this is bbc news. we will have the headlines and all the main news stories for you at the top of the hour straight after this programme. this week, we are guarding

against danger and disaster. shona is in sweden to put the first average female crash test dummies through their paces. whoa! 0k! i'm ready to be rescued right now! that looks chilly. it certainly does. but how could drones help rescue swimmers in distress? lj takes the plunge to find out. and then from cold and wet to hot and dry. laura checks out the ai watching for wildfires. the alert's come through. i didn't even notice that, but the camera did. as cars get ever more powerful and ever more numerous, the quest for road safety is an ongoing battle. some cities, like london, have introduced congestion zones, which reduce the amount of traffic and make things safer for pedestrians, but there's also research, of course, going into how to protect the passengers inside the vehicles too. car safety testing is still largely done on the same crash test dummies that we used in the 1980s, and they were based on the male form.

but now a team of engineers in sweden are in the final stages of developing the first average female crash test dummy. so, what happens to a woman's body during a crash? shona mccallum has been to linkoping in sweden to find out. when you think of car crashes, you probably think of something like this. but rear impacts, being hit from behind, are also happening every day on our roads. it might look gentler, but these kinds of collisions can leave people with debilitating injuries like whiplash. crash test dummies are used to test how well car safety features protect people against injury, but not everyone is equally protected. women are three times more likely to suffer whiplash than men if they're in a car that's hit from behind,

and although whiplash is not usually fatal, it can cause serious and permanent disabilities. we stopped at a zebra crossing... sarah's car was hit from behind last month. there was a big bang, and a little car had been shunted into the back of me by a transit van. it was a really big shock at the time, and my daughter was absolutely crying her eyes out. her neck was hurting, and she said her back as well. got a stiff neck and shoulders. i'm having to take medication for that. and both of us are due to see a physio shortly. the anxiety of, are you going to being able to do yourjob or not because of your aches and pains? yeah, it is amazing howjust a bump, a shunt from behind, can impact your life. some scientists say more

representative crash test dummies are an important step in improving car safety. engineers here in sweden have been busy working on the first crash test dummy that represents the average woman. dr astrid linder is leading the research. in order to ensure that you identify the seats that have the best protection for both part of the population, you definitely need to have the part of the population at highest risk represented. currently, the industry predominantly uses average male dummies in car safety tests, although there are a number of dummies with different weights, ages and sizes. the crucial point, though — the average female is not represented. you can assess how it interacts with the seat during the crash and also how well it protects the occupant. and what is unique about this occupant here is that she is

the model of an average female. dr linder�*s dummies are designed specifically to test how well cars protect people from injuries in low—impact rear collisions. she's162cm tall and weigh 62kg. what you can see here, of course, is the soft part of the body. females are somewhat shorter and lighter than males, on average, and then we also have differences in muscle strength, which plays a role in terms of how you respond to a crash. but then in addition, of course, when it comes to the interaction with the seat, we have differences in the shape of the torso and the centre of gravity of our torso and the outline of our hips and pelvis.

the engineers are performing tests on the dummy to see what happens to her in a simulated rear crash. alarm blares. so, we've just seen the crash test. what are we now seeing on the screen? you see the relative motion of the torso and the head, and the head interacting a bit with the head restraint. and you see that this is a very low severity. it's 7km/h, there would probably not be a scratch on your car if you were hit with this severity. no damages and so on. but you see the amount of motion that goes on in our body when we are impacted in this severity.

and you see that range, don't you, just from the way that the chin moves right back? you really only see that in slow motion. absolutely, it's over in 100 milliseconds. so, why has it taken so long for a dummy representing the average woman to be created? i think it has to do with this resistance that we live in, that it's too expensive, it costs too much, and it's very easy for powerful groups to push back on government entities to say, "we can't afford something else." us company humanetics are also innovating to create more realistic dummies. but their female dummy is roughly the size of an average 12—year—old girl. that's the size required in most tests by industry regulators, along with a dummy that is the size of an average man. at the end of the day, we don't know who's going to get in the car, right? it's going to be our mother,

it's going to be our grandmother, it's going to be our daughter, and we want them all to be equally safe as well as our sons, our husbands and our fathers. and so we need to make sure that that interior cabin is not biased in any gender equality, we want to make sure it's equal for all bodies. we contacted leading car manufacturers including ford, mercedes, toyota, nissan and audi. they acknowledge the work being done in sweden, but they aren't currently required to use an average female dummy by industry regulators. the plans for dr linder�*s dummies will be made openly available next month. it's taken decades to get here, but a crash test dummy representing the average female is close to becoming a reality, bringing with it hopes that women will one day be safer behind the wheel. that was shona. and to talk more about the issue of male—centric design, i met the author

of invisible women, caroline criado perez. caroline, you've talked a lot about how the issue of inequality is in everything from medical trials all the way through to gadget design. how big a problem is this? it's a huge problem. it's a structural problem that exists in every part of the world. this idea that if we just collect data on men, that will, sort of, suffice, that men are somehow this kind of default gender—neutral setting for humanity, and if we design things for them, that is like designing things for humans. and we are forgetting about the fact that half the population are not men. it seems a big thing to forget. why has this happened? you look at renaissance medical illustrations, the anatomical illustrations, the male body was presented as the default body. and it's reallyjust sort of carried on through history, that we present men as if they are gender—neutral. and i think the problem is, really, that we don't acknowledge that we are doing

that, so then we don't really think that we're excluding women. if you went up to people and asked them, "do you think we test cars on male and female car crash test dummies?" they would say, "well, i've never really thought about it but, yeah, i assume we do, of course we would." more people don't know this is going on. when it comes to something like a smartphone, you'd think that it would be simple to just have different sizes, some that would be smaller for people with smaller hands, some that were bigger for people with bigger hands, who are probably going to be men. you were happy with where apple were going with this at one point, but then it all went a bit wrong, as far as you're concerned? you might well think it would be easy to just have different sizes of things, what a radical idea. and that was, in fact, what apple did briefly. so they originally had this iphone se, which was a smaller phone, but it was a less advanced phone. and then in the last couple of years, they decided to do away with that and to introduce the mini, which was as good as the big phones butjust smaller, which was fantastic,

and they've decided to discontinue it. do women want smaller devices, though? i think it's a really interesting cultural question, actually. i will not make claims that all women want one thing, and obviously some women are going to want a bigger phone. some men want a smaller phone. but what i'm talking about is averages here, and it's very difficult to separate what people want from social norms and social hierarchies. and so what you often find is that because, historically, the so—called female version of things has been seen as the worst thing, a lot of women don't want to go for what is seen as the female version of something. electric cars were around right from the beginning, pretty much, but petrol cars won out because they were seen as the more manly thing.

and electric cars were presented as something for ladies. of course, when it comes to something like a smartphone, i like to have a big smartphone, and i'm not bothered about the size of a vr headset. but there are far more serious issues at play. this is a systemic issue, and when you talk about a systemic issue, it means there will be things that arejust annoying. it's not going to kill me that the shelf is set too high for me in a supermarket, right? what might kill me is that there isn't a... you know, artificial hearts, for example, most of them are designed around a male body, so they don't fit inside a female body. this isn'tjust some isolated example. it's in everything. the map on your smartphone giving you the quickest route rather than the safest route, which a woman might want, and i could argue that is probably not being presented as an obvious option, because mostly men are not as worried as women are about how they get home at night in the dark. all the way through to

the doctor missing your heart attack because it hasn't presented in a classic male way. you have been looking at all this for some years now. do you think there's been progress? it's an uphill battle. this is a huge change we're talking about, so it's going to take a really long time. that was lara talking to caroline criado perez. now let's have a look at this week's tech news, and tech giants have reported slower revenue growth this quarter. google owner alphabet said sales rose by 6% in the six months to september, but this is the us firm's weakest quarterly growth in nearly a decade outside of the start of the pandemic. a robot fish that can gobble up microplastics from water has been brought to life by the university of surrey. gillbert is a prototype of this year's winning entry to the uk's natural robotics contest, and it has gills that can filter out plastics in the water as it swims. and freely available to download for anyone with a 3d printer.

we have got robots out on lakes patrolling the water for microplastics and bringing them back to the lab. and it's going to support an ongoing programme of making the water cleaner. into the metaverse now, where interpol is looking to catch the next generation of criminals. the global policing organisation has announced it will be training officers in its own virtual world. it hopes that, by experiencing the metaverse first—hand, it will be better equipped to police it. and finally, scientists at the national university of singapore say they have created the world's first interactive mouthguard. the smart mouth guard lets individuals with limited hand function control smartphones, computers and wheelchairs by translating bite patterns into instructions. the open water, the last place you want to get into difficulties. last year, lifeguards from the royal national lifeboat institution rescued more than 3,000 swimmers in distress off the coast of the united kingdom.

but what if there was a way to get to swimmers in trouble even faster without lifeguards even having to set foot in the sea? well, here, in southern wales, a new solution is being trialled. one good thing obviously from this is because we've had comms with cardiff, it's just happened, they will go and put their own notice out to let other aviators know that there is going to be some sort of motorised aircraft system flown from this beach. now, it sounds like they're talking about a drone here, but it's notjust any drone. it's an ip67 waterproof floater drone, so it can fly but it can also float on water. the camera is waterproof, everything about it is waterproof, it can fly in the rain, it can fly in much higher wind speeds than a typical drone. and you can sit it on the water, float and take off again. but that's not all.

this drone has a hidden feature that is crucial in its mission to save lives — an ability to not only carry but to release. you've got the payload release mechanism, you can hook up a buoyancy aid to it and remotely release it out to sea. put that over your head and put your arms through. and that's exactly what we've come to see in action today, in a simulated rescue with me as the willing guinea pig. there you go. ok, this is cold. it's really cold, and i've got to get into that? now there are, of course, situations where you wouldn't need the drone. for example, if i was close to the shore. in that case, lifeguards could just dive straight in and rescue me. but out here, hundreds of metres from shore, and when every second counts, the drone can beat even the fastest of swimmers in a race. 0k!

i'm ready to be rescued right now! the rescue drone can carry multiple types of buoyancy aids ranging from a tube buoy, like you see here, to one that instantly inflates upon hitting the water. we simulated the rescue, because you need special permission to drop things out of the sky. and this expands with a carbon dioxide canister, much like you see in those

fizzy drink machines. this is a flotation device, so it means i can hold onto this until i'm rescued. now safely back on dry—ish land, i wanted to find out more about the drive behind this project and whether this would lead to lifeguards being replaced by drones. technology is new to our industry, and i think if people embrace it to support the lifeguards and life—savers, it could be phenomenal. it's not there to replace people, that's really important. we need lifeguards, we need humans to do rescues, to resuscitate, to give cpr, first aid, all that kind of stuff when it goes horribly wrong. i think this will enhance traditional lifeguarding. i think we absolutely will still need lifeguards, and this technology will allow them to maybe do theirjob better because they have more visibility and they can get to places quicker. this life—saving system will be trialled early next year. at £900, the training doesn't come cheap, but apparently it will be funded by the beach

owner or manager. there's probably quite a few different use cases. the drone obviously is great for dropping equipment, like you saw today, but it also has other opportunities, so it could be used to spot rip currents. and it's notjust how the drones can be used, but the additional add—ons that can be plugged into them in the future. these range from high—resolution cameras for photography, thermal cameras, loudspeakers and even sonar. while this will be the first system of its kind in the uk, a similar system has been in place in the spanish city of valencia since 2016. and as you can see here, it's clearly proving it can save lives. that was l] in the water. rather her than me. 0k, we're going from the very, very wet to the very, very dry now, the complete opposite. we have all watched in horror at the devastation caused by wildfires across the globe.

lives and homes destroyed, wildlife displaced, all while firefighters are risking their own lives to try and stop the flames. climate scientists are warning that, as heatwaves get more intense and more frequent, the risk of wildfires will increase too, of course. the question is, can technology help get wildfires under control earlier? laura goodwin investigates. it only takes one spark to start a wildfire that can spread for miles and rage for days. with our climate changing and land becoming drier, it's providing the perfect conditions for wildfires to blaze. and even in traditionally cooler parts of the world, wildfires are becoming more unpredictable. mist and cloud are dominating the skyline today but back in the summer, it was very different.

it had been particularly dry, and this piece of moorland in west calderjust outside of edinburgh burned for three days. it took 60 firefighters and i2 appliances to eventually bring it under control. dr tom smith is a wildfire expert. i believe you're at the site of a summer grassland fire in scotland, which is very unusual. fires normally occur in the spring, when the heather fuels have dried out and become available to burn before they green up and contain lots of moisture. that usually stops the fires from happening in the summer in scotland. but what you've seen is that the grasses have got so dry that they were available to burn in august. we are seeing these longer, hotter, drierspells, and that's predicted to continue through the rest of this century until we do something about carbon emissions and reduce the level of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. how important is acting early, early detection and trying to get on top of things as quickly as possible?

first of all, there is prevention, and that's identifying parts of the landscape that are most at risk from fires. we model fires on the landscape using computers, we drop ignitions onto simulations and look at where the fire might spread. that is one key, kind of, tool in our toolbox. another one is being prepared, so apart from prevention, we can prepare. but could technology help to catch wildfires before they take hold ? we've come to the bayes centre at edinburgh university to find out, and to do that, we need to go up. andre chung is ceo of robotics cats. they've developed ai detection systems trained to spot the early signs of wildfires. in most part of the world, the firefighter have a really challenging job. they don't have enough resources, to have enough first—responder firefighters to put out the fires. if they can find the fire

earlier, it use less resources to control them. that's a critical point. using cameras in itself is not new but currently many systems rely on manualjudgement. what robotics cats have done is teach the al to recognise the signs of fire far earlier. so, obviously we don't have a fire that we can look for here in in edinburgh, but we've set up a screen to look at. where is this, andre? this is controlled burns in hong kong, in the remote areas. and we are going to see if this camera can detect it? yes. it is taking images of the video and send it to ai and the ai, we run analytics on the images to see if there is any fire—like signal. and hopefully we'll get the alert on your phone? just the images, real—time detections. we see the image and the highlight of the fire front is here. yes, so the alert has come through. i didn't even notice it but the camera did. the ai did.

we train the ai using a lot of early—stage wildfires and the ai, we'll run analytics on the images, to see if there is any fire—like signal. the inherent risk of wildfires means this is a space in which the tech has had to grow. across the world, different techniques are being employed, from giant sprinklers in spain to infrared cameras in america. ai will have its place but, ultimately, the aim is the same — to detect wildfires as quickly as possible and protect the lives they threaten. that was laura. and that's all we've got time for. thanks for watching, see you soon. bye— bye.

hello. well, the met office have confirmed that it was another very warm month across the country, and october in england was the fourth—warmest october on record. but quite alarmingly, we're now seeing some of the warmest conditions on record, taking the year as a whole to day. as for rainfall, well, we needed the rain, but it's only northern ireland which was significantly above average. but for the first few days of november, our rainfall accumulation chart shows that all of us will see some pretty wet weather. the darker colours in the south show some welcome rain to come here. but it's notjust wet, some windy weather, and especially during the next 2a hours. widespread gales across the country, and in this hatched area, we could see potentially damaging and disruptive gusts of wind of 50—70 mph, all tied in with this approaching and deepening area of low pressure. now, before it arrives, a little ridge there which indicates a quiet end to the night. a few mist and fog patches, a lot of dry weather, just a few showers in the south and the west, but a rather chilly start compared to what we've been used to —

2—3 celsius in some sheltered glens in scotland. lots of sunshine, though, through scotland, england, wales to begin with. northern ireland cloudy, already turning windy, increasingly wet through the morning, some heavy rain at times sliding into western scotland and through the afternoon to wales and western parts of england. much of eastern england, though, will stay dry until later in the day, with some sunny spells. temperatures here around 15—16 celsius in the southeast, but it will feel cooler than that in the north and the west as those winds pick up. in fact, it's going to get windier as the day goes through. just an example of some of the gusts by mid—afternoon, 40—50, close to 60 mph, maybe a little bit more as we head into the evening. heavy rain sweeping across all of england. strongest winds overnight to take us into thursday across central and northern parts of scotland. winds easing a little bit later. and the clearer skies that some will see to the north and west into thursday morning, again down into single figure temperatures. milder in the southeast. and this is where the big question mark for thursday will be. the weather front may just drag its heels, bringing bursts of rain northwards and eastwards as we go

through thursday, east anglia, the southeast, and the channel islands. away from that, though, more likely to see sunny spells develop, a scattering of showers, some of those heavy towards the south and west, and the temperatures 10—13 celsius. feeling cool compared to what we've been used to, but that's where we should be for this stage in november and the sort of temperatures we'll see through friday and into the weekend. friday, the driest day of the week most widely. saturday, of course, bonfire night, rain will be pushing its way in and some strong winds, too. bye for now.

welcome to bbc news. i'm lucy grey. our top stories: cheering jumping forjoy — israel's religious right is projected to make major election gains as former prime minister benjamin netanyahu is tipped to win a record sixth term. 0utgoing president jair bolsanaro refuses to acknowledge defeat after brazil's election but says he will respect the constitution. elon musk�*s shake—up of twitter goes on. if you want the coveted blue tick, you'll have to pay for it. and the music world pays tribute to hip—hop star takeoff, shot dead at a bowling alley in texas.