NASA projects space
station built by 1992
Ag womenhoopsters
vib season opener
Battalion
Serving the University community
Vol. 80 No. 59 CJSPS 045360 10 pages
College Station, Texas
Tuesday, November 20, 1984
Checkin' it out
Photo by ANTHONYS. CASPER
Showing some 4 year olds from the First Baptist Church Day ture Aggies. The bonfire’s fourth tier was started last night
Care Center around the bonfire site, Scott Lofton, the Head and these youngsters promised to come back and give their
Civilian Redpot, becomes the man of the hour for these fu- approval so that work could continue.
Turkish diplomat slain in Vienna
United Press International
VIENNA — A suspected Arme
nian terrorist bent on avenging a
1915 massacre of his countrymen
shot and killed a Turkish U.N. offi
cial Monday as the diplomat stopped
his red Mercedes at a busy intersec
tion on his way to work.
A white scarf bearing the words
“Armenian Revolutionary Army
ARA” written in neat, hall-point pen
lettering was found next to the body
of the slain diplomat, Evrin Ergun.
The killing was the second assassi
nation of a Turkish official in
Vienna in six months.
Witnesses said a dark-haired,
moustached man in blue jeans and a
denim jacket ran up to Ergun’s red
Mercedes at the intersection and
pumped six shots through the driv
er’s window.
Ergun, 52, deputy director of the
Vienna-based United Nations Cen
ter for Social Development and Hu
manitarian Affairs, died instantly
from a 9 mm bullet wound to the
head, police said.
Police believed Ergun had disre
garded Foreign Ministry warnings to
Turkish diplomats to change their
routes daily because his assassin ap
parently lay in wait expecting the
diplomat to pass by.
About an hour after the shooting,
United Press International received
a telephone call from a man who, in
an apparently tape-recorded
statement, claimed responsibility for
the attack in the name of the ARA.
The man, speaking in accented
English, said the ARA “will continue
to kill Turkish subjects in the fixture”
in revenge for the massacre of some
1.5 million Armenians by Turkey in
1915.
Police said passersby chased the
gunman into a pedestrian passage.
Mexico City
fire sparked
by explosions
United Press International
MEXICO CITY — A huge fire
sparked by a series of explosions at a
natural gas distribution center Mon
day engulfed a Mexico City neigh
borhood, sending flames more than
a mile into the sky and killing 100
people. Hundreds of others were in
jured.
Flames raged for hours after the
blasts in the northern residential and
commercial area of San Juan Ix-
huaxtepec and pockets continued
burning into the late afternoon. A
strong smell of gas hung over the
area.
Streets were littered with rubble
from shattered houses, charred ve
hicles and other debris. Entire blocks
of houses were gutted.
Police said 15 people were ar
rested for robbing abandoned
houses and businesses, and army
troops wearing gas masks were
moved into the neighborhood to
stop further looting.
“Everything started a little before
six in the morning when there was a
strong smell of gas and all of a sud
den, everything got very bright, like
the sun came out early,” one resi
dent said.
A police spokesman said 100 peo
ple were killed in the blaze, most of
them within seconds of the initial ex
plosion in their homes and on the
streets. Authorities said the death
toll could rise as rescue workers
reached other victims buried under
the rubble.
Police said more than 500 people
were treated for injuries, many at
make-shift centers set up near the
devastated area. Because of the
numbers of injured, only victims
with thixd-degree burns were ad
mitted to hospitals.
Police, firefighters and army
troops blocked off the area, which is
about l‘/2 miles in diameter. Ambu
lances and passenger buses raced
back and forth transporting injured
to hospitals and clinics.
Authorities warned that more ex
plosions could occur as the fire
spread, possibly igniting four other
gas tanks. About 350,000 people
were evacuated, police said.
Witnesses at the scene reported
seeing charred bodies lying in the
streets. Rescue workers carried out
others, still dressed in nightclothes,
from under mounds of debris.
“We just ran into the street,” said
Mario Sanchez Santana, who was
asleep with his family when the first
explosion rocked their home. “No
body said anything. Everybody just
got out. Then we saw a gas tank blow
up. It landed up on the hill and
smashed a house.”
Police said the first explosion ap
peared to have come from a gas
truck at one of several distribution
centers in the area owned by Unigas,
a private company that supplies nat
ural gas for domestic use.
The fire set off by the blast leaped
to a nearby gas storage center of the
state-owned Pemex, police said. Res
idents said the first blast was fol
lowed by at least seven others.
Authorities said some 600,000
people live in the area.
Posthumous degrees awarded each graduation
By ROBIN BLACK
Senior Staff Writer
The programs passed out to peo
ple at Texas A&M graduation cere
monies seem fairly run-of-the-mill.
The almost endless list of the names
of the graduates seems uniform with
the exception of an occasional aster
isk.
That asterisk signifies a last me
morial to a fallen A&M student.
Each year about four posthumous
degrees are awarded to students
who died just short of completing
University graduation requirements.
University policy on awarding the
degrees allows the family or aca
demic department of the deceased
student to request the posthumous
degree. To be eligible for such a de
gree, a student must have been cur
rently enrolled in or pre-registered
for his last semester.
Each case is reviewed by the stu
dent’s respective department and
dean, then by the A&M Faculty Sen
ate and finally by the University reg
istrar’s office.
The Faculty Senate approves not
only the posthumous degree candi
dates but also all the other degree
candidates for each semester. The
Senate has been doing so since it be
gan a couple of years ago and took
over the duties of the Academic Pro
grams Council.
The University has been awarding
posthumous degrees for many years,
but, Assistant Registrar Donald'
Gardner says the policy was clarified
* about ten years ago by the APC be
cause of a growing interest in the de
grees.
“It seems like we’re awarding the
degrees at about every commence
ment,” he says. “That’s too many.
I’m the one who calls the families
and makes the arrangements for
who will pick up the degree, so it
gets a little more personal for me.”
Gardner says most of the degree
recipients were killed in traffic acci
dents.
“With all the students we have
from Houston and Dallas driving
back and forth, that’s where most of
the deaths come from,” he says.
“We probably give out four or five
of the degrees every year, and these
are just from students who died who
happen to have completed all their
academic requirements.”
Some degrees aren’t awarded im
mediately after a student’s death.
One of this year’s two recipients,
Pamela Sue Reynolds, a murder vic
tim, died in March 1978.
Gardner says the family probably
wasn’t familiar with the University
policy on the degrees.
“One of the reasons they never
pursued the degree was probably be
cause of the nature of the death,” he
says.
Gardner says that one of Rey
nolds’ family members was at this
summer’s commencement ceremo
nies and noticed the posthumous de
gree awarded then, and that’s when
the family requested one for their
daughter.
Reynolds was a physical education
major from Valley Mills and was en- -
rolled in her last semester at A&M.
The other student receiving the
degree this December is Bill Robin
son.
Robinson, a senior journalism ma
jor from Austin, was to have been
editor of The Battalion this semes
ter.
He was fatally injured in a car ac
cident the night of Aug. 20 and died
a week later (Aug. 27) at St. Joseph
Hospital.
Grievance group hears
women discuss band
By KAREN BLOCH
Reporter
The Student Senate resolution
stating that “women should be en
couraged to participate in the
Fightin’ Texas Aggie Band” was dis
cussed at the meeting of Student
Government’s Issues and Grievances
Monday night. The opinions voiced
by the nine students in attendance
were different.
Susan Giesler, commanding offi
cer of Squadron 14, an all-female
outfit, said the women in her outfit
were opposed to the resolution.
“Women were admitted to the Uni
versity in 1964. They were allowed
to join the Corps in 1974. Now, fi
nally, in 1984, we’re being accepted.
“I’m not saying that this (not al
lowing women to join the band) isn’t
sexual discrimination. I fully agree
that it is. But, this would put us
(women in the Corps) back about
five years.”
Some guys, Giesler said, make a
generalization. They resent the girls
in the Corps because of the issue of
women trying to get into the band.
“They just think you’re a girl and we
don’t want girls in the band.”
“I can speak for my whole outfit
when I say that women iri the Corps
are not being affected positively by
this,” Giesler said. “The minute this
(the resolution) started out I had
freshmen coming to me crying be
cause a guy told them ‘Get away
from me.’ ”
“If you let women in the band
hostility will be taken out on us be
cause we’re women in the Corps,”
Keta Roth, a junior in Squadron 14,
said. “This just isn’t the right time.”
“To say that this isn’t the right
time to let women in the band is self
ish of us,” said Mandy Schubert, a
sophomore in Company W-l, the
other female outfit. “The first
women in the Corps had to go
through a lot to get us to the position
that we’re in now.
“Sometimes we’re just going to
have to make sacrifices — even if it
isn’t what we want — for girls who
want to join the band in the future.
We have to make sacrifices for the
progress of the University.”
Roth said allowing women in the
band is inevitable. “But, if women
are let in the band they need to have
a full unit.”
The band is an outfit in the Corps,
Roth said. “It’s broken into six out
fits for administrative purposes, but
it acts as one outfit. I understand
them not wanting a girl in their out
fit. I wouldn’t want a guy in mine.
“The guys in the band work to
gether, sleep together, eat together
and play together. They’re like a
family and that’s what makes them
so good.”
Schubert agreed that the band
acts as one outfit. 1
“But,” she said, “there are wom
en’s outfits in the Corps and there
are men’s outfits in the Corps. That’s
a parallel. Just like there are frater
nities and there are sororities. There
is no parallel to the Aggie Band for
women to be. a member of.”
A&M's emergency staffers
ask a lot of good questions
By JOHN MAKELY
. \ Reporter ' '
"Joe Public doesn’t really ex
pect our dispatchers to ask as
many questions as they do,” Cap
tain Steve Elierbe of the Texas
A&M University Emergency
Medical Services said.
'i The University ambulance
service currently employs a sys
tem adapted by Eilerbe that pro
vides more information about the :
■ lent to ambulance crews be-
e they arrive at the scene of
the accident. But some people
who cal! seem to think they are
getting the third degree.
• : . When you call the University :
emergency number, <9911 if you
are calling from on-campus, 845-
1111 for offrcampus) the dis
patcher on the phone with you
will ask a lot of questions, but he is :
not call-screening, Elierbe said.
^If you call, then we send — ev- !
ery single time,” Elierbe said -
“If both of our ambulances •
well take this full information
and transfer it to College Station,. :
and make sure you get an ambu
lance right away.”
When you call, the dispatcher’
will ask some prescribed, basic
questions including the caller’s
name, the phone number from
which call is placed, what hap
pened, the exact location of vic
tim, their level of consciousness,
whether breathing is controlled
or labored and iI there is bleed
ing.
After determining the nature
of the injury the dispatcher uses a
flip-card system to ask the caller
key questions pertaining to the
specific nature of the injury, • |
The card system outlines about ’.
four yes or no questions that de
termine the code for sending the
ambulance.
These questions also provide
the crew with a more in-depth as
sessment of how bad the scene is
and what specialized medics will
berequired. -
Once the ambulance is sent,
die dipatcher calls the person re
porting the accident and asks
more detailed questions to deter
mine the status of the victim and
check if any new information is
available.
“When we call them back they
wonder right off... ‘Are they call
screening? Why does it take so
long?’ ’’Elierbesaid,
“We don’t.screen calls at all and.
when the dispatcher calls back, it
is to get additional information,
and also give pre-arrival instrue-
tkms to persons at the scene to aid
the injured person before the am* 1 ; :
balance arrives,” !