Image provided by: Texas A&M University
About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (July 24, 1979)
Battalion /ol. 72 No. 174 Pages Tuesday, July 24, 1979 College Station, Texas USPS 045 360 Phone 845-2611 Weather Partly cloudy and warm today with slight chance of thundershowers this afternoon. 20 percent chance of rain today and tomorrow. High in the low 90’s and in the low 70’s this afternoon. University riello, Univeniti siana, and Leon coordinator at: ;xas at Austin, Tall staff inctj >f Texas Tech Uaii Smith of the l* i Carolina, ae Universityofli Charlie Thoms 'niveristy head In m for coaches of j scheduled with 1| U n i versify offeu uring on volleyl of Texas Weslj ig basketball; xas Woman’s Uni* rack. fTCU will head In I Joe Dean, nafo ctor for the Com all be a specialp s of Dallas HigH the North teamii aff and Bob Mcfjii ds the South fi >rth leads the :* have been four! i last year, 74 ton of Abilene North basketl dleton ofBi North alsoleadi including ir. a record attei jers,” said uite, president I be replaced ct Eddie final business luring that sessaj elect will be Nazi documents key to energy search its n to show up oi You can’t plan they’re requii tournaments Ifers are." ids hosts the Hi nament. i, headprofessi id recent comp! ;e of River Oaks available to the mly during the ilenty of seats six days, but the| 'hen it can’t gel Parten said case is anyone 2 t.” Rick Newman, a volunteer fireman from Clyde, laid the main ret Texas, takes a break at the end of the first day of this erOaksis"theydi year’s Fireman’s Training School. Newman is one of y and can suitik some 2,500 firemen in College Station this week for here’s too much! • a tournament rs and about the tchell is one of ters of tennis it but there’s ah ed in the RiverO social event Hard day in training the university’s largest annual continuing education activity. Tomorrow’s Battalion will have a feature story on the fire school training program. Battalion photo by Lee Roy Leschper Jr. More than 30 years after the fall of Be rlin, Texas A&M University researchers are finding clues for ways to reduce U.S. dependence on oil imports from records left behind the German war machine. Nearly half a million documents weigh ing several tons, which describe the tech nical process for turning German coal to gasoline as well as the construction of plants to do the job, were seized by the Allies as Hitler’s Germany collapsed. With President Carter’s call last week for Rosalynn OKs new changes United Press International DALLAS — First lady Rosalynn Carter conceded Monday the president’s Cabinet shake-up created “a little confusion” but said it needed to be done and was done well. “We have a tough time ahead,” Mrs. Carter told a news conference in Dallas, the last stop of the day on her tour of four southwestern states. “I think it was very clean. It was not as massive as people thought. “I think the Cabinet shake-up might have created a little confusion,” but she said such uncertainty was something “you cannot avoid.” Last week President Carter dismissed five members of his Cabinet and an nounced that members of his own White House staff were undergoing an evaluation. Mrs. Carter also addressed a Democratic Party reception in Dallas and again said her husband was “healthy, happy and confi dent” about the future. Before finishing the day in Dallas she visited Fort Worth, Texas and took part in activities at a YMCA youth camp. Mrs. Carter insisted only “little changes” would occur in the shake-up and claimed all Cabinet members would have direct access to the president. She in effect also admitted the offers of resignation from three of her top staff members last week carried little weight. She said those staffers had been evauated six weeks ago. In the middle of a four-day, four-state tour, the first lady has been asked re peatedly about the mass White House res ignations of last week, despite her an nounced intention on the tour to empha size meeting the people. )il rigs unprotected: paper ds United Press International SWORLEANS — Oil rigs in the Gulf ^exico are like “2,500 sitting ducks,” ’ vulnerable to terrorist or enemy at- 1 a newspaper reported Monday. Tterrorists or hostile nations wanted to ipletely disrupt the United States Wmy, and make a hell of a mess in the Jess, they could, as things stand now, I it with a dozen plastic explosives by ing up oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, ” veekly newspaper Figaro said. It would be like shooting fish in a bar- In a copyrighted story, Figaro reporters Gary Esolen and Chris Harris said they checked with the Navy and Coast Guard and found “a confusion of responsibility among federal agencies” about which is charged with protecting offshore rigs. Don Caswell, a Chevron security office, said little can be done to prevent a surprise attack. “Our concern is and has been the safety of our people,” Caswell was quoted as say ing. “Rigs can be dangerous places, and we want to assure safety and to provide for recovery of people in case of an accident. ” If sabotage or an attack took place, Cas well said, “the first we would know about it is when the bombs went off.” He said it woud be too difficult and too expensive to station boats or helicopters at all rigs in the Gulf. Maynard Stephens of Tulane Univer sity’s engineering school, who has pre pared three studies for the Defense De partment on the vulnerability of the oil in dustry to attack, recommends that some protective measures be taken. “What I’m afraid of is that nothing will be done until there’s an actual attack, and then /I risis is in Washington People angry: survey 5.50 6.50 0 845-2916 United Pres* Intel-national Most Americans are willing to make sacrifices to support President Carter’s plea for unity in solving the country’s energy problems but many believe any “crisis of confidence” is centered in Washington and is not a national ill. Of dozens of people interviewed by UP! around the country since Carter’s energy speech last Sunday night, many did not think the coun try was suffering from what Carter called “a crisis of the American spirit” and most were suspicious of the reasons behind the gasoline shortage. /More than half said they believe any crisis lies within Carter’s presi dency and some of those who agreed with the president that a national “crisis of confidence” exists said Car ter waited too long to shout his ur gent rally cry for moral unity. Some of those who have already sacrificed by reducing their gasoline and electricity consumption were angered that their conservation ef forts had not been matched by others. The majority, however, agreed the federal government must do something to make the United States more energy self-sufficient. And most insisted that — whether from financial necessity, patriotism or both —• “they have already been doing their part.” Liz Beck, a housewife from Kansas City, Mo., spoke for many of the people surveyed in describing her family’s share of energy saving: “We have insulated the house. We have one car and my husband takes the bus to work. I car-pool to the grocery store. We don’t go on vaca tion hardly at all. We’ve only run the air conditioner twice this year. I hang my clothes out instead of put ting them in the dryer.” But it was President Carter's “crisis of the American spirit” state ment that triggered dozens of pro- and-con statements from every walk of life. In Baltimore, bookstore clerk Amo Wasserman, 42, said, “To say that there is a crisis threatening to destroy the fabric of America is put ting it so portentiously. Carter con siders himself in a crisis situation so he has to present an image of doing something.” , Jerry McClanahan, 27, a coal miner in Delbarto,, W.Va., agreed: “I don’t think the nation is in a state of crisis, but Mr. Carter definitely is. He has taken away all the confidence ;too done a year ago. ’ In Montpelier, Vt., Mrs. Harriet Sweet, 59, a mother of four who is a welfare and veteran’s benefits recip ient, unemployed because of two re cent operations, thinks the crisis rests firmly on the presidency. “I think President Carter is a lot at fault,” Mrs. Sweet said. ‘T don’t think he has a very good backbone. He makes a lot of statements but does not carry through on them. I don’t think the world is in as bad a situation as he makes it out to be. But I think we need someone who will do more than smile and say the Lord will provide.” Dick Merrill, president of the First City National Bank in Houston, said Carter is “kind of strapping the § uilt on the American public and I on’t think that’s where it belongs. I think it belongs on the leadership that he and the Congress have gi ven.” a national effort to develop synthetic fuels, the scientists at the Texas A&M Center for Energy and Mineral Resources, led by Au strian Dr. Kurt Irgolic, have intensified their microfilm search of the detailed rec ords kept by the Nazis. “Seventy percent of Germany’s war ef fort was powered by synthetic fuel, ” Irgolic said, “and it was made from virtually the same type of coal that is found in major deposits in Texas and other parts of the country.” The documents contained detailed in formation on synthetic fuel technology de veloped as early as the 1930s when Hitler began gearing-up his war machine. They include information on the action of cataly tic agents, the development of gas generators that were fitted on vehicles, the coal liquifaction process and even the blueprints for constructing plants. The Texas A&M scientists have been going over the records for two years, abstracting the information and providing a description of the material for use by other researchers. Funding for the massive project is run ning out, Irgolic said, with nearly 90 per cent of the documents still untouched and many of the German insights into synthetic fuel production still buried in the mountains of records. In another major project that could help reduce the nation’s dependence on Middle East oil, Texas A&M engineers are continu ing their studies on a clean and safe process to convert lignite coal to gas by burning it underground. The scientists already have demon strated the practicality of the process with an experimental well near Rockdale which began producing gas in March. The gas comes from a 15-foot-thick lignite seam 235 feet beneath the surface of a Central Texas cow pasture. Two drill holes 10 feet apart were used; air is forced through one hole to feed and regulate the burn, producing a low grade gas from the other hole. Two days after the test began the experiment was producing gas at an average rate of 400 cubic feet per minute. “At that stage the gas is roughly enough to run a 1,300 horsepower turbine,” Dr. James Jennings, a petroleum engineer who heads the project, said. “But it can produce gas at five times the present volume.” Other than small amounts used in other experiments, the gas was flared off. A col lection system was not allowed since the first phase of the experiment concluded in April. “There is good reason to believe the pro cess will work on a commercial scale, ” Jen nings said. Researchers in design graphics, mechan ical, civil, agricultural, petroleum, and environmental engineering are continuing the research through the Texas A&M Re search Foundation, a non-profit organiza tion. Much of the work is funded by a con sortium of oil companies and the Texas En gineering Experiment Station, a division of the university. Still other energy research at Texas A&M involves the use of animal wastes to produce methane gas, the use of wood chips for generating power, chemical methods for squeezing more oil out of exist ing wells, several studies to develop solar energy and dozens of other energy-related projects. weTl see an overreaction,” Stephens said. He estimated all the firefighting equip ment in the gulf could handle about four rig fires at a time. “If we imagine an attack serious enough to hit as many as 20 high-pressure rigs at once, the result would be total chaos, an economic and environmental disaster,” Figaro said. “What would happen if a well-trained group of terrorists decided to bow up oil rigs in the Gulf? The answer is they would find 2,500 sitting ducks, and nobody watch ing.” Figaro said one oil rig was hijacked two years ago and held for $1 million ranson, but the government and oil companies “succeeded in putting the lid on the story out of fear that publicity might lead to a rash of rig takeovers.” “The Navy has not committed a single ship to protecting oil rigs in the Gulf. The Coast Guard has no special program to de fend offshore assets. The oil companies have concentrated on preventing theft, keeping employees from smoking dope on the job, and ‘providing a safe workplace.’ They have simply ignored the threat of sabotage or attack.” Summer registration a new record A record 10,090 students are enrolled at Texas A&M University for second session summer classes, according to Associate Registrar Donald D. Carter. That total is for the College Station cam pus only. Carter said. Additionally, 310 students are enrolled at Galveston; 40 graduate students at the Marine Laboratory and the remaining 270 at Moody College or abroad the Texas Clipper. All figures reflect enrollment for the fourth class day, the official summer report ing period for the Coordinating Board, Texas College and University system. Battalion photo by Clay Cockrill To the sound of music Jogging long distances can be, among other things, monotonous; but John Snyder, a junior in building construction, solved the problem easily by taking a little FM music with him. His only concern Friday afternoon along Welborn road was that the drizzle didn’t short out his system.