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union bank has put its financial strength to work for small businesses to major corporations. what can we do for you? >> and now "bbc world news." >> a major eruption in mount merapi claims 40 lives. and investigations continue into the engine failure on the qantas. and survivors of january's earthquake are urged to leave the makeshift shelters. welcome to "bbc world news." broadcast in america and around the globe. coming up later for you -- conspiracy or coincidence? a massive cyber attack cripples the internet as they prepare for the best selections in 90 years.

and the horrors of first world war are exposed. >> now, we're getting reports from cuba that a plane carrying 68 people has crashed in the center of the country. the reuters news agency says there are no initial reports of survivors. that's according to sources at havana and santiago cuba airports and state run airports. the plane was an atr twin turboprop aircraft that belongs to the state-owned aerocaribbean airlines. the plane was on a domestic flight from santiago.

nearly half are believed to be foreigners. >> singapore airlines said it's resuming air flights of the airbus passenger planes a day after the engine operated by the qantas failed soon after takeoff. the qantas flight made an emergency landing at singapore. in a moment we'll have the latest from our correspondent in singapore. first though, we have a report on how the emergency unfolded. >> we have a technical issue with number two engine. >> it's what every passenger dreads. thousands of feet up. a tear in the wing clearly filmed from inside the plane just 15 minutes from singapore en route to sydney. >> secure at this stage. we're going have to hold for some time. >> the a380 the biggest passenger plane in the world was caught on film from the ground in indonesia.

it had dropped as it flew over batam island. parts of the engine had fall on the ground. at first, they thought it had crashed. but after circling and dumping its fuel, the aircraft prepared to make an emergency landing. it went smoothly. and calmly. all 433 passengers and 26 crew were safe. but left questioning what went wrong when they arrived back in singapore. >> i was sitting just behind the wing, so we thought it was just -- we heard a loud thud. everybody sort of -- everybody was shaken by it. you can imagine how. >> mart of the engine -- part of the engine fell off and then it wend dead. >> on closer inspection the et cetera -- the extent of the damage was clear. these planes are designed to fly with one or two engine failures.

>> it looks like it's an uncontained engine failure, but it will involve us doing a detailed investigation with the manufacturer airbus, and the manufacturer of the engine rolls royce. >> tonight, qantas has grounded its six a380 planes and singapore airways is delaying the super jumbos for air checks. for those flying in from around the world, what caused this engine to fail while in midair? was it just an isolated incident or a problem that can affect all a380 planes across the world? >> well, singapore airlines which are basically the a380's for 24 hours are the same model, resumed services of the plane

earlier today. german carrier which operates the a380's has not grounded aircraft and so far, no word from qantas when they'll restart the flights. but f.a.a. said they'll resume the flights after completing technical checks together with engine manufacturer rolls royce and airbus. >> i can tell you that passengers from that qantas airbus 380 that made the emergency landing has now left australia on relief flights. well, qantas' chief executive alan joyce has given a news conference. let's have a listen to what he has to say. >> directed against two different parts of the engine. we can get the technical details for you if you want to know. the turbo -- the nozzles on the aircraft. >> are they concerned with the aircraft so young -- >> again, they're trying to

improve the performance of what -- of the maintenance what's taken place. it is not unusual. if it was unusual we would signal that. different engine, different aircraft, when you're complying with them you meet the regulators requirements and we were fully complying with the two on this engine. >> how much -- >> -- be concerned with flying the a380? >> no, talking to our captain that was involved in the qf 32, he was so positive about the aircraft. he says he loves the aircraft. he thinks it's a fantastic aircraft. and he's 100% convinced that this is a great aircraft to fly. as long as we can identify and make sure that this problem doesn't occur again which is what the checks are all intended

to do he said he would be happy to operate on the aircraft. >> [inaudible]. >> i can only talk about qantas. it isn't a decision we have made because we believe the recommendations that we are getting and it's a recommendation, not a directive from rolls royce, but they're undertaking the check on the engine to ensure that the engines are safe to fly again. so we are not going to take any short cuts. we regard our safety reputation as the most important that we have. 5 >> [inaudible]. >> no i'm only talking about qantas operation. i'll leave other operators to decide what they want to do. we want to make sure we're comfortable flying the aircraft again and we go through the aerochecks on the engines. >> [inaudible]. 100,000 or 1 million? >> it's too early to say.

we're in a position where we obviously have -- what amounts to 70% of the international operation are operated by the a380's. that's spread between london and los angeles. and we are finding ways -- it is different from the volcano as you're probably aware, the volcano lasted for six days. that cost us at the time we said between $1.5 million and $2 million a day. but we didn't have any options. there was no other aircraft that we could operate. at this time, we are hiring in aircraft and using aircraft that we would be flying doe mostcame to fly internationally. so a lot less impact than -- >> [inaudible].

>> if there's something significant, it will be when the aircraft get back in the air and if there's something significant we'll report it. we're not there. >> do you have any concerns that there are some design flaws with the aircraft? in the engines in particular, considering the damage that was caused to the wiring, pretty much rendering the engine inoperable? >> prior to the review that we're doing, we have been doing with airbus is looking at the potential causes of what could have caused the failure. and rolls royce have identified a number of potential areas that this could have occurred. at the checks, they're looking at all the areas to ensure that there isn't an underlying problem that's there. once we go through the checks we'll be comfortable that the engines don't have a problem. >> there was a fair -- [inaudible]. pieces of the aircraft, can you

give us an update on the debris that landed on the town and do the investigators believe any debris may have fallen -- >> they believe the debris is being collected. we have a number of indonesian authorities so the debris can be used as part of the investigation that is taking place. it's too early we don't have the clerktion of all the material. but it looks like a significant amount has been recovered and is on land. but it's too early to identify. i think it will help, but i think we have sufficient information of what's happened on the engine to make a view of the likely causes and there's still a number of likely causes of that. that's helping us with the check regime that we are doing. >> we'll leave the press conference, live in sydney. just to recap what he's been

saying so far in the conference, he has said that the a380's he expects them to be up and running within the next 24 hours. we're getting other news. privately owned aircraft belonging to an oil company has crashed. soon after taking off in pakistan's city of karachi. about 20 people are on board. this is according to the civil aviation authority. the english language express tv said that the plane crashed near the airport in karachi. as we get news of it, we'll bring it to you. now a cloud from mount merapi has killed dozens of people while they slept. that brings the death toll to

nearly a hundred. our correspondent is in jakarta and joins me now. alex, what's the latest there? >> officials are now still finding out the exact number of casualties from the eruption last night. hospital is telling us that at least 30 bodies have been brought in with dozens more of people with burn injuries some of them badly are also overwhelming hospitals right now. it was the biggest eruption of the mount merapi so far, even bigger than the initial eruption last week which killed as many people as last night. the nearby airport has been closed this morning as rescuers -- or workers have to sweep the runway of thick layers of ash and some schools are now

closed because of the raining ash, about 25 kilometers from the volcano. >> of course, we have seen weeks full of eruptions. what are the officials who are watching the volcanoes saying? >> even those who have dedicated a lifetime of studying the volcano are saying that they have been baffled by its erratic behavior since the first eruption last week. the merapi volcano has usually one big eruption and then calms down, whereas this one, there have been smaller eruption since the first tuesday of last week. then starting about two days ago the eruption seems to get bigger and bigger and now there are worries that a new lava dome forming could collapse and if it does it could trigger a deadly surge up to 1,800 degrees fahrenheit of ash and gas. and that's why authorities have now extended the exclusion zone

from 10 kill -- from 15 kilomet kilometer radius to 20 kilometer, that's why they have extended the zone. >> thank you very much. security checks are being stepped up on air freight coming into the u.k. with shipments being graded according to risk. it's the latest move to improve security since bombs were intercepted on the flights. the plot map blamed on al qaeda, and a group which in yemen is struggling to contain. jeremy bowen is there and sends in this report from the capital. >> here the government is feeling the pressure from the outside world. police are making sure the career companies that allegedly were used to transport the bombs stay closed. restructions on air cargo don't

help, according to a minister who unwittingly flew on the same planes as one of the bombs. >> so you are closing them, in exchange for goods and services and people coming in and coming to yemen to help, but you're also showing that these extremist elements that they have wong, they have achieved what they have wanted. they have isolated this country and strangled the government. >> the old town of sana are one of the jewels. people are quite well off here. but even here, you can get an idea of the poverty that can make al qaeda's ideology attractive. yemen has a whole lot of problems and as far as the president is concerned al qaeda is not the most serious. he faces an insurgency in the north, a separatist movement in the south, the country's small

deposits of oil are running out, there isn't enough water, there's high unemployment and in the countryside especially increasing numbers of people don't have enough food to eat. the question -- where do you begin? they have some suggestions at this youth group called the assist association. starting with educating the poor. they're practicing their english and discussing what's gone wrong with their country. >> what do you expect it to be? we watch the persons who is waiting -- on anything which is related to the other religions so we get the bad picture. they try to get revenge. and this thing is wrong, of course.

>> they are going a very bad week to achieve their ends. they don't care about it. i don't care. i don't care. >> yemen has been offered decent money for development aid, but downing airliners could exhaust the patience of their rich friends. >> you're watching bbc. another eruptiontion of mount merapi claims at least another 40 lives. an qantas says it hopes to resume flights of the a380 airbus within 48 hours. investigations continue into the engine failure on one of the qantas super jumbos. well, more on the news that the democrats have held on to the senate seat in washington state

after three days of counting. incumbent senator patty murphy held off dino rossie in a tight contest. our reporter peter bose is in los angeles. why has it taken so long to get these results? >> well, washington state has a very high proportion of mail-in ballots, much more than most other u.s. states. that largely is why it takes so long to count the votes. so it has been three days since the election that coupled with the fact of course that this has been a very close race between an incumbent democrat and a local businessman, dino rossie, he has a long track record in this state, an aspiring politician, a very hard-fought campaign. he aimed his campaign at mostly her spending record and also her campaign contributors.

it was closely fought and obama, this was on the list of the democrats' top 10, so nationally the democrats put a lot of into campaigning for their candidate. and as you say, she has succeeded in winning a fourth term in the senate. >> looking at the balance of the democrats, particularly in the house of representatives where it's lost the majority, where does this leave the party? >> well, this leaves the democrats with 51 seats in the senate as opposed to the republicans 46. now, there are two independents, they side with the democrats and the result from alaska is still to come. so it gives the democrats a narrow but reasonable comfortable majority in the senate which of course will be perhaps more consolation to the president after his very disappointing results losing control of the house of representatives. >> peter bose, thank you.

at least 20 people have died in a land slide in costa rica. it gave way after heavy rainfall. and police and emergency workers are digging through rocks and rubble in a search for survivors. more than a thousand people have been evacuated after a week of torrential rain caused widespread flooding. >> it sounded like airplanes approaching. then we were hit. the accounts of just one of those lucky enough to escape the wave of mud and rocks that crashed down the hill at dawn. others couldn't get out in time. the landslide slammed into some 30 homes of the suburb lying close to the capital of san jose, burying people and possessions. rescuers scoured the area for the missing and have to dig through upturned cars and washing machines and tin roofing materials.

among those bodies are three or five relatives. i sincerely i hope, i don't want to say it's true, i haven't seen it. it's not true until i have seen it. it's an area where poor people live in shanty dwellings, alongside much more upmarket homes. red cross workers said that despite their efforts, they had only found corpses including several children. it followed two days of heavy rains that flooded a river near the town and sent over a thousand people in the capital and along the pacific coast to seek shelter. the authorities expected the downpour to continue, and say that since tuesday the equivalent of three times the average rainfall for the whole of november has been recorded. schools have been closed across

costa rica and the government is helping them to help reach the outlying areas. >> demonstrators have clashed with police in northern spain after many staged a protest against the forthcoming visit of pope benedict. a group of atheists and gay rights activists were prevented from going through the city and the pope will visit the area on saturday before heading to barcelona. extraordinary pictures of the aftermath of the first world war, hidden away for nearly a century was found in a vault in paris. it includes unique aerials taken and the footage offers an extraordinary insight into history.

>> 1919, after four years of the most destructive war man kind had ever known, traveling along the western front to film the extraordinary pictures of the aftermath. shattering the medieval city, flattened by four years of bombardment. and here's the sudden battlefield, the ground pitted with shell holes. today, the town is a peaceful place, completely built above the ruins of 90 years ago. this is the town of laos, where local people set up a street market next thousano houses so damaged. on the plateau, east of paris, a group of rusting french tanks abandoned in the former no-man's-land. and everywhere the trenches. zigzagging across the

countryside and sometimes intricate networks stretching as far as the eye could see. >> although this was shot in 1919, it gives us an entirely -- it gives you a different feel about the first world war. it's remarkable. never seen anything like it before. i think it will change people's perceptions. >> the pilot waving to passersby below was called jacques, and in world war ii he became a member of the french resistance and he was killed by the germans. his daughter was a tiny baby at the time of his death and has never seen this footage until the bbc showed it to her. >> i never -- in all the years imagined him smiling. now he's smiling. >> the great wall was the first conflict in history in which aerial photography played a significant part.

royal flying corps observers wielding cumbersome equipment risked their lives to take pictures thousands of feet up. they allowed generals to compile maps of the trench networks and modern historians to look at the countryside of belgium. >> and the main news we have had in the hour, a cloud of gas from mount merapi has engulfed villager, killing, dozens as they have slept. 50 people are feared to have died and bringing the death toll to nearly a hundred. also qantas hopes to review flights with the airbus a 380 and there's a look at the engine failure. singapore airlines said it's resuming flights of the airbus. and in cuba, a plane reportedly

carrying 68 people has crashed in central cuba. of course, as the stories develop we will bring you the latest news. you're watching bbc news. >> funding was made possible by -- the freeman foundation of new york, stowe, vermont and honolulu. newman's own foundation. the john d. and catherine t. macarthur foundation. union bank.

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