09/04/2017 Midlands Today

Good evening. Kennedy, BBC News at Vimy Ridge.

A potentially lethal batch of the Class B drug Black Mamba

to West Midlands Police. Birmingham, according

It comes after a man died in the city centre overnight

The man who died was found in Fletcher's Walk in the early

Police say he was homeless and believed to be in his 30s.

Despite help from paramedics, he couldn't be saved.

He'd been helped in the past by Birmingham homeless outreach.

This lad that died this morning was very, very popular.

He had a lot of friends on the streets, they loved him,

And we're seeing young kids out here with drink and drug problems,

family problems out here, off their face on this.

You know, they can't move, they can't talk.

And within a few months, I'll be honest, most of them die.

Black Mamba, aka Spice, was recently reclassified from legal

A number of homeless charities told me use initially dropped,

but in the last few months, it's surged.

We are not kidding, we're having ambulances out three,

four times a morning, in the afternoon, and it's

because it's a class B, it's not a class A drug,

And it's available everywhere, on the internet, they just ring

people up, people will bring it out to them.

West Midlands Police say they believe the current batch

of drugs on the streets of Birmingham is potentially lethal.

Officers say they will take strong action against anyone involved

in the production or supply of the drugs as they work

to shut down the supply chain across the region.

A picture of a young Birmingham woman smiling at an EDL protestor

The photo was taken at yesterday's rally in the city

centre where around 100 demonstrators were gathered.

It's already been retweeted thousands of times and has

been shared on Facebook and on online news sites.

Police in Cheltenham say they're concerned for the welfare

23-year-old Heidi Slender went missing from her home

in the Vittoria Walk area last week and was last seen on Wednesday

Police say Heidi is considered vulnerable and they want her,

or anyone with information, to get in touch with them.

People across the region have been soaking up the sunshine today

The average for this time of year is around 13 degrees!

Joanne Writtle has been out and about in Shropshire and Birmingham.

Stunningly unseasonal weather drew crowds to Ironbridge in Shropshire

at temperatures more akin to June bathed the Gorge in sunshine.

It's quite surprising, for April, to see the weather so nice.

It's lovely to be like this in April, we expect it from the summer.

The summer rays were welcome news for people running the nearby

We're so lucky to be launching our Easter holiday

activities this weekend, the weather is absolutely glorious.

Did you expect it to be this sunny in the Easter holidays?

It's because, it's in, like, April time, and it's spring.

You can do lots of different stuff like go in the paddling pool.

Birmingham had a record number of tourists last year.

39 million visitors according to Marketing Birmingham.

So this kind of sunshine is a welcome extra boost

for places like here, Cannon Hill Park.

Tourism revenue reached ?6.5 million in the city with 70,000 jobs

But today, all people were interested in were the 22

It's a lovely day to get out, get some nice fresh air,

get down to the park, get an ice cream.

I hope that it will last a little bit longer,

because sometimes we don't get so much chance to get this

Over to the experts to find out the answers to that.

Things are set to change as we head into this evening.

A cold front is going to start to work its way down

from the north-west and that will introduce cooler

So, it seems it was good while it lasted.

And we'll have the weather forecast for you in just a moment.

One rugby result for you as Wasps stole a 32-30 win over Northampton.

Paul Doran-Jones' last-minute try on his Wasps debut went on to give

the Premiership leaders victory over the visitors.

Elliot Daly's earlier try initially kept the hosts within touching

distance but Christian Wade and Joe Simpson's tries put Wasps

Temperatures reached 22 Celsius widely across the West Midlands

today, but as we head towards the start of the new week,

things are going to turn a little bit cooler.

It's courtesy of a cold front that is sinking its way down

from the north-west, introducing thicker cloud for a time

and maybe the odd bit of light drizzle but nothing more than that.

Clearer spells follow on behind with a minimum temperature

So certainly a fresh start to the day tomorrow.

A lot of brightness around, some good spells of sunshine.

The risk of one or two showers on that north-westerly breeze

Even in the sunshine, it won't feel quite as warm as today,

with highs of 12 or 13 Celsius and cooler for much of this week.

I'll be back with the late news just after 10.20pm tonight.

Until then, have a very good evening, bye for now.

Good evening. If you can use a smelter describes the weather it

would be owed a barbecue, and why not? Beautiful blue skies with highs

of 25 degrees, yes, there was more cloud further west, and it was thick

enough for some rain in the far north-west of Scotland. You can see

this old snow