For more pure air
This tower at the corner of Jersey Street and Texas Avenue is more than
a portable weather station — it is part of a pollution monitoring project
Ming undertaken by the Texas Transportation Institute at Texas A&M.
The data recorded will ultimately be used to understand how altering
traffic signals at busy intersections affects automobile acceleration and
thus the level of emissions. Battalion photo by Clay Cockrill
X/.S. recognizes
Nicaragua change
United Press International
| WASHINGTON — The United States Tuesday formally recognized the new
igovemment in Nicaragua.
The coalition government took over from ousted military strongman Anastasio
Somoza.
State Department spokesman John Trattner said the foreign ministry of
Nicaragua sent word to Washington through the U.S. embassy that it wished to
maintain relations with the United States.
The State Department told the embassy to reply that: “The United States also
looks forward to continuing relations.”
[ Trattner said such recognition is a formality, since it is customary for the United
I States to take such a move.
I The Department spokesman said it has not yet received a request for the
extradition of Anastasio Somoza, but that if one was received, “We would consider
it.”
L Trattner said that Somoza had tried to get immunity from extradition before he
I took political asyslum in Miami Beach.
But “we made no commitments.”
Texas truckers advise
additional deregulation
United Press International
SAN ANTONIO — Warning of serious
problems in moving the nation’s food sup
ply, farmers and stockmen Tuesday urged
a federal task force to further deregulate
the trucking industry and to knock
bottlenecking weight regulations imposed
by seven states along the Mississippi
River.
“Farmers are becoming more aware
every year of a growing inability of the
transportation system to meet the expand
ing needs of agriculture,” said C.H.
Fields, assistant director of international
affairs for the National Farm Bureau Fed
eration in Washington. “The recent pro
test shutdown by the independent truc
kers apply demonstrated the vulnerability
.of agriculture to the providers of transpor
tation service.”
Fields said the Farm Bureau, the na
tion’s largest farmer organization with
three million member families, was join
ing independent truckers in urging Con
gress to deregulate the industry and apply
pressure to states for a uniform 80,000
pound weight limit. He said Farm Bureau
representatives would meet with inde
pendent truckers Wednesday to discuss
the legislation.
“It makes good sense to increase the
number of exempt products from rate and
route regulation by the ICC (Interstate
Commerce Commission),” added Clifford
R. Boucher. Boucher is the associate man
ager of the Livestock Marketing Associa
tion of Kansas City, Mo., made up of more
than 1,400 marketers, dealers and stoc
kyard businesses.
Nixon
tapes
checked
United Press International
WASHINGTON — A federal judge
ruled Tuesday archivists may screen
Richard Nixon’s taped “diaries” to deter
mine whether his thoughts were private
reflections or whether they involved gov
ernment business and should be made
public.
U.S. District Judge Aubrey Robinson
issued the brief opinion in a 5Vfe-year court
battle over public release of the ex
president’s White House papers and
tapes.
Nixon says the “diaries”, personally
taped recollections at the end of each day,
are private property. Robinson said they
may be examined by government arcivists
to determine if they will be made public.
Robinson Tuesday also upheld a Gen
eral Services Administration regulation
providing that the Watergate tapes can be
made available at listening centers across
the country. The diaries are not part of
those tapes of conversations wich Nixon
had with his top aides during the scandal
that drove him from office.
Lawyers for Nixon, the government and
the Reporters Committee for Freedom of
the Press already have reached a tentative
agreement for release of most of Nixon’s 42
million White House papers.
That agreement must be approved by
Congress, which first seized Nixon’s mate
rials by passing the Presidential Rec
ordings and Materials Preservation Act of
1974 and then ordered the GSA to estab
lish regulations covering their release to
the public.
But Nixon’s lawyers objected strongly to
allowing even archivists to listen to the
“diaries” he recorded on voice-activated
dictabelts at the end of each day — includ
ing his final days in office.
“We recommend that the present ag
riculture exemption be retained and
additional products added, such as meat
and agriculture production material such
as fertilizers and machinery,” Boucher
said.
Agriculture representives testified at
the fifth in a series of 12 hearings being
conducted throughout the nation by the
14-member Rural Transportation Task
Force.
The task force is looking into problems
that have led to shortages of railcars and
trucks for moving meat, wheat and other
grains, fruit, vegetables and cotton this
year, and on needed improvements in
rural road and bridge systems.
The task force is scheduled to deliver its
recommendations to Congress by Jan. 1,
1980, for development into the first na
tional rural transportation policy.
“The current petroleum shortage and
the feeble attempts of government to
manage this shortage raise another vital
question as we look into the future,”
Fields told the panel. “We hope those in
decision-making positions in government
now realize that it is not sufficient to prom
ise adequate fuel for getting crops planted.
“It makes no sense for producers to in
vest in the production phase of the food
system unless crops can be cultivated and
harvested, processed and transported to
market, and made available for consumer
acceptance. This, the consideration of
energy availability must be a part of trans
portation planning and problem solving.”
“Prior to the current fuel crisis seven
states in the Mississippi Valley served as
an effective barrier for trucks moving
through the Midwest carrying 80,000
pounds gross weight,” Boucher said. “In
order to comply with weight limitations in
the seven states, the trucks could loan only
to 73,280 pounds.”
In their recent shutdown, independent
truckers termed the seven states with the
lower weight limitations, “the Berlin
Wall.”
Because of differing regulations which
Fields called “ridiculous,” he said “there is
no way a trucker can cross the country leg
ally today.”
Stoney M. Stubbs, a frozen food trucker
from Roanoke, Texas, who chairs the task
force, said a national plan needs to be de
veloped to solve transportation shortages
at peak harvest that have left wheat rotting
on the ground at Perryton, Texas, this
summer.
“You can’t write a law or order that says,
‘cars, show up at Perryton,”’ Stubbs said.
“We’ve had rail car shortages for moving
grain since the 1880s and I’m not sure that
it’s going to change.”
But Stubbs said more coordination and
storage facilities are needed and other
modes of transportation need to be ex
plored.
Weather
ITT T7
JL JHLJLLi
Battalion
A flash flood watch has been 40% tonight. High today low
issued until midnight tonight. 90’s, low tonight mid 70’s.
Otherwise it will be cloudy to Winds will be East-northeast
partly cloudy with a 50% at 10-15 m.p.h.
chance of rain today and
Vol. 72 No. 175 Wednesday, July 25, 1979 UPSP 045 360
12 Pages College Station, Texas Phone 845-2611
Claudette disintegrates
after hitting Texas coast
United Press International
Fickle Claudette, a storm that changed
intensity and direction several times be
fore plowing inland, today slowly disinteg
rated along the Texas-Louisiana border,
raking Beaumont and Port Arthur with
high winds and heavy rains that snarled
traffic, flooded low-lying homes and closed
offices.
Beaumont police found a man dead in a
car trapped in a flooded underpass. An au
topsy was planned to determine whether
the man, who was not immediately iden
tified, drowned.
As the storm moved inland, the Na
tional Weather Service posted flash flood
warnings in far southeast Texas and flash
flood watches for several parts of Texas in
cluding Brazos and surrounding counties
and parts of northeast Texas and northwest
Louisiana.
“It’s so disorganized you can’t find a
center,” a National Weather Service
spokesman said. “But there’s all kinds of
weather behind it.’’
Damage appeared to be mostly wind-
raked roofs, downed trees, broken power
and telephone lines and flooding.
Four tornadoes, but little resulting
damage, were reported around Beaumont,
where streets were flooded and the Jeffer
son County Courthouse and Lamar Uni
versity summer classes were closed for the
day.
At Port Arthur, 15 inches of rain and
wind gusts of 60 mph were measured unof
ficially. Tides were 2 to 3 feet above nor
mal along the coast, where marine ad
visories kept offshore oil service and fish
ing vessels close to shore.
Winds ripped the roof from a service
station at Sabine Pass in far southeast
Texas, the storm’s first landfall about 2
p.m. Tuesday.
“It took the top off the Gulf station
across the street from me. I’m sitting here
looking at it flying around,” said Albert
Westerman of Sportsman’s Supply in
Sabine Pass.
Sea Rim State Park, on the coast west of
Sabine Pass, was closed Tuesday and cam
pers evacuated. Acting superintendent
Bob Fish stayed in the park in his home
built on stilts and said wind and rains were
heavy but damage slight.
The storms fringe dumped 3.5 inches of
rain on Lake Charles, La., to the east, and
about an inch on Galveston, to the west.
At Cameron, La., where Hurricane Au
drey killed several hundred in 1957, offi
cials said residents left shelters and took
the flooding and high winds calmly.
Amendment to han
busing defeated
United Press International
WASHINGTON — The majority of the
Texas congressional delegation was on the
losing side in Tuesday’s House vote defeat
ing a constitutional amendment to ban ra
cial busing.
Sixteen of the delegation’s members
voted in favor of the amendment to forbid
forced busing to achieve integration of the
schools, but the measure fell 74 votes of
the necessary two-thirds majority.
All four GOP congressmen voted in
favor of the amendment, as did the major
ity of Texas democrats, during the roll call
vote.
Those voting to defeat the proposal
were Democratic Reps. Jack Brooks, Bob
Eckhardt, Marvin Frost, Henry B. Gon
zalez, Mickey Leland, Jim Mattox, Carles
Wilson, and House Majority Leader Jim
Wright.
Firemen’s Training School
back at A&M for 50th year
KEITH TAYLOR
Battalion Staff
Summertime at Texas A&M Uni
versity brings hot, humid weather,
freshmen orientation and the fire
men.
For the next three weeks the 50th
annual Texas Firemen’s Training
School sponsored by the Texas En
gineering Extension Service will
hold classes for municipal, industrial
and Latin American fire depart
ments.
This week 760 municipal fire de
partments are participating in the
school, said Chief Henry D. Smith,
director of the Fire Protection
Training Division of the Texas En
gineering Extension Service. He
said 730 Texas departments, 23
out-of-state departments and seven
foreign departments are repre
sented at the school this year. There
are about 2,400 firemen participat-
Smoke sends
man to hospital
A participant in the Texas A&M
University Firemen’s Training
School was admitted Tuesday after
noon to St. Joseph’s Hospital for
smoke inhalation. Lee E. Mayfield,
fire chief of the Plano Fire Depart
ment, is listed in satisfactory condi
tion in the intensive care unit of the
hospital.
ing in the training, with the majority
coming from small volunteer de
partments, he said.
The school, which is completely
self-supporting, has classes ranging
from basic fire-fighting techniques
to advanced chemical fire control.
“The main thing we try to teach is
to be safe. We train the men to get
in and make rescues and get out
safely. Life comes first, even at the
risk of our own, ” Smith said.
The school also emphasizes quick
control, containment and extin-
(Please refer to related feature,
P- 6)
guishing of fires along with courses
on fire prevention.
“Prevention is strongly em
phasized. The economic loss to a
town is 4.3 times greater than the
actual property loss caused by a
major fire in a town,” he said.
By sending its firemen to the
school, a town can receive up to a 5
percent reduction in the key rate on
insurance, Smith said. The key rate
is the average insurance rate for a
home or business in a given com
munity.
“Everyone learns new techniques
and new ideas. This includes the in
structors as well as the students,” he
said.
Manufacturers of fire-fighting
equipment let the school use new
equipment so the firemen can see
what is on the market and to give
them a chance to learn how to use it.
Smith said.
With the current energy short
age, the school is paying particularly
close attention to teaching preven
tion and containment of petroleum
fires, he said.
Trainees divide their schooling
between classroom work and actual
fire-fighting.
Actual fire-fighting experience is
taught at the newly dedicated
Brayton Firemen’s Training Field.
The training field, named for the
program’s first director. Col. Harold
R. Brayton, can simulate fire condi
tions ranging from house fires to
tank truck explosions. The field is
located next to Easterwood Airport.
Firemen training at the school
said the work at the school is hard,
but worth it.
James Karl Manuel, a full-time
fireman for the Nederland fire de
partment, was working at the chem
ical plant simulator at the recently
training field.
Manuel has been a fireman for
four years, but this is his first time at
the training school.
“I have been learning a lot about
chemical fires. We’ve been learning
new and better ways to control and
contain fires.” he said.
“The training here is good, but
you can go 30 years in the fire serv
ice and never be sure about a fire.
Every fire is different. You never
know what will happen until it
does.”
Soaked with water and smeared with oil smoke, this
team of firemen takes a break after dousing one of
Battalion photo by Lee Roy Leschper Jr
the numerous fires they will fight this week during
the Fireman’s Training School.