Tuesday, February 25,1986/The Battalion/Page 7
World and Nation
Source: Low temperatures
on booster were reported
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Crews exam
ining the space shuttle Challenger at
close hand shortly before launch re
ported abnormally cold tempera
tures on one booster rocket over a
radio circuit monitored in NASA’s
launch control center, a source close
to the shuttle investigation said Mon
day.
But, he said, “these low tempera
tures never got the attention they
should have.”
The issue of what launch officials
knew and when they knew it will be
explored by the presidential investi
gating commission in open hearings
Tuesday and Wednesday.
“It will all come out tomorrow,”
the investigation source said. “It ain’t
going to be good.
“The American people are going
to scream bloody murder.”
Meanwhile, Mary Elizabeth
Beggs, wife of NASA administrator
James M. Beggs, told the Asso
ciated Press he will resign in the next
few days.
Beggs went on unpaid leave last
year after a grand jury indicted him
on charges stemming from his days
as a General Dynamics executive.
A top level NASA source said the
White House would not immediately
name Beggs’ successor but that act
ing administrator William Graham,
whose appointment Beggs is known
to oppose, was unlikely to get the
job.
Witnesses scheduled to come be
fore the commission Tuesday in
clude Allan McDonald, the Morton
Thiokol engineer who refused to en
dorse a recommendation to launch,
and Joe C. Kilminster, the firm’s
vice-president who signed the rec
ommendation.
The source said the readings were
made by an “ice team” sent out be
fore the launch to ensure the shut
tle’s fuel tank was not covered with
ice that could drop off and damage
the ship’s tiles.
The team, he said, works like a
bomb-disposal squad, reporting over
a radio every movement and step
around the ship and its toxic, volatile
fuels —- so if there is an explosion,
experts can trace the movements.
“These guys on the pad are re
porting continuously where they are
and what they are doing on an open
net, so if anything goes boom, some
one will know what happened,” the
investigation source said.
He said part of the reason their
cold-weather readings did not raise
alarm is because “they did this on
their own,” using an infrared py
rometer, that had not previously
been part of the team’s equipment.
10,000 unable
to return home
in California
Part of Boise, Idaho, was cut
off Monday as flood control
workers blocked streets with a
sandbag canal to drain swollen
ponds, and about 10,000 Califor
nians were still unable to return
to homes flooded by more than a
week of storms.
High water and mudslides
caused by weekend rain and melt
ing snow closed some Idaho high
ways while some roads remained
closed in northwestern Nevada,
washed by the same nine-day se
ries of storms that inundated
northern California.
Oregon, Washington state and
Montana also had scattered road
closings caused by flooding,
mudslides and washouts from
rain and melting snow.
Most of the Olivehurst-Linda
area, inundated Thursday when
a levee burst, was dry enough for
residents to start cleaning up.
The death toll stands at 20
across the West from the series of
storms that started Feb. 11.
Nancy Hardaker, a spokeswo
man for the state Office of Emer
gency Services, said that storm-
caused damage in northern Cali
fornia was estimated at $319 mil
lion. At least 10,872 homes were
damaged and 1,463 were de
stroyed, she said.
Government spells
out rights of aged
who use Medicare
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Facing com
plaints that elderly Medicare pa
tients are being dumped from hospi
tal beds before they are well, the
government released on Monday a
“bill of rights” spelling out how the
aged can fight premature hospital
discharges.
The statement, including a tele
phone number where patients can
file an emergency appeal, will be
given to each of the 9 million Medi
care beneficiaries hospitalized each
year, the Health and Human Serv
ices Department said.
Otis R. Bowen, secretary of the
HHS, said:“All patients deserve to
have a clear understanding of their
rights when they are hospitalized.
“With these messages, the Medi
care program will be providing im
portant information to beneficiaries
more directly, more effectively and
more helpfully than has been done
in the past.”
Consumer groups have com
plained in recent months that Medi
care beneficiaries sometimes were
dumped from their hospital beds
prematurely because their pre-set
Medicare payments had run out.
The American Association of Re
tired Persons and the People’s Medi
cal Society called on the Reagan ad
ministration in November to inform
Medicare patients of their legal
rights against premature discharge.
Bowen did not mention those
complaints directly. He did say there
is no evidence of a “systematic in
crease” in premature discharges,
and noted that both consumer
groups and medical industry groups
were consulted in drafting the rights
statement.
The retired people’s group and
the People’s Medical Society have
said that hospitals too often simply
inform Medicare patients that their
benefits have run out and they are
being discharged, even though dis
charge is not supposed to be in
fluenced by payments.
The groups said the problems
were caused by belt-tightening in
Medicare, particularly the pre-set
payment rates based on types of ill
ness under the so-called prospective
payment system.
Since 1983, payment rates have
been based on the average cost of
treating a particular illness.
High court dismisses pornography statute
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The Su
preme Court, in a decision that
could hamper local efforts to combat
pornography, struck down as un
constitutional Monday an Indianap
olis ordinance that subjected distrib
utors of sexually explicit materials to
lawsuits.
By a 6-3 vote, the justices said the
ordinance, which allowed women in
jured by someone who had seen or
read pornographic material to sue
the maker or seller, interferes with
freedom of speech.
The Indianapolis ordinance de
fined pornography as a practice that
discriminates against women by por
traying them as sexual objects who
enjoy pain or humiliation and pre
sents them as sexual objects of vio
lence.
Women hurt by someone who had
seen or read pornograhic material
were allowed to sue the maker or
seller of the pornography.
The ordinance was found uncon
stitutional by two lower federal
courts, and Indianapolis city officials
asked the high court to reinstate the
ordinance. The city’s appeal called
the ordinance an innovative and
promising way to help those it called
the victims of pornography, mostly
women and children.
Despite being told “the record
shows that the pornography indus
try . . . generates sex-based abuse,”
the justices agreed with the lower
courts that the ordinance went too
far.
In other business, the court also
agreed to decide by July the consti
tutionality of the new law requiring a
balanced budget by 1991. The jus
tices said they will hear arguments in
the case on April 23, and decide it
before adjourning for the summer.
The court also let stand the Texas
“no pass, no play” law that has side
lined high school athletes and si
lenced band musicians with failing
grades.
Aggie GOP
presents
George Strake
February 25, 206 MSC
7:00 pm
New Members Welcome
the dept, of philosophy
the dept, of sociology
and
present
Dr. Lawrence Busch:
A Lecture in Agricultural Ethics
“Agricultural Research:
an Instrumental Approach”
Is increasing agricultural
production always a good thing?
How does technology influence
goals for U.S. agriculture?
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