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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 4, 1985)
■■■■■ A&M horse judging team wins 3 national competitions — Page 5 Lady Ags stay undefeated at home with a 72-61 win Page? Vol. 82 No. 66 GSPS 075360 12 pages stmas -1 Shuttle photos "may help find water in Africa Associated Press fel)WARl)S AIR FORCE BASE, Cajit. — The space shuttle Atlantis landed safely Tuesday with a cargo of promise: photos that may locate Helen water in drought-ridden Af rica. a purified hormone for tests of a tjew medical treatment-, and video (apes to help design a U.S. space sta- ! tioh. 1 W^ ! ' 1 h mission c o m m a n d e r use Brewster Shaw at the controls, the shuttle landed at this desert air base ju|4:33 p.m. EST in front of about 6,100 spectators. Hfhe shuttle’s plunge from orbit staned when Shaw fired rockets at 3:27 p.m. to slow the craft and drop it from its 218 mile-high orbit in a lopg blazing glide over the Pacific Ocean. HOthers on the crew were astro- hauts Bryan O’Connor, Mary Cleave, Sherwood Spring and Jerry Ross, McDonnell Douglas engineer Charles Walker, and Mexican astro naut Rodolfo Neri, the first of his nation to fly in space. SgShaw said at Monday’s news con ference that the astronauts took photographs of Africa’s drought- stricken Ethiopia and Somalia. Ex- peits plan to examine the photos for surface evidence of water that may be hidden beneath those desert m ■■ lands, where famine continues to fom u 3 kii! ICJiliMJ ■\] so stored aboard Atlantis were miles of video tapes of Ross and Spring as they built large structures of spindly metal struts in the shut- ^ es °P en car g° bay during two | Spacewalks. Scientists believe the J construction demonstration will :amination and a major contribution in the de- >ar end. This offer is sign of an American space station planned for the 1990s. HAtlantis also carried samples of a ays for the conve' p Un [" iec | hormone that can be used to treat red blood cell deficiencies, such as anemia. The samples, pu rified in an electrical process that is more efficient in zero gravity, will be used in animal tests, the first step in winning Food and Drug Administra tion approval for clinical use. ■The astronauts also launched three communications satellites, con ducted a variety of crystal-growth experiments, and tested a new auto pilot system that will enable shuttles to automatically hold position in or bit next to a space station or satellite. The Battalion College Station, Texas Wednesday, December 4,1985 7 aturday 9-2 tin 300 titles, ft selections e reductions i Street ire) j; ave a ve you on with trgrove Dental ar appropriate each family ; for families v H D«mblnski. 00S W MellM. Dt> s Wilk»r. DOS Wilson. DBS khlreh, DBS Photo by MIKE SANCHEZ Resuscitating Annie Inez Ferraco (bottom) and Susan Dart (top), both on Resuscitation Annie during the CPR block of in- Texas A&M students, practice their life saving skills struction while in scuba class. Defense firm suspended by Pentagon Associated Press WASHINGTON — General Dy namics Corp. on Tuesday lost its right to obtain new government con tracts, one day after the firm and four former or current executives, including NASA administrator James M. Beggs, were indicted on fraud charges. The contract suspension, an nounced by the Defense Depart ment, is the second such action im posed on the nation’s third-largest defense contractor this year. The lat est suspension applies not only to Pentagon contracts, but also to any other government work. Meanwhile, a key congressman said Beggs plans to take a leave of absence as NASA administrator while he defends himself against the charges. “He is relinquishing his duties during the period in which the courts will judge the charges made in the indictment,” said Rep. Don Fuqua, D-Fla., chairman of the House Science and Technology Committee, which oversees NASA. Fuqua said he talked to Beggs on Tuesday afternoon and that “he in formed me of his decision to step aside.” The suspension order was issued by the Navy in its role as executive agent for the Pentagon on all con tractual matters involving General Dynamics, which received defense contracts worth $6 billion in fiscal 1984. Alvin Spivak, a company spokes man, said the Navy’s action was “in appropriate, since the issue in the case should not have resulted in in dictments against the company or its people.” Spivak said the indictment in volved “highly sophisticated regula tory and accouting matters.” Had those matters been properly re ferred to a “civil forum ... we doubt that the government’s position would have prevailed,” Spivak said. On Monday, Beggs had said “I am See General,page 12 Abortion acti visf leave choice to individual /e er '6 4364 J Strike marks anniversary of gas leak M WITH THIS COMBINED WITH labpaT'Entsof'" Associated Press ■ BHOPAL, India — A general strike paralyzed this central Indian city Tuesday and thousands of angry protesters filled the streets on the isec ond day of demonstrations mark ing the first anniversary of the Union Carbide gas leak that killed more than 2,000 people. I Flundreds of effigies of the Amer ican chemical company’s chairman were set ablaze Tuesday night. | ; Marches and rallies were con ducted in at least five other Indian cities, including New Delhi and Cal cutta, commemorating the leak of methyl isocyanate gas that killed more than 2,000 people in Bhopal — most of them slum dwellers —and injured 300,000 others. About 4,000 demonstrators swarmed outside the Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, demand ing that the plant he permanently closed before another disaster oc curs. “Our struggle will be alive as long as we have life in our bodies and sen sation in our toes,” Abid Rizvi, a tex tile union leader, told protesters out side the plant. “Down with killer Carbide, drown Anderson in chemicals,” they shouted. Protest leaders said they planned to burn one effigy for each victim in the Dec. 2-3, 1984, industrial disas ter, the world’s worst. Government offices, schools, shops and markets in Bhopal were closed Tuesday in memory of the victims. Motorscooter rickshaws and mini-buses, the principal means of transportation in the city of 900,000, stayed off the roads. Black flags flew over homes in most of the slums around the Bho pal plant while the victims marked the anniversary as a “black day.” No violence was reported in any of the demonstrations. The United News of India, quot ing official sources, said three more slum dwellers who lived near the plant died Tuesday of gas-related in juries. By SONDRA PICKARD Reporter The choice of abortion is one that should be left to the individual and not the government because it is un certain when life actually begins, an abortion activist said Tuesday in Rudder Theatre. Sarah Weddington, an Austin at torney, fought before the U.S. Su preme Court in favor of legalized abortion in the 1973 landmark case of Roe vs. Wade. “The Supreme Court has said that where the experts in law, medicine, science and religion cannot agree on an answer to the question of when life begins, then that is an issue for each person to decide for themsel ves,” Weddington said. “I agree with that decision.” She said the majority of Ameri cans still believe that abortion should be a matter of choice and not a mat ter of state prescribed law. Before Weddington won her case, a Texas law provided that abortion was illegal except in cases where the woman’s death was imminent. She said a few states had more liberal laws, permitting abortions in cases of rapt, incest, or fetal deformity. Weddington pointed out that Texans continued to receive abor tions despite the statute. “There was a flight that left Love Field in Dallas every Saturday morn ing going from Texas to California for people who were going there to get procedures,” Weddington said. Sarah Weddington “But in many parts of Texas there were women going to Mexico for es sentially illegal procedures that were often very dangerous and not well- performed.” However, Jane Roe was not one of these Texans. She tried to obtain an abortion in Texas but was denied. Weddington met Roe at this time and decided to take her case. Although Weddington won the case, Dallas District Attorney Henry Wade announced that he would con tinue prosecuting. The case was then See Activist, page 12 f I Rowe is nominated for Battalion editor By BRIAN PEARSON Senior Staff Writer Michelle Powe was nominated Tuesday by the Student Publica tions Board to be editor of The Battalion for the spring 1986 se mester. The decision by the board, which is made up of three stu dents, three faculty members and one administrator, was unani mous. The decision must be con firmed by Texas A&M Provost Gordon Eaton. Powe, a senior journalism ma jor from Springfield, Va., is the current managing editor of The Battalion. During her S’A-years at | the newspaper, Powe has been staff writer, senior staff writer, as- Michelle Powe sistant news editor,-assistant city editor, photo editor and editorial page editor. “I’ve been here for a long time See Spring editor, page 12 Phone fraud Company investigating B-CS residents for long distance toll abuse By CRAIG RENFRO Reporter Bryan-College Station residents are under investigation for several thousand dollars of long distance toll fraud abuse, says a spokesman for U.S Telecom Inc. Tim Bowring, assistant vice presi dent for corporate communications for U.S. Telecom, in Kansas City Mo., says the investigations are part of a multi-million dollar loss suf fered by long distance services in Texas. “We noticed an unusual amount of numbers being dialed out of the switching center for the (Texas A&M) campus area,” Bowring says. “After we identified where the abuse was occurring we canceled many of the abused codes.” When the investigations are com pleted, students will be encouraged to come forward and make restitu tion for the calls, Bowring says. “Students are breaking federal law and are subject to fines,” Bowr ing says. “They just aren’t getting free phone calls.” Long distance service companies across the nation have lost an esti mated $500 million through toll fraud abuse, says a spokesman for MCI Telecommunications Inc. John Houser, corporate public re lations director for MCI in Washing ton, D.C., says the Secret Service is being called in to investigate the fraud. Bowring says most people don’t realize the illegal calls are a felony, punishable by a $50,000 fine or by 15 years in jail. “Our purpose is to stop the abu se,” Bowring says. “We prefer not to prosecute. The best solution of all is for code abusers to come forward and make restitution for the calls. “This investigation is like a drug bust. We don’t want to get the per son with a half-ounce of marijuana, we want the big dealer.” Houser says Communications Fraud Control Association, an orga nization of 34 long distance compa nies, has banded together to identify where the fraud is occuring across the states and to assist federal offi cials with the investigations. “Monitoring systems are being used to detect frequently dialed codes, and then the calls will be tra ced and the suspects will be appre hended,” Houser says. Last week five individuals were ar rested in New York for toll fraud abuse, Houser says. He says there are several ways people can get these free numbers. “There are computer hackers who just keep dialing numbers until they find one that works,” Houser says. “I’ve even heard of instances in New York where you can buy a code off the street for $2.” Bowring says even though the in vestigations are preliminary, they have been done in other areas and were succesful. “Tell students don’t do it,” he says. “It isn’t worth it.”