lThe Battalion The Weather I Vol. 74 No. 52 34 Pages in 2 Sections I Serving the Texas A&M University community Thursday, November 12, 1981 College Station, Texas Today High 70 Low 48 Chance of rain 20% Tomorrow High 68 Low 45 Chance of rain 30% USPS 045 360 Phone 845-2611 ots fired t en voy Paris United Press International PARIS — A gunman fired six shots y at acting U.S. ambassador Christ- Chapman in an “assassination I .tempt but the veteran diplomat Bped unhurt by ducking behind his Hetproof liinousine, police said. BtU.S. embassy spokesman said the I Bek occurred as Chapman walked to * Bar from his residence near the Eiffel I Beron his way to the embassy. Bhc attempt on Chapman, b(), came IB Br reports surfaced that Libyan lead- I Bloammar Khaddafy had targeted ® Berican embassies in London, Rome, I) Bina and Paris for attacks. Chapman, 'L4 Bmimber two official in the American Brassy, is serving until newly named jBrassador Evan Galbraith arrives, Tprench officials said there was no p accompanying Chapman as he jked to the car, driven by a chauffeur, [the attacker fired the shots with a mm pistol, Chapman ran to the r side of the car and crouched be- Ind it. The attacker escaped on foot, invest gators said. ■'He showed he had lots of cool- Bdedness,†said state prosecutor y Bistian Le Guenhec, who went Bkly to the scene to lead the investi- lerhflrtBim. He said police recovered six Brty cartridge eases ejected by the liinnatic pistol. ageatBChapman, after being interviewed Bxrlicc, was driven to the embassy in ■car, which had two bullet holes in ■rear section. Police said the bullets, ......tttmK an unarmored portion of the NY1Xp ;ln went entirely through the trunk B out the other side. 'sSU'llRcports of possible Libyan attacks Snst American embassies surfaced ■month after U.S. Ambassador to tal\ Maxwell Rabb was suddenly called reWashington for consultations and ■n niven an around-the-clock guard (men he returned two weeks later. ■According to the reports, Khaddafy ■nned the attacks in revenge for the Boting clown of two Libyan jets by lerican F-14 fighters over the Gulf of rain the Mediterranean Sea in Au- a NY Mi No injuries were reported to Chap in’s driver or passersby in the quiet esidential street next to the Champs de on the Left Bank. Columbia in orbit, everything normal United Press International CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Astro nauts Joe Engle and Richard Truly rock eted “smooth as glass†into orbit on the second test flight of the shuttle Col umbia today to open an age of routine roundtrips into space. The winged spaceship roared to life more than 2 l /2 hours behind schedule after a cliffhanger countdown. It climbed into the mostly clear sky, leav ing a geyser-like column of flame and smoke in its wake. A rumbling roar swept across the space center as the ship gained speed quickly under the combined push of twin booster rockets and its main hyd rogen engines. Mission control reported that the climb into a preliminary orbit appeared normal. The astronauts’ initial orbit ranged from 61 to 138 miles high. “Everything’s looking good aboard, said Engle after the ship had come with in radio range of a tracking station in Madrid. It was a spectacular beginning to a five-day, 17,400-mph journey that will take the astronauts 83 times and 2 mil lion miles around the Earth. Never be fore had a used spaceship flown in space. It also was a spectacular birthday pre sent to Truly, who turned 44 today. Columbia took off at 9:10 a.m. after the launch crew won a dramatic race with the clock and fixed a broken elec tronic unit with a spare rushed in from the next shuttle under construction in California. An additional 10-minute delay was called nine minutes before blastoff while ground crews checked flight pre parations. “Smooth as glass, Houston,†Engle said two minutes after launch, just after the ship’s twin booster rockets split away to parachute to recovery ships standing by in the Atlantic. It then continued on toward orbit with its three main engines doing the work. They generated power equal to that produced by the output of 23 Hoov er Dams. Engle, 49, and Truly were both mak ing their first venture in orbit, although Engle is a veteran of X-15 rocket plane flights to the edge of space and both flew the prototype shuttle Enterprise on landing tests in 1977. The ship weighed 4,475,943 pounds at liftoff and its boosters and three main engines produced 6,425,000 pounds of thrust. This extra margin of push moved the 184-foot machine into the sky quickly. The spaceship accelerated quickly into space, and four minutes after launch, the astronauts had passed the point of no return. They were no longer within reach of the cape should an emergency occur. The pilots received a steady stream of “go reports from flight controllers. Eight minutes into the flight, the ship’s main engines shut down as plan ned. Columbia was traveling at 16,500 mph at the time. It was 73 miles high. Then, Engle reported that the ship’s big external fuel tank was jettisoned. Its debris was to land in the Indian Ocean. The ship’s two orbital maneuvering engines then ignited as scheduled to give Columbia the additional speed needed to reach a preliminary orbit up to 138 miles high. Today’s launch attempt was in doubt until a last-ditch effort produced a 36- pound electronic data translator that worked. The original one in the Col umbia failed late Tuesday night and a replacement installed . Wednesday morning developed even worse difficul ties. That prompted an emergency call for two more of the units, known technical ly as multiplexer-demultiplexers, from Challenger, the second shuttle nearing completion at the Rockwell Internation al plant at Palmdale, Calif. The unit was an important link in the shuttle’s complex internal data com munications system. It helped process instrument readings from throughout the ship so they could be understood by the ship s onboard computers and com puters at the mission control center in Houston. Mothers' club surveying students about instructors Up,up and away! Photo by Mitchel Chang What better way to spend a University from a distance. day than looking at Texas A&M Helium balloon sets record United Press International ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. —- The [bur-man Double Eagle V crew, attempting a historic trans-Pacific cros- mg in a helium balloon, has broken the prld distance record — while still some 2,500 miles from land. By late Wednesday, Capt. Ben bruzzo, Larry Newman and Ron lurk, all of Albuquerque, and Japanese Lsinessman Rocky Aoki had flown heir 160-foot-tall balloon about 4,000 nifes, a spokesman at the Double Eagle's flight center in Albuquerque said. The previous helium balloon dis tance record was held by Albuquerque’s Maxie Anderson and his son, Kris, who logged 3,314 miles on a 1980 flight from San Francisco to Ste Felicite, Quebec. The Double Eagle V, which took off from Japan Monday, raced at 90 mph- plus over Pacific waters today, aiming for a touchdown on the California coast sometime early Friday. Based on weather projections, the balloon is expected to drift over the U.S. mainland near San Luis Obispo, Calif, sometime Friday. Maxie Anderson, now a rival of the Double Eagle V crew, plans his own ballooning extravaganza late this month or in early December. He and Don Ida of Longmont, Colo., plan to complete an interrupted round-the-word flight in their balloon, the Jules Verne, which will be launched from Jaipur, India. By MARY JO RUMMEL Battalion Staff The Houston A&M University Mothers’ Club is conducting a survey among parents of Texas A&M students concerning student-instructor relation ships. Club officers have heard complaints from numerous mothers and students about foreign teachers not speaking En glish fluently, instructors not offering adequate office hours and instructors spending too much time on research and too little time on teaching, said Shirley Neal, president of the Houston organization. The Houston area comprises women whose sons and daughters are students or former students of Texas A&M Uni versity. “In the complaints we have heard, the students don’t know where to go — they feel they are running into a brick wall,†she said. “We wanted to know if the problems are widespread or if these were just iso lated cases.†In order to find out, the organization has mailed 7,200 questionnaires in the last few weeks to the homes of students in the Harris County area, and club members hope to have them back again by Christmas. The questionnaire is to be completed jointly by students and their parents. Within two days, 400 questionnaires were returned, and only six of the 400 returned have indicated that the stu dent has not experienced problems with instructors, Neal said. “Many mothers have called to say their students won’t be home until the Thanksgiving holidays, so we hope to have the results in by Dec. 1,†she added. The club has not decided what to do with the survey results, but one con sideration is to send the results to Uni versity administrators and other Texas A&M mothers’ clubs, Neal said. Faculty members might be in terested in reviewing the survey results as some are already aware of students’ complaints. “As a University, we have a responsi bility for really excellent research and really excellent teaching, said Dr. Rod O’Connor, head of the first year chemis try program. “Both are important. He added that he is interested in the survey results to find out if the problems are widespread or just isolated inci dents. Dr. H.E. Lacey, head of the mathe matics department, says problems do exist, but they are part of overcrowding in a university the size of Texas A&M. The University’s fall semester enroll ment peaked at 35,146. Lacey explained that the math de partment has 82 faculty members to handle the 13,000 students enrolled in math classes. The Houston mothers club has con tacted Student Government members, outlining the survey and the possibility of those students conducting a similar survey on campus. Student Government members cover similar questions in some of the campus canvasses they conduct throughout the year, said Executive Vice President Jeff Bissey. The student input from the can vasses eventually will be presented to the administration. developer says city needs to face reality By RANDY CLEMENTS Battalion StafT The College Station Planning and bning Commission needs to face real- for developing property, developer [VV. Wood said in the Commission’s irkshop meeting Wednesday. Wood is requesting 102 acres he re ined from single family residential de- elopment (a maximum of eight units an to acres designated as: general mmercial, medium density apart- lent development (a maximum of 24 nits an acre), professional develop ment (clinics and office buildings), wnhouse development (a maximum of 4 units an acre) and single family re- j, W idential development (a maximum of 12 units an acre). -*! The land is on the north side of #7 outhwest Parkway and next to the East t,/ iypass. ! The Commission, which previously pled the request, said the problem lith the rezoning involves six of the ^ eres requested for medium density bartment development, the request Irtownhouse development and the re- juest for single family residential with a baximum of 12 units. Commissioner Anne Hazen said the roposed development for the three i reas was too high and should be re- ^ oned to a lesser density. Gerald Miller, a resident living near y jjthe area, said he is confused about the A commission’s concern about the six v ^cres of medium density apartment de- elopment since it approved nearly 22 lores of the same zone across Southwest arkway. The rezoning of both the 102 acres nd the 22 acres was discussed by resi- ents, the city staff, the developers and commission subcommittee, and a compromise plan was developed and presented to the Commission Nov. 5, Miller said. The members of the Commission not on the subcommittee, however, dis approved of the high density of develop ment. Wood asked the commissioners to consider leaving the higher-zoned apartment development, but zoning the single family residential to eight units an acre. The request will be reconsidered Nov. 18. City Planner Al Mayo said the 22 acres across the street from Wood’s proposed development site, to be consi dered tonight by the city council, may determine what the Commission does about Wood’s request. In the past, he said, the council has turned down most of the requests to rezone to this high a density of develop ment. If the council aproves the 22 acre re quest, Mayo said, it may give the Com mission more confidence to recommend approval for Wood’s request. Wood said approval of the 22 acres may help, but could hinder, the chance of approval for his request. There’s no telling what the Commission will de cide, he said. There has been a conscious move by the Commission to take a longer, harder look at rezoning requests for large tracts, he said. The Raintree-Westinghouse con troversy last spring probably instigated the Commission’s closer look approach to planning. Wood said. The closer look means they are spending more time with the planner and developer, which is the best way to get the planning point across, he said. Staff photo by Bob Sebree Please say cheese Mitchel Chang, Aggieland photographer, tol erates the confusion as he poses residents of Spence Hall for their dorm picture on the Corps quad Wednesday.