope with the increasing mix of renewables in the energy mix but obviously, we will need to see what the details of this drop—off was and why the grid was not able to make up the shortfall in the very limited amount of time it had available. remembering the actual power outage that lasted 15 minutes or so. i'm joined now via webcam

from bristol by lawal brown. you are one of the passengers whose journey was heavily disrupted yesterday. thank you very much for talking to us. i would suspect that yesterday as a day you would rather forget so let's get it out of your system now. what was the journey you are hoping to ta ke what was the journey you are hoping to take yesterday afternoon? well, i had been working in stevenage and at the end of the day we wanted to come back to bristol so we got on the train at five o'clock in stevenage orjust train at five o'clock in stevenage or just before five train at five o'clock in stevenage orjust before five and at five o'clock it broke down just outside uckfield which is ten miles south of steve na g e uckfield which is ten miles south of stevenage and then spent nearly six hours on that train before we were taken off and put on another train are taken field, we got there at 1135 which was again against the a distance of ten miles. nearly six and three quarters hours. you could have walked it. yes. average of two miles an hour, i think.

good grief. that is part one of the journey and the next bed was getting from hadfield into london and then from hadfield into london and then from london down to bristol. idid from london down to bristol. i did that go? they did not make any plans to get me from hatfield to bristol so they decide to go to london and it was nearly midnight. so they had laid on some buses and we got on the transfer bus which promptly broke down before it had left hatfield. and the driver called another bus that while we were waiting my colleague and i decided to cut our losses and collar taxi so i dropped her off in wembley and then the taxi driver was kind enough to drive me all the way back to bristol. so what time did you get him this morning? it was about 3:45am. laughing aside and all the frustration you have in the exhaustion and even thousands of people going through the same experience yesterday, are you kind

of what was your reaction when you learned that this was just the result of two of the many stations that supplied the national grid failing at the same time? yes, i suppose i was a little surprised though i knew a power station so you can have a knock—on effect on the grid. what surprised me in particular was that our train did not restart when the power was switched back on and there was a problem tenzing had with three or four of their trains according to the driver. to some systemic problem in their fleet that did not restart. so that is even more peculiar. presumably the kind of thing you would quite more about what they think that perhaps they need to look at, start to look into it if the power is going to cut then you cannot restart the train. that is a big problem. yes, absolutely. and the other thing that would be nice, i did not struggle too much because i had mortar with me but families with children, if you're on a small commuter train you

need food and water if you're on for that length of time. 0bviously that length of time. obviously it was difficult to do that. that is a good practical example. people are travelling for leisure rather than work it is a lwa ys leisure rather than work it is always worth thinking about whether there might be something that you should carry just there might be something that you should carryjust in case would not because you think you're going to be stuck for six to travel 12 miles but just because you might get routine delays and gets very hot in those trains, doesn't it? absolutely. we expected to have supplies with us but if you're just jumping on the 20 minute train to london you have got a problem. what was the mood like? when our trainer was absolutely fine. there was a little bit of singing early on but that died down. a few people complaining but nothing major and, yes, it was very, though he ran some of the trains people were getting upset and wanted to get off.

ican upset and wanted to get off. i can understand. i wasjust going to say surprisingly calm, really. yes, in the circumstances you can imagine if some people had lost the template would be understandable in those kind of stressful situations. the other thing about not knowing, so the information side, what was that like? well, obviously you can go on the internet and find that it is on the bbc website within ten minutes or so so you had a rough idea of the background cause. and in our particular case the driver was is almost frustrated as we were because he kept making calls, not getting through because all the other trains of the same problem, and it was taking him a long time to get information back to us. and the plan changed a bit along the way so, yes, bit frustrating but better than in the old days because at least you can use your phone to find out what is going on. that is true. you have a very sanguine attitude to what was obviously a very, very frustrating journey. i hope you can enjoy the weekend now that you are back safely

in bristol and thank you very much for talking to us about yourjourney from hell. travellers have been hit by widespread disruption as rail operators across the country battled hazards caused by wet and windy conditions. these pictures are from the west coast mainline which has flooding on the tracks following heavy overnight rain.the weather is also causing cancellations, delays and speed restrictions in south western and south eastern england. brittany ferries says services between portsmouth and cherbourg have been cancelled. p and 0 is warning passengers to expect delays of up to two and half hours on the dover to calais route. and the site of the bristol balloon fiesta — which attracts thousands of people every year — has also been temporarily closed, due to strong winds. at least 50 people have been killed and many more injured after a fuel tanker exploded in tanzania.

the lorry is believed to have exploded in the area of morogoro around 200 kilometres to the west of the capital city dar es salaam. a local police chief said people were trying to remove fuel from the vehicle when the blast happened. police in the us city of el paso say a man suspected of shooting dead 22 people last saturday, has said that he was targeting mexicans. the gunman will face the death penalty if he's convicted. donald trump has called for a strengthening of background checks on people who buy firearms. north korea has fired two unidentified missiles into the sea of japan — its fifth major weapons test in under three weeks. they were fired from near the north—eastern city of hamhung. this latest launch comes just hours after president trump announced he'd received what he called ‘a beautiful letter‘ from kim jong—un. laura bicker has more. the north korean leader is continuing to test weapons while

keeping the door to diplomacy with donald trump open. this latest launch comesjust donald trump open. this latest launch comes just hours after the us president announced he had received a beautiful letter from mr president announced he had received a beautiful letterfrom mr kim. mr trump said the north korean leader was unhappy with south korea and the us carrying outjoint military exercises. the us president appeared to with mr kim and said he was not a fan either. he wasn‘t happy with the tests. 0n the other side with the united states and as you know, i‘ve never liked it either. i‘ve never been a fan you know why? they have sent a series of messages the state media criticising washington for the war games. meanwhile analysts believe that the recent tests have allowed north korea to prevent a new type of short—range ballistic missile which would be manoeuvrable in the air and test the us and south korean missile defence systems. missile defence systems. russia‘s state nuclear agency says five of its staff have been killed in an explosion

at an artic military base. officials say it caused a brief rise in radiation levels — but posed no threat to local communities. as andy beatt reports, it‘s the second incident to hit the country‘s military facilities in a week. scratch the surface of this quiet coastal city and you‘ll find fear and uncertainty. in vas a‘s far north, the city is less than 50 kilometres from a deadly military explosion and a limited leak of radiation. despite assurances from the defence ministry that were not harmful and return to normal within 40 harmful and return to normal within a0 minutes, a large stretch of coastline has been close to shipping. locals have been rushing to buy iodine, known to be helpful at blocking radiation damage. translation: yesterday‘s events have

shaken up the whole time. people started to panic. within a matter of an hourall started to panic. within a matter of an hour all the iodine and iodine —containing drugs were sold out. at the centre of the scare, the military base. it tests nearly every rocket system used by the fashion navy including intercontinental ballistic missiles. the jet engine involved in the blast said to use and isotope ourselves. this accident is the second to hit russia‘s military in less than a week. on monday, a massive blaze at an ammunition depot in siberia‘s region left one person dead and eight others injured. flying munitions damage to nearby school and nursery forcing the evacuation of nearly 10,000 people. further blasts were reported at the facility on friday. while the two incidences are unrelated some say moscow‘s mission

to rapidly expand its military makes future accidents ever more likely. the environment agency said it was carrying out tests on part of the river frome, in somerset, after it was turned bright blue by a mystery substance. results are expected on monday, but it is being treated as a pollution incident. currently there are no reports of dead wildlife. i wonder what sites hail and has for us. i wonder what sites hail and has for us. now it‘s time for a look at the weather with helen willetts. the stormy weather we have been promising all week is upon us. we had a gust of wind up to 80 mild an hourin had a gust of wind up to 80 mild an hour in the south coast but my generally speaking the coasts around about 60 mph. in man not far short of that so they could bring down some trees, certainly some branches of not some small trees because these are quite saturated and they look to get even more saturated, u nfortu nately, across look to get even more saturated, unfortunately, across parts of northern gwent, northern ireland and scotland. there it offers ones for the amount of rain. itjust keeps

coming through tonight and in this pa rt coming through tonight and in this part of the world. we could see 60-80 part of the world. we could see 60—80 millimetres of rain through today and tonight. and then tomorrow we have got even more starting to develop at least the winds will slowly a bate develop at least the winds will slowly abate through tonight and tomorrow and in the south. but that doesn‘t have a greater risk of heavy showers tomorrow. the heaviest rain except to develop in central and southern scotland, northern england through the day moving its way gradually southwards and again giving another inch or possibly more. further south, as i say, some slow—moving thundery showers but getting cooler for next week.