it is a bronze medal. bronze also for melissa courtney—bryant — who got gb going with a third place finish in the women's 3000 metres. she lost out to the german pair — hanna klein — who won gold, and konsta nze klosterhalfen, britain's hannah nuttall was 5th. and neil gourley took silverfor britain, in the men's 1500 metres, his first major senior medal. he was a close second to norway's jakob ingebrigtsen, the olympic champion held off a resurgent gourley in the final stages but the scot was delighted to push him all the way. i believed i could do it. i put myself in the right places and i got beaten by someone who was just better. i've got take that on the chin and outdoors because our momentum is heading into it. when a medal here today, i haven't done that yet

never won a major metal. so it was important to get that started. yeah, as you said, this is a building block for the summer and we are not there yet but we're getting there and getting closer and closer. manchester city can close the gap at the top, with a win in tomorrow's lunchtime kick off against newcastle united. their boss, pep guardiola has been talking about their former captain vincent kompa ny�*s future. kompany�*s in charge of runaway championship leaders burnley — who city face in the fa cup quarter finals. kompany won ten major honours in ii seaons at the etihad, and guardiola believes one day he'll return to city as manager. personally, i am delighted with his success and i think all of us have found that happy to be back. and so, i think he's destined to become a manager, it was written in the stars. it's going to happen. i don't know when but it's going to happen.

knows the environment, knows the fans, all the needs. the destiny is there. west bromwich albion lost valuable ground in the race for a playoff spot in the championship — after they were beaten 2—0 at hull city. an absolute cracker set hull on their way — with a his first goal for the club, with that rocket into the top corner. no stopping that one. an own goal in the second half sealed their fate — albion�*s fourth league defeat in seven, with hull nowjust three points behind them in 13th. there was a surprise pacesetter in second practice of formula 0ne�*s season—opening bahrain grand prix this weekend, aston martin's fernando alonso topped the timesheets, the spaniard continuing the team's strong pace from testing, finishing a tenth ahead of the red bulls of world champion max verstappen and sergio perez. lewis hamilton was eighth fastest, with mercedes team—mate george russell in thirteenth. there was a dramatic finish in super league as reigning champions st helens were beaten by a last gasp leeds rhinos drop goal. blake austin was the man who put

the ball between the sticks for the rhinos with just twenty seconds left on the clock. the result gives the away side their first win of the new season and moves them up to tenth in table. in rugby union's premiership — northampton saints were on the end of real mauling by bristol bears, who won 62 points to 8, at ashton gate. it's the biggest win of the season — with bristol scoring nine tries, harry randall with two of them. northampton were ahead courtesy of a penalty, but it was one—way traffic from then, in bristol's favour, the win moving them to 8th, with saints losing ground on the top two. finally — the women's six nations starts at the end of the month. one of the games taking place is in northampton at franklin's gardens, where england will play italy. ahead of the match, two girls schools had the chance to meet and train with one of england's biggest stars. 0ur reporter, james burridge was there too: when i'm carrying the ball, i think get in touch and then, where's my mate.

with an english rugby big stars. under the record point scores and were tempted, ready and willing to inspire the schoolgirls to in her footsteps. the schoolgirls to follow in her footsteps. pushes younger players being taught by professionals really good. it is absolutely - amazing, there's no way to, no words to describe how good it feels. - it will inspire girls to play rather thanjust watch rugby. i've got so many friendsjoining already and just from the world cup itself, it'sjust going to change women's by. rug five or six years ago, you probably would not have seen this, this is happening largely because of you guys come inspiring girls to do this, does that make you feel? it's not why i play rugby but it's such a huge part of it now. i think all of us are incredibly proud of this. the opportunities are there for young

girls to experience playing rugby which there's not many people who you showcase rugby to and say i hated and so, theyjust need an it opportunity to play it, see it and watch it and things like this are amazing opportunities for people in schools, it's great. at the end of march, a tournament held in its own right, the red roses roll into northampton when they play italy, a chance for thousands to see some of the biggest names in the women's game. it's always mainly been about the men but now we have a stand—alone six nations in front lewis gardens, twickenham and getting loads of ticket sales for that and it also means that we've got the fan base and the men also have this and so, just to see that growing is amazing. these girls left usually motivated and hoping one day that they may be running out with the red roses. that's all the sport for now.

over the past 30 years or so, i've covered conflicts talk about aliens. high—tech spying in high altitude balloons. if you invade our sovereignty then we will shoot it down. l115 invade our sovereignty then we will shoot it down.— shoot it down. us military 'ets firina shoot it down. us military 'ets firing expensive i shoot it down. us military 'ets

firing expensive missiles h shoot it down. us militaryjets firing expensive missiles on i shoot it down. us militaryjets - firing expensive missiles on objects which being the real threat. it might also sound like something from a sci—fi novel. but there is some serious issues here. how much of a security threat are balloons? everyone's talking about this. security things flying around. i'll break this down what we actually know and talk to a couple of experts about why we have seen this reaction from the americans and a row with china. but out did this crisis start two ., ., , china. but out did this crisis start two ., ., ., ~ , two for those of you to think this miaht be two for those of you to think this might be the _ two for those of you to think this might be the moon, _ two for those of you to think this might be the moon, it _ two for those of you to think this might be the moon, it is - two for those of you to think this might be the moon, it is not - two for those of you to think this might be the moon, it is not the | might be the moon, it is not the moon. the moon is off to my right, i can see it. there is said to be closed and us officials had to

explain that this really was. he notes a surveillance balloon and i'm notes a surveillance balloon and i'm not going _ notes a surveillance balloon and i'm not going to be able to be more specific— not going to be able to be more specific than that.— not going to be able to be more specific than that. they said it was a weather balloon _ specific than that. they said it was a weather balloon that _ specific than that. they said it was a weather balloon that at - specific than that. they said it was a weather balloon that at been - blown off course. the us military said they could not shoot it down for fear of causing debris damage below. so it drifted across america and out over the atlantic that be eventually shut it down. the spotting of the first balloon that north american air defence to adjust the radar settings. political pressure may play a part. settings. political pressure may play a part-— play a part. this is the atrocity happening _ play a part. this is the atrocity happening in _ play a part. this is the atrocity happening in america - play a part. this is the atrocity happening in america and - play a part. this is the atrocity happening in america and if. play a part. this is the atrocity| happening in america and if we play a part. this is the atrocity - happening in america and if we do not speak— happening in america and if we do not speak stronger, china will continue _ not speak stronger, china will continue to do this.— not speak stronger, china will continue to do this. there is some lead in that _ continue to do this. there is some lead in that supper. _ continue to do this. there is some lead in that supper. donald - continue to do this. there is some lead in that supper. donald trump wanted _ lead in that supper. donald trump wanted to— lead in that supper. donald trump wanted to nuke _ lead in that supper. donald trump wanted to nuke a _ lead in that supper. donald trump wanted to nuke a hurricane, - lead in that supper. donald trump wanted to nuke a hurricane, you l lead in that supper. donald trump . wanted to nuke a hurricane, you want even throw— wanted to nuke a hurricane, you want even throw a — wanted to nuke a hurricane, you want even throw a dart _ wanted to nuke a hurricane, you want even throw a dart to _ wanted to nuke a hurricane, you want even throw a dart to the _ wanted to nuke a hurricane, you want even throw a dart to the balloon. - even throw a dart to the balloon. why to _ even throw a dart to the balloon. why to the — even throw a dart to the balloon. why to the massive _ even throw a dart to the balloon. why to the massive spy - even throw a dart to the balloon. why to the massive spy below i even throw a dart to the balloon. | why to the massive spy below not even throw a dart to the balloon. - why to the massive spy below not get shot down earlier. but that meant

that they were seeing many more of what they would describe not as balloons but objects. if anything enters into our airspace, whether we know what it is or not, we will monitor it and take appropriate action. 0ne monitor it and take appropriate action. one was seen over alaska on february ten, the next day, another object was shut down over the yukon and canada. 0n object was shut down over the yukon and canada. on february 12, a strange octagon object was shot over lake huron. these are smaller than the first balloon but they could've gotten in the way of civilian airliners. this seems to be things in the sky everywhere. at the same time, china began accusing the us of hot flight its own objects into chinese newspaper the beijing permission. it chinese newspaper the bei'ing permission.�* chinese newspaper the bei'ing ermission. , ., ., ., , permission. it is also common for us to illeuall permission. it is also common for us to illegally enter _ permission. it is also common for us to illegally enter -- _ permission. it is also common for us to illegally enter -- for _ permission. it is also common for us to illegally enter -- for the - permission. it is also common for us to illegally enter -- for the us - permission. it is also common for us to illegally enter -- for the us to - to illegally enter —— for the us to do this — to illegally enter —— for the us to

do this if— to illegally enter —— for the us to do this. if illegally flown over china's— do this. if illegally flown over china's airspace within ten times without— china's airspace within ten times without any approval from relevant chinese _ without any approval from relevant chinese authorities. the best thing for the _ chinese authorities. the best thing for the us— chinese authorities. the best thing for the us to do is introspect itself— for the us to do is introspect itself and _ for the us to do is introspect itself and change its course instead of slandering and inciting confrontation. amid growing speculation about what's going on and after one military official refused to rule anything out, on february 13th, the us decided it needed to clarify one thing — these objects were not aliens. i know there have been questions and concerns about this, but there is no, again, no indication of aliens or extraterrestrial activity with these recent takedowns. maybe this is the point

to address the ufo issue. they exist. they're actually called unidentified aerial phenomena now, and there are hundreds of reports from us pilots about them which get catalogued. they get investigated, not so much because they might be extraterrestrials or aliens, but because the us fears they might be some new technology from another country. and many of those reports may, in fact, have been balloons or similar objects. it's now emerged that the other three unidentified objects shot down between february 10th and 12th were all, to use the jargon, benign. in other words, perhaps weather balloons or research balloons, but not spy balloons. so, what do we know about the original spy balloon? it was huge — 200 feet tall and helium—filled. there were solar panels to provide power and sensors and instruments along the bottom. it also had some ability to be manoeuvred and guided, although only limited. it was flying at about 60,000 feet. but it's thought that these kinds of balloons can go up to twice that altitude. and to really understand why they're so useful to china, we need to look at a weather map. wind speeds vary hugely depending on how high up you are. and at the altitude where this balloon was flying, there is a very stable and predictable wind pattern between china and north america. so, what are the balloons

actually being used for? the answer is espionage. they carry sensors to collect signals and data as they fly over locations. us officials are analysing the wreckage they recovered from the sea in order to try and understand what exactly those sensors do and what china was after. you don't need to get into specifics, just, did we know what they're trying to collect, yes or no? yes, sir. we understand that this is part of a broader suite of operations that china is undertaking... so, we knew what they were looking for. sir, we i think we should talk about this more explicitly in the classified session. but, yes, sir, we understand that this is part of the broader suite of operations that china's undertaking to try and get a better understanding of us. .. i got it. i mean, there's all sorts of suites of operations we have with what's going on in outer space. but the question is, did we know what that balloon was trying to gather? do we know what information it was trying to gather from the united states? it didn't fly over us by accident. it was intentional.

do we know what the chinese communist government was looking for? senator, we have some very good guesses about that and we are learning more as we exploit the contents of the balloon and the payload itseif~ — 0k. what might the chinese be trying to find out? lee hudson covers defence and aerospace for politico. lee, what were these balloons doing, particularly these chinese spy balloons? so, it seems, according to the us intel community, that they were gathering not only images, but electronic warfare signals, which means that could be anything from cellphone communication and other types of data, because they were flying over an intercontinental ballistic missile site, over montana, which the us military typically tries to protect. people at first thought, why balloons? but i guess your point is that there are things balloons offer that satellites and other

techniques might not. it can be hard to distinguish where a balloon is coming from. for example, a satellite or a drone, you could say it's coming from x country's military, but with a balloon, it's more benign. and so beijing tried to say that it was being used for meteorological purposes. a bit of deniability about what they're really up to, you mean? what do we know about the chinese balloon programme, then? so, we know that they have been doing this throughout the world, that a lot of these are connected. and this instance with the united states has made the us at least look into the programme more. and so we've gathered information that this has been going on for a while. and do we know if other countries have spy balloon programmes as well? yes. i mean, the united states has one. 0k. so, that's a prime example. the united states has balloons off the east coast that are run by customs and border control,

that they use for counter—drug interdiction. so they're looking towards south america. does the us think that they were taking pictures but also collecting some kind of signals as they flew over some of the military sites? yes, absolutely. and i think what we're still trying to figure out is whether us intelligence was able to block those signals from transmitting back to china. that's still a question mark that many have, because if the united states was able to jam those signals, then maybe they weren't as lucky in their attempt. there's a long history going back more than two centuries of using balloons in surveillance, but they still have value today. the altitude they're flying at means they can do things satellites can't do, loitering longer over targets

and also collecting signals, because they're in the atmosphere rather than in space. the chinese programme which the first spy balloon belonged to, us officials say, is run by the people's liberation army, and it's been running for years, with at least three balloons over us airspace during the previous trump administration. but both the us and china may have been keeping quiet about what was going on. that's normal for espionage, but now everyone is looking for these balloons. i want people to know that we'll do whatever it takes to keep the country safe. we have something called the quick reaction alert force, which involves typhoon planes which are kept on 24/7 readiness to police our airspace, which is incredibly important. so, what are the challenges in dealing with these balloons? we're going to bring back our graphic for this part. flying a spy plane lower in the atmosphere would be seen as an aggressive act and much more deliberate than just releasing a balloon into the wind. and meanwhile, a satellite up in space is not seen as such a problem.

but balloons are in a kind of grey area in between — and harder to spot. they also pose particular challenges to the military in working out how to take them down. i suspect there's probably a desire to find a way to deflate any potential future ambitions for using these things on a larger scale. excuse the horrible pun. professorjustin bronk is the senior research fellow for air power and technology in the military sciences team at rusi, a think—tank. justin, how does the military deal with balloons? i mean, how do theyjudge whether they're a threat or not? it's a difficult one. so, in terms of dealing with them, first of all. — there's the immediate question of what altitude are they at and what speed are they drifting at, because the primary means for militaries to detect flying objects is radar. and radar works essentially by bouncing energy off objects and reading the returns.

but in order to not get endless false returns if you're looking for something like aircraft or missiles, which would be the normal military things that they're trying to track, they will filter out and drop anything that is moving outside of a given range of speeds. so this is why military radars, for example, are able to, most of the time, disregard things like clutter from the ground, reflections from trees and reflections from birds, clouds, depending on the frequency of the radar — because those objects are moving relatively slowly or stationary, and so the radar will simply filter them out. the wider you make those kind of velocity gates in terms of what the radar is looking at and what it's disregarding, the more clutter you'll have to deal with, and so the better processing you'll require in order to get usable results for military purposes. what's happened since the chinese spy balloon incident in the us

is that the us appear to have reprogrammed a lot of their surveillance radars for air defence purposes with much, much wider velocity gates. so they're suddenly seeing a lot of sort of floating objects, of which there are many that are not spy balloons. you know, weather balloons, research balloons, just hobbyists putting cameras up on high—altitude balloons. but theyjust weren't seeing those before. and so now, having opened up the velocity gate, they're now having to try and classify and potentially intercept a lot more things that theyjust we ren't noticing before. make no mistake, if any object presents a threat to the safety| and security of the american people, i will take it down. _ well, i think we need to focus on the real issue here, which is the impact all of this has had on an already fragile and fraught us—china relationship. i mean, the united states has long had this sense of inviolability. they haven't had to fight on their own territory since the end of the us civil war.

and to discover that they are not as inviolate as they thought they were is a big deal culturally and, if you like, semiotically for the us population, and i think this is what is at stake here. it's quite clear that china has messed up. you know, somebody somewhere should have realised that this programme was ongoing at a time when both china and the united states were keen, bordering on desperate, to put a floor beneath a rapidly deteriorating relationship. nobody seemed to think that the discovery of one of these balloons, airships, dirigibles, call it what you will, might derail this. when the news first came out, the chinese response was to say that, you know, the united states is making a fuss about nothing.

the commentators, newspapers plundered the cliche book to talk about this. and this, i think, is indicative of a fundamental misunderstanding by china of what this means. nigel inkster is the former director of operations and intelligence at mi6. he says international law is clear that countries can act to remove flying objects like balloons from their airspace. it may be that these balloons or something like them have overflown the uk at very high altitude and nobody has noticed them. you know, if the uk wanted to shoot one of these objects down, under international law, it would be entirely within its rights to do so. but i think there will need to be a degree of political consideration applied to this. after all, the united kingdom is not the united states. we're not a global superpower. but with this increased vigilance, could we see countries shooting down more objects which pose no threat?

yeah, it is difficult, especially because a lot of more kind of amateur—type balloons that are floating around may not have filed any flight plans or got any permission. and so there may be very little awareness of exactly what's up there, most of which is entirely harmless. it does pose a challenge, doesn't it, because you've gotjets flying up to try and look and see what they are, which sounds like it's quite difficult for them, and then firing $400,000 missiles to shoot them down, which seems to be the only available option. yeah. even the highest flying military jets, things like the f—22 or the british typhoon, which can operate significantly above 50,000 feet, which is typically where fast jets tend to stop in terms of going higher, f—22, typhoon can operate up to 60,000 feet or even a little above. it's tricky being up there.

there are considerations around pilot life support and pressurisation of the cockpit. typically, aircraft are designed to operate at really extreme altitudes above that, like the u—2 spy plane or the 71 blackbird, again, spy plane. crews would wear kind of spacesuits, full pressure suits, and most jet fighters aren't equipped for that. also, where there have been previous examples of weather balloons, for example, or surveillance balloons from the us side that have kind of got lost or cables have broken, where fighters have tried to shoot them down at lower altitudes using cheaper gunnery, you've had instances where hundreds or even thousands of cannon rounds have gone straight through the balloon, not gone off, in the sense that the rounds haven't exploded because the skin of the balloon is too insubstantial to trigger the fuse. and so they've just put tiny holes in them, which doesn't really cause

them to leak at any particularly significant rate, and they've just continued. and of course, if it's over a civilian area or, say, the continental united states, a large area, you have to be very careful where you're firing cannon rounds because those will still come down somewhere. it is a difficult thing to solve with military equipment that isn't designed for it. does that mean we're going to have to look at new ways of defending or dealing with balloons, airships, otherthings flying at this altitude? because it sounds like it's possible we might see more in the future. it's not a technology of the past, but one that many countries look like they're developing. it may be that there will be more interest in certainly tracking the use of balloons and potentially developing more specialised capabilities to shoot them down more predictably or with lower cost. the flip side is that, you know, this is not a new technology, and spy balloons are something that have been used significantly by most

powers over the years. particularly during the cold war, they were played around with. there are difficulties with them, which is that it's harder to control exactly where they go, even if they have limited propulsion systems on board. so, while balloons are a niche, they're probably not revolutionary in that sense. min — it's more a political challenge and also something that you wouldn't necessarily want to have no answer to in case someone started getting much more creative with what they might try and then do if you had no answer to it, and just let it go unchallenged. so, what are the security risks? in one word, escalation. spying happens all the time, but the first rule of espionage is don't get caught, because when you do, it can turn into a problem. the us learnt this a couple of times. there was a major incident in 1960 where soviet air defences shot down an american spy plane flying at high altitude within its territory during the cold war. and more recently, in 2001, a us surveillance plane which was flying on the edge of chinese territory was forced to land in china after colliding with a jet watching it closely. that led to a tricky crisis.

back then, relations were not that bad. they're much worse today. as we made clear last week, if china threatens our sovereignty, we will act to protect our country, and we did. cheering and applause translation: this - behaviour is unimaginable and borders on hysteria. it is 100% an abuse of force. it is a clear violation of international practice. if the rhetoric grows and both the us and china feel they need to act tough and shoot things down near their airspace, then tensions will grow and there could be dangerous mistakes. so, are these balloons a real security threat to you and me? they may not be in themselves, but how countries react or overreact to them could have real consequences. we're already seeing that what's essentially a tool of espionage could significantly increase tensions between the world's two

most powerful countries and maybe even spark a crisis. and there's the risk that a lot more innocent balloons could get shot out of the skies by fighterjets. colder weather and snow in places but changes will be subtle in the only turn a little bit colder and the beloved of cloud and scattered showers and certainly largely cloudy start to saturday and best chance for any length of spells through the day across southwest scotland parts of northwest england preps north wales as well. equally, the beauty a

hot shower especially northeast scotland in the eastern side of england. temperatures about where they have been over the past couple of days, six to 9 degrees. cloud cover through saturday night and there will be some showers around and particularly in northern parts of scotland. most places thing above freezing but if you do have clear skies of red any length of time, you'll get a touch of frost. into sunday, again a lot of cloud there will be some showers and limited practice any spells and is the end of the start of next week, it will be all eyes to the north and we bring some quarter weather and snow in places but changes will be subtle in places but changes will be subtle in the only turn a little bit colder and the be a lot of cloud and scattered showers and certainly largely cloudy start to saturday and best chance for any lengthy sunny spells through the day across southwest scotland parts of northwest england preps north wales as well. equally, there be a hot shower especially northeast scotland in the eastern side of england. temperatures about where they have been over the past couple of days, 69 degrees. cloud cover through saturday night and there

this is bbc news — i'm nancy kacungira — with the latest headlines for viewers in the uk and around the world. a probe into lockdown parties at downing street — suggests the former british prime minister, borisjohnson — should have known rules were being broken. i believed that what we were doing was within the rules. that's why i said what i said in the chamber. president biden meets the german chancellor for talks — as the pentagon announces details of more military aid for ukraine. 0n the ground in ukraine — the head of russia's wagner group says its forces now surround most of bakhmut — the east ukrainian city, that's been the focus of extensive fighting.