20/12/2016 East Midlands Today

And now the news for the East Midlands, I'm Geeta Pendse.

First tonight - the Christmas tourists from the East Midlands

who narrowly escaped last night's truck attack in Berlin.

A journalist soon to begin working at BBC Radio Leicester,

saw the lorry plough into market stalls in the German capital.

And a Nottinghamshire woman who was also there says it

Here's our social affairs correspondent, Jeremy Ball.

A scene of Christmas cheer destroyed in an instant,

She's visiting Berlin before starting her new job

We heard a massive crash to the left of us.

We looked over and thought maybe fireworks were going off

or something like that, and then the lights that

were hanging at the Christmas market started to be pulled down and then

we saw the top of an articulated lorry going from our

We just didn't know what was going on.

It completely decimated the hut where we'd bought the wine from,

It's the most terrifying thing that's ever happened to me.

There were people on the floor bleeding, crying, wooden panels

The market is all around that church...

Alison was in Berlin celebrating her birthday and flew

She and her husband were shopping there before the truck attack.

We were at the market about 3:30pm yesterday afternoon,

We got into bed and neither of us could sleep because suddenly

you're thinking, crikey, if we'd have made it

a couple of hours later, we could have been involved in that.

It's devastating to think it happened, that

We'll be back again for the Christmas market next year.

But 12 people lost their lives and dozens have been injured,

and now the questions - why did it happen and how to stop

attacks that are so ruthless in their simplicity?

Just to kind of get away from it, we had a wander round some

of the museums here and I'll stop and stare at a painting

and all of a sudden I'll hear something or I will see something

and I can just feel myself welling up.

I just don't know how this is going to affect me long-term.

Emma Rushton there, speaking to us from Berlin,

East Midlands Airport has escaped a fine running

into many millions of pounds in spite of an illegal deal

It had an agreement with a car parking operator not to undercut

the airport's own parking rates, thereby breaking competition rules.

The airport got off free, and has since apologised and said

This is the first competition investigation by the Civil

It found that between 2007 and 2012, East Midlands Airport had an illegal

deal with a company called Prestige Parking.

The airport said to this company, look, you can have your operation

on our airport site but you mustn't undercut the prices that the airport

And that broke competition law because they were fixing the prices.

The CAA is being lenient - instead of ?12.5 million,

They're not fining them at all because of their cooperation.

We've been asking people in the East Midlands what they think

I'm completely averse to anything at all where people are ripped off.

I reckon every airport's doing it to some extent.

I think I would encourage people to use public transport.

Well, we've had a statement from the Civil Aviation Authority.

Of course, we would have liked the Civil Aviation Authority

or the Competitions Authority - or indeed the airport -

to take part in the interview, but none of them wanted to do so.

An inquest has heard how the husband of a Derbyshire woman,

who died in hospital after being found seriously injured,

was himself killed later that same day on the M1.

Claire Nagle was discovered injured at her mother's home

in Borrowash on Friday, then died in hospital.

Her husband Vincent Nagle died hours later after being hit

Police arrived at this home in Borrowash on Friday morning

to find 38-year-old Claire Nagle lying on the kitchen floor seriously

She was taken to the Royal Derby Hospital.

Half an hour later her husband, 44-year-old Vincent,

a heating engineer and plumber, jumped from a bridge on the M1,

near the Trowell Services, and hit a lorry before his body fell

onto the middle lane of the southbound carriageway.

Today, here at the opening of the inquests into their deaths,

Detective Constable Barry Hall from the East Midlands Major Crime

Unit said the provisional cause of death for Claire Nagle

was pressure on the neck, pending further tests.

The pathologist also found ligature marks and bruising around her neck

and haemorrhages on the eyes, showing signs of asphyxia.

Vincent's provisional cause of death was an injury to the neck,

The court heard that he died instantly.

The couple had been living separately at

Earlier on Friday, her son, Nathan, who was living nearby,

Eyewitnesses said he'd told them he'd been attacked with a nail gun.

The police have said the three incidents are linked and they're not

A murder investigation has been launched into Claire's death.

The 38-year-old was studying mental health nursing

It said her loss will be felt deeply.

Meanwhile, a fundraising page set up for Claire's children has

The senior coroner, Doctor Robert Hunter,

adjourned the inquests, which were opened separately,

as the police investigation into Friday's tragic events continues.

Navtej Johal, BBC East Midlands Today, Derby coroner's court.

Council tax in Nottingham is set to rise again next year

The city council says it needs to plug a ?27 million shortfall

while funding the growing cost of elderly care.

As it stands, council tax will go up by just under 4%,

and there's every chance the eventual rise will be even

higher - just under 5% to balance the books.

The council's other saving plans include cutting 63 jobs,

putting up charges for on-street parking and reducing opening hours

We're being forced to possibly put up the council tax,

we are having to make cuts and even the service we're trying to protect

for the elderly is not going to be as good as it should be.

And it is not a good position to be in.

The touching friendship of two women from Leicestershire

going through cancer treatment is the focus of a national campaign

Mandie Stace and Jude Price have both been treated at the Leicester

It's the end of the year Mandie Stace and Jude Price

But together they've helped each other cope with cancer treatment.

When we're together, yeah, we have both had

cancer, but when we're together and laughing...

And you can forget you've got cancer as well.

The pair were filmed chatting at Jude's bedside whilst

They share a laugh about their hair falling out during chemotherapy.

The friendship between them and the humour that they share

I think really comes across powerfully in the advert

and we hope that will really speak to people and they will be able

This we can do and it costs us nothing, it's easy,

we're just having a laugh while we do it.

If it's going to make a difference to anybody,

even if it just made a difference to one person,

Mandie and Jude are still getting used to watching

It'll be seen by millions at Christmas and the New Year.

So, it's goodbye from me - but with your weather now,

Well, after a bit of a cloudy start of us tomorrow,

we'll see some sunny spells, before showery rain pushes down

from the north west, so for some a bit of a cloudy start

and that's because as we head overnight tonight, cloud

We are looking at mostly light and patchy rain pushing down

Temperatures hover at about three or 4 degrees.

First thing, especially across more southern parts,

it's going to be quite cloudy and a bit damp still,

then we start to see it brightening up, cloud breaking,

some spells of sunshine, ahead of the next band,

which looks like it's going to push in round about mid day onwards,

and it will continue to track down to the south east.

The odd heavy downpour is possible and then it starts to clear,

with temperatures to around eight or 9 degrees.

The breeze will be moderate, at times fresh, from the south west.

Thursday, quite a chilly start to the day, a touch of frost,

but then dry and fine with spells of sunshine for most of us

Then, you may have heard about Storm Barbara,

we're going to really feel the effects of the strength

It's going to be a dry start but then strong and gusty winds

and I'm afraid that wind will stay with us as we head

into Christmas weekend, so make sure you keep listening

That's it from us here on the late team.

country it's worth knowing the national forecast. Over now to

Tomasz. So, the weather's going to blow a

few cobwebs away in the coming days and maybe a few other things, as

well. How stormy is it going to get? For most of us probably not too

terrible. It is, however, going to be very nasty across parts of

Scotland on Friday. The clouds are racing across the Atlantic and we

will see a storm by