iTexasA&M ■ 1 | ■
The DQiTQlion
Serving the University community
(oi; 76 No. 23 USPS 045360 30 Pages In 2 Sections
College Station, Texas
Friday, October 1, 1982
ill poisonings cause
ylenol capsule recall
United Press International
CHICAGO — Authorities early to-
lawsaid they found cyanide in a cap-
lule of ExtraStrenth Tylenol from a
wither than the 93,000-bottle batch
llready recalled in the deaths of five
jeqple in Illinois.
Store owners in 31 states pulled a
BOO-bottle lot of Extra-Strength
Tylenol labeled MC2880 off their
heves, fearful they may have some
fthe cyanide-laced capsules that kil-
ediive people in the Chicago area.
Hiarly today, the Du Page County
orpner’s office confirmed cyanide
tas also found in a capsule taken
rom a bottle with the lot number
1D1910. The bottle was found in the
tome of one of the victims.
The discovery of bottles of possibly
bntaminated ExtraStrength Tylenol
it several Texas drugstores promp-
edpealth officials across the state to-
layto warn consumers against taking
he painkiller.
A Waco pharmacy reported find
ing some bottles from a 93,000-bottle
batch already recalled in the deaths of
five people from cyanide-laced cap
sules in Illinois.
Lou Mclntire, manager of Sav-On
Drugs, said he did not know how
many of the bottles of batch MC2880
had been sold at the Waco store and
asked customers to return any bottles
they had purchased in the last month.
Police say the capsules were
poisoned by a “very sophisticated,
very malicious person.”
Police considered the deaths possi
ble homicides. Two of the dead men
and the critically ill woman were
members of the same family.
Larry Foster, a spokesman for New
Brunswick, N.J.-based Johnson &
Johnson, warned consumers not to
buy or take Tylenol with the MC2880
lot marking on the bottle.
“Apparently a very sophisticated,
very malicious person is at large who
had to spend a lot of time and a lot of
effort to lace these capsules with
cyanide,” said Winfield Police Chief
Carl Sosta.
Consumers in the San Antonio
area reported purchasing several bot
tles from that second batch —
MD1910 — at commissaries at Ran
dolph Air Force Base, Fort Sam
Houston army base and Lackland Air
Force Base.
Although no cyanide contamina
tion was reported in either city, the
discovery prompted Bexar County
Health Director Courand Rothe to
tell consumers not to take the ExtraS
trength capsules period.
A spokesman at the Texas Poison
Control Center in Galveston said he
would “be a little leary of taking any of
them (the capsules). At this point I
don’t think I would take any ExtraS
trength Tylenol.
“Flush them down,” he said.
staff photo by David Fisher
Slaves for Sale
McFadden Hall sponsored a slave sale in
front of Sbisa Dining Hall Thursday to raise
money for charity. Betty Epps (left ), and
Kathy Gunderson (right), danced for the
enthusiastic crowd of mostly males to help
push up the prices bid for them. The slaves
will work for their buyer for three hours.
Both girls are freshmen from Houston
studying business administration. Part of
the money went to The United Way.
oviet plane crashes and burns, kills 13
■ United Press International
IjUXEMBOURG — A Soviet
pilot Ilyushin 11-62 airliner with
people aboard crashed and burst
flames on landing at Luxem-
Irg’s Findel Airport, killing up to
[people and injuring 64 others,
Ice said today.
IA police spokesman said early
arsday rescuers had found seven
lies but another six people were
[sing and presumed dead in
Idnesday’s fiery crash.
All ambulances in the tiny duchy of
some 365,000 people were mobilized
to rush survivors, some with serious
burns, to hospitals. Authorities called
on rescue teams in nearby France and
West Germany for help.
Some of the 64 injured were flown
by helicopter to France, West Ger
many and Belgium. A police spokes
man said 27 people were released af
ter treatment.
Col. Jean-Pierre Wagner, of the
Luxembourg Gendarmerie, said the
. j’-gj ^
plane’s captain and two co-pilots were
“safe and sound.” Flight 343 from
Moscow, which was to have continued
to Lima, Peru, carried 66 passengers
and a crew of 11.
Airport sources said 15 of the pas
sengers were headed for Luxem
bourg with the remainder to have
continued to Peru. The nationalities
and names of the victims were not
released immediately.
An air traffic controller said the
plane, a four-engine Ilyushin 11-62
jet, apparently developed brake
trouble.
“The aircraft is completely burned
up,” a spokesman for Luxembourg
Airlines said Wednesday.
Radio Luxembourg reported
three hours after the accident, mem
bers of the Soviet Embassy with
megaphones were searching the
wooded area where the plane crashed
in search of some 20 passengers un
accounted for at the time.
Airport sources said the night skies
ay wl
plane came in for a landing, touched
the main runway and then suddenly
veered to the right.
It crashed in a wooded valley, some
1,000 yards away, cutting down
dozens of trees and exploding into
flames. Many passengers were
thrown out of the craft by the blast,
the police said.
The airport was closed for all traf
fic until today. Incoming flights were
rerouted to Metz, West Germany.
It was the first serious plane crash
in Luxembourg, although a private
Danish Piper plane crashed at the air
port in a storm two weeks ago, killing
its three occupants.
The last reported crash of an
Aeroflot plane was in Moscow in July,
which authorities reported killed 99
people.
Among other serious Aeroflot acci
dents was an Aug. 17, 1979, crash that
killed 173 people when two Aeroflot
TU134 jets collided over the Ukraine.
Legislature pays for fire damages
on uninsured University property
by Hope E. Paasch
Battalion Staff
Recent fire damage at Texas A&M
University is not covered by insur
ance, the director of the insurance
and risk management office says.
Director John Honea .said only
buildings constructed with money
from bond sales against the Perma
nent University Fund are covered by
fire insurance. Buildings and proper
ty in this category include dormitories
and auxiliary enterprise operations.
Campus buildings constructed
with money from the Available Fund
are not covered by fire insurance, but
damages are paid for by the state, he
said. The Texas Legislature decided
it was more economical to appropri
ate funds to pay for fire damage as it
occurs rather than insure all build
ings.
Associate Director of Business Ser
vices Gerald Smith said the Legisla
ture will not pay for damage from the
recent fire in the eleventh-floor di
ning area of Rudder Tower, even
though Rudder Tower was built with
money from the Available Fund.
The Legislature would appropri
ate funds for structural damage to
Rudder Tower, but the contents of
the dining area are covered under the
University’s fire insurance. The di
ning area is run by the Department of
Food Services and is considered an
auxilary enterprise.
The fire caused no structural dam
age, so the Legislature will not be
asked to appropriate funds for the
damages.
Honea said the fire last week at the
Agriculture Engineering Research
Lab caused extensive damage and
funds for repairs and replacement of
equipment must be appropriated by
the Legislature.
The acquisition of funds from the
Legislature is a lengthy process, he
said. The University must prepare a
detailed list of damages and seek com
petitive bids for replacements and re
pairs.
The University will request the
appropriation from the Legislature
when it convenes in January, Honea
said.
League poll says Mark White has
slim lead in Texas gubernatorial race
staff photo by David Fisher
Cutting times coming
The proper way to cut a tree with a chainsaw is
demonstrated by Larry Roberts, a senior animal science
major from Koonce, at the cutting demonstrations being
held this week. People who want to work at the cutting
site have to attend the classes and get a cutting card
before they can work at the bonfire cutting site. Roberts
is in charge of the centerpole for company C-l.
United Press International
AUSTIN — A poll released by the
League of Women Voters Thursday
ruled out any appearances by minor
party candidates in upcoming guber
natorial debates ana also indicated
Mark White has a slight lead in his bid
to unseat Gov. Bill Clements.
The league, which is sponsoring a
series of televised debates on the gov
ernor’s race, said it would allow minor
party candidates to appear if the poll
indicated they had 15 percent voter
support.
David Hutzelman, the Libertarian
Party candidate, had been trying to
get on the debates but the league’s
poll indicated he had less than 1 per
cent voter support. Bob Poteet, the
Citizen Party candidate, also received
less than 1 percent.
The poll was based on 925 tele
phone interviews, resulting in a 3 per
cent margin of error. Respondents
first were asked to identify which of
the four parties they would vote for in
the governor’s race.
A second question asked a prefer
ence again but gave both the party
and the name of the candidate.
The results, compiled by Shipley
and Associates of Austin, showed
White leading Clements 41.6 percent
to 38.4 percent. However, if the 3 per
cent margin of error is considered,
the race could almost be deadlocked.
White was predictably pleased by
the poll results, but a Clements cam
paign spokesman said the poll re
ndered stilted results.
Tony Garrett of the Clements cam
paign said that by asking for a party
preference the survey was “politi
cized” and guaranteed a higher show
ing for the Democratic candidate. He
said Clements’ polls still show the in
cumbent with a “comfortable lead.”
“If you first ask someone for a par
ty affilitation you lock them in to that
party’s candidate,” Garrett said. “It
goes against human nature to contra
dict yourself.”
But White said the polls demons
trates Clements’ loss of support.
“Not only does it show that we’re
ahead in the race, but it also shows
that Clements has been misleading
the public with his statements that
he’s ‘comfortably ahead’ in the race,”
White said. “It also demonstrates that
the people of Texas are repudiating
Bill Clements’ mudslinging and dirty
campaign tactics.”
Economic index takes downward swing
after showing signs of better times
United Press International
WASHINGTON — The govern
ment’s sensitive index of leading eco
nomic indicators dropped 0.9 percent
in August, the first downswing in five
months, the Commerce Department
said today. ^
The four previous months had
shown improvement that was repe
atedly cited by administration offi
cials as signs of approaching better
times.
An accompanying index of coinci
dent indicators, measuring current
economic activity, dropped 0.6 per
cent, showing August was the worst
month so far of the 13-month-old re
cession.
The negative direction of the fi
gures had been publicly estimated
several days beforehand by Com
merce Secretary Malcolm Baldrige
and other department officials, “to
soften the impact of the news,” one of
the officials said.
Questioned on NBC’s “Today”
program prior to release of the eco
nomic indicators, Treasury Secretary
Donald Regan said a one-month de
cline after four consecutive months of
improvements does not derail re
covery.
“I would suggest, combining five
months, we’re in the up phase,” Re
gan said.
A separate report by the Labor De
partment today showed the latest
weekly unemployment claims
reached a recession high, a seasonally
adjusted total of 703,000 new unem
ployment claims for the week ending
Sept. 18, the highest since the claims
were first adjusted for routine layoff
trends in 1963.
Commerce Department officials
today said historical data show that
the August decrease in the leading
indicators does not necessarily rule
out a recovery beginning by the end
of the year.
Spokesman for the department’s
Bureau of Economic Analysis, Larry
Moran, said that “of the last four re
cessions, twice we’ve had situations
where leading indicators were going
up followed by a month or two of
decline, followed by a recovery.”
From April through July the indi
cators climbed 3.8 percent. “We’ve
never had a situation where the lead
ing indicators increased 2 percent or
more which was not immediately fol
lowed by a recovery,” Moran said.
Five of the 10 indicators available
for August declined, led downward
by a drop in building permits. Also
negative were August claims for un
employment insurance, new orders
for consumer goods adjusted for in
flation, raw materials prices and the
length of the average workweek.
Increases were led by an expansion
in the money supply, adjusted for in
flation last month. The pace of de
liveries and orders for new equip
ment contributed some slight im
provement. Also partially offsetting
the declines were stock prices and a
change in total liquid assets.
Another leading indicator, the rate
at which new businesses are formed,
has not been included in the leading
indicators report since December be
cause of what the department says are
“missing components.” In the latest
release, the department announced
the business formation indicator may
be permanently dropped.
The composite index of all the
leading indicators was 128.6 in Au
gust the department said.
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forecast
Today’s Forecast: High in the
low 90s, low in the mid 70s. Partly
; cloudy skies.
A