:00:00. > :00:00.the challenge. We are going to catch up with two Spanish superstars. See
:00:00. > :00:08.ya. Playlist Morning. Leah here with
:00:09. > :00:15.Friday morning's top stories. Coming up: JK finishes a script for a spin
:00:16. > :00:21.off Harry Potter movie. And the robots built with
:00:22. > :00:25.inspiration from termites! First up, most of us had a calmer
:00:26. > :00:28.night but another band of stormy weather is already on its way, with
:00:29. > :00:32.rain and high winds hitting the South West of England this morning.
:00:33. > :00:35.17 severe flood warnings are in place across the UK and engineers
:00:36. > :00:39.are still working to restore power to some of the thousands of homes
:00:40. > :00:45.that were cut off on Wednesday. Let's go live to Ayshah who is in
:00:46. > :00:52.Chertsey, Surrey. Thank you. Yes, this is near the
:00:53. > :00:57.River Thames. I have just walked over the bridge and the River Thames
:00:58. > :01:01.is gushing through. There is loads of water. Places that were flooded
:01:02. > :01:05.are still flooded as the water is not going anywhere. I am by a flood
:01:06. > :01:10.defence which was built yesterday by the Environment Agency. This is
:01:11. > :01:14.Allison from that organisation. What is this here for? When we have
:01:15. > :01:19.flooding to the extent we have now, we use a lot of temporary defences
:01:20. > :01:23.which can be sandbags or barriers, or in this case a watered-down,
:01:24. > :01:27.which we have laid along the road, because it needs a flat surface, to
:01:28. > :01:33.provide temporary protection to the properties. The other side we are
:01:34. > :01:36.also deploying sandbags and temporary defences and supporting
:01:37. > :01:39.those people as well because we want to protect all the properties we
:01:40. > :01:43.can. Whatever we put here will not make anything worse but we are
:01:44. > :01:47.trying to do what we can for each property. Do you think the
:01:48. > :01:51.Environment Agency has done enough to protect homes and businesses? I
:01:52. > :01:54.have been working them for 15 years in flood management and my
:01:55. > :01:58.colleagues are hugely experienced. We are doing everything we can and
:01:59. > :02:02.drawing in help from the military to protect these properties. Thank you.
:02:03. > :02:05.More rain is expected today and people will have a nervous wait.
:02:06. > :02:09.Thanks, Aysha, The bad weather is affecting you guys all over the UK
:02:10. > :02:17.and you've been getting in touch with your stories. Ellie, Jake,
:02:18. > :02:25.Chloe and Max sent us this report. Hello, I am Chloe. I am Ali. I am
:02:26. > :02:38.Max. This is our story of the floods. This is my usual route to
:02:39. > :02:48.school. It no longer exists. We used to have this car park by my house.
:02:49. > :02:55.We used to spend all of our free time in this park. Now there is no
:02:56. > :02:58.chance of that any time soon. Many people had to be evacuated from
:02:59. > :03:06.their homes due to the high volume of water caused by the flooding,
:03:07. > :03:13.including us. Jack in Bath has contacted us
:03:14. > :03:17.because his back garden is flooded. And Matthew in Rhyl got soaked and
:03:18. > :03:21.his next door neighbour's ariel fell down! Thanks for the video report
:03:22. > :03:24.guys and all your comments. If you've been affected by the floods,
:03:25. > :03:29.we want to hear from you. Grab your mobile and if it's safe to do so,
:03:30. > :03:32.send us a short clip or take some snaps of what's happening in your
:03:33. > :03:35.area. You can also leave us your flood and bad weather stories over
:03:36. > :03:39.on the Newsround website. And it's not just us that have been
:03:40. > :03:42.struggling with severe weather. A giant snow storm has hit America's
:03:43. > :03:45.north-east. More than 38 cms of snow has fallen in the Washington DC
:03:46. > :03:48.area. Around 500,000 homes and businesses have had their power cut
:03:49. > :03:51.and thousands of flights have been cancelled.
:03:52. > :03:55.Exciting news for Harry Potter fans. JK Rowling says she's finished the
:03:56. > :03:58.draft script for her spin off movie! The author revealed in a magazine
:03:59. > :04:02.interview that she wrote Fantastic Beasts And Where to Find Them in
:04:03. > :04:05.just 12 days. The story's based on the text book Harry Potter uses in
:04:06. > :04:07.Hogwarts. There's no news yet on when the movie will start being
:04:08. > :04:10.made. Over at Sochi and Lizzy Yarnold
:04:11. > :04:14.could become Britian's first Gold medallist at the Winter Olympics
:04:15. > :04:17.today. She only took up the sport in 2010 but dominated the first two
:04:18. > :04:25.runs of the skeleton competition and leads at the half way point by
:04:26. > :04:30.almost half a second. Her competition starts at 4pm. For that
:04:31. > :04:35.Kristian Bromley and Dominic Parson start qualifying in the men's
:04:36. > :04:40.skeleton. Before that the British women's curling team face Japan.
:04:41. > :04:43.Scientists in America have taken inspiration from termites to build
:04:44. > :04:47.robots. Take a look at this. These mini robots are building layers of
:04:48. > :04:50.bricks by sensing the area around them and taking cues from each
:04:51. > :04:53.other. They're working in a similar way to termites, which can create
:04:54. > :04:56.impressive structures several metres high.
:04:57. > :04:58.That's all from me. Newsround's back right here in about half an hour.