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The Fifth Floor

Factual: Life Stories

Global stories from the BBC’s 40 Language Services, with Faranak Amidi

Faranak Amidi presents global stories from the Fifth Floor, home to the BBC’s 40 Language Services.

Faranak Amidi presents global stories from the Fifth Floor, home to the BBC’s 40 Language Services

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The Fifth Floor: Breathless: The human cost of flaring

Documentaries

Gas flaring in the Rumaila oil field in Southern Iraq

01/12/2023 GMT

Breathless: The human cost of flaring

BBC World Service - The Fifth Floor, Breathless: The human cost of flaring

How the oil industry’s gas flaring habit is putting health at risk

How the health of millions across the Gulf region is being put at risk by toxic gas flares.

A BBC Arabic investigation has revealed that toxic pollutants released during gas flaring are endangering millions more people than previously feared. Flaring - the burning of waste gas during oil drilling - is taking place across the Gulf, including by COP28 hosts, the United Arab Emirates. Reporter Sarah Ibraham tells us what the documentary, Breathless, reveals about how the pollution can spread hundreds of kilometres, affecting air quality across the entire region.

Hong Kong city walks 
Sampson Wong is the author of two books about walks around Hong Kong, and has been promoting the benefits of walking and watching since Covid.  Meiqing Guan from BBC Chinese joined him to find out more. 

Covering the Uttarakhand tunnel rescue
It took 17 days to free the 41 workers trapped in a collapsed Himalayan road tunnel in northern India.  BBC Hindi’s Anant Zanane was reporting from the scene, and broke the story live on air. 

The matriarchal herders of Shimshal 
For the BBC's 100 Women season, BBC Urdu's Farhat Javed trekked to Pakistan’s Shimshal Valley with the Wakhi shepherdesses, a female-led community who have used the wealth from raising livestock at extreme altitudes to build roads, and educate their children.  

Serbia’s multi-millionaire barber – myth or reality?  
This year marks the two hundredth anniversary of the birth of Nikola Bizumić, the Serbian barber reputed to have moved to London, changed his name to John Smith, and made piles of money from his invention: the hair clipper.  BBC Serbian's Nemanja Mitrović has been digging into his mysterious story, particularly what happened to his missing millions.  

(Photo: Gas flaring in the Rumaila oil field in Southern Iraq. Credit: BBC)

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