The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current, January 26, 1988, Image 6
it: O 81 Happy Spring Semester We pay cash for Used Compact Discs. For more information call the CD Hot Line 846-2695, or come by the new location at Si Page 6/The Battalion/Tuesday, Januaiy 26, 1988 DEFENSIVE DRIVING CLASS TICKET DISMISSAL — INSURANCE DISCOUNT January. 29, 30 (6-10 p.m.) February 3, 4 (6:00 p.m.) PLUS 845-1631 Radiation leak leads inspectors to test workers Weather Watch E DALLAS (AP) — Health inspec tors tested workers in Texas and Pennsylvania who may have been ex posed to harmful radiation at elec tronic chemicals plants where air guns used to eliminate static mal functioned, officials said Monday. The Nuclear Regulatory Commis sion ordered an immediate halt Monday to distribution of the air guns until they find the cause of an apparent leak that exposed the workers of Ashland Chemical Co. to low-level radiation. “We are taking blood and urine samples from all employees who were in the room in which the static elimination devices malfunctioned,” David Lacker, director of the Texas Bureau of Radiation Control in Aus tin, said. ^‘Results are expected in a day or two.” Lacker said the tests would reveal whether workers had ingested or in haled any of the radioactive particles that leaked from the cleaning de vices. He said it appears the radiation leakage was confined to one room at the Dallas plant. The two plants, which bottle acids used in the manufacture of semicon ductors, will remain closed during testing and cleanup, Loscocco said. All 37 employees in Dallas and 90 employees in Easton, Pa., are being tested. Meanwhile, a two-man team sought to determine how the ce ramic microspheres leaked from air guns leased from 3M Corp., 3M spokesman Dennis Mick said from the 3M Static Control Systems Divi sion in Austin. The radiation leak was discovered Saturday night after officials checked equipment similar to that involved in radiation leaks found Thursday at Ashland’s plant in Easton, 60 miles north of Philadel phia, Loscocco said. The company notified the Nu clear Regulatory Commission and the Texas Bureau of Radiological Health of the contamination at the Dallas plant, Loscocco said. The commission staff on Monday ordered 3M to suspend distribution of the models of guns used at the two plants, models in the company’s 900 series, until the cause of the leaks is found and corrective action is approved by the commission. Also, 3M was ordered to inform all users of the incident, to call for user reports of anything similar and to test other devices to come up with a “comprehensive test plan which will provide a high degree of assur ance that any other leaking devices will be identified,” said an an nouncement from the commission’s staff headquarters in Bethesda, Md., near Washington. A third Ashland plant, in Newark, Calif., showed no contamination, an NRC spokesman said Sunday. The radioactive ceramic micros pheres, smaller than a grain of sand, probably would pass through the body if they remained intact, NRC Region 1 spokesman Karl Abraham said. The microscopic polonium spheres emit alpha particles that cannot penetrate skin, but scientists have not determined the potential hazard if the polonium 210 is in gested, Abraham said. Ashland Chemical is a division of Ashland Oil Inc., which owned a storage tank that spilled 3.7 million f allons of fuel near Pittsburgh, with 50,000 gallons leaking into the Mo- nongahela River. Sunset Today: 5:55 p.m. Sunrise Wednesday: 7:18 a.m. Map Discussion: An extensive ridge of high pressure, at surface andaloli continue to dominate the local area with fair to partly cloudy skies, cooltei cold nights. The intense low pressure over New England will moveoffstoq snow showers will linger from the Great Lakes southeastward tothewim side of the Central Appalachains. Expect a slow warming trend beginning Thursday for the local area. Forecast Today through Wednesday. Fair to partly cloudy with a high today of 49i) Winds light from the South. Low temperature Wednesday morning 26de$rs high temperature Wednesday afternoon in the low 50's. No precipitation is expected. Weather Fact. Bubble High - A small high, complete with anticyclonicara of the order of 50 to 300 miles across, often induced by precipitation and* currents associated with thunderstorms. They are relatively cold andunst overrunning the “Bubble High" may form squall lines on the peripheriesolss systems. Prepared Py Chans si Staff Meie.nl A&M Department of > Retarded man’s sketches keep Silsbee’s past alive Too few applicants prompt MHMR board to extend job search SILSBEE (AP) — knew all along there Iks in Silsbee from for- AUSTIN (AP) —The Search for a new state commissioner of mental health and mental retardation is tak ing longer than scheduled because so few people have applied for the job. Nineteen people, including four physicians, have applied to head the largest public agency in Texas, according to a list compiled by the Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation. One of the applicants is a woman, Jan Ducker, 59, of Sunapee, N.H., executive director of Northeast Al cohol and Drug Services, a private company that operates two hospitals and three outpatient clinics in New England. The MHMR board decided last week to extend the application pe the riod until the end of February rati than closing it on Jan. 31, as planned, said Board Chairman Roger Bateman. The job will become available March 31, when Commissioner Garry Miller is scheduled to resign from the post he has held for six years. Bateman said the board decided to extend the application period, “because we want to make sure there’s a broad group” of applicants. Wade Paul was a way he could keep foil getting about their past, but it took a whole bunch of pencils and some en couragement from his mother be fore he figured it out. The 37-year-old, mentally re tarded client of the Hardin County Sheltered Workshop had, over the past two years, turned a hobby of sketching into a refined skill without really meaning to. From there, it took only the watchful eye of the workshop’s di rector to recognize his talent and channel it in the right direction. This past month Paul put the fin ishing touches on 12 sketches of va rious historical landmarks in Silsbee from the early 1900s. They will ap pear in a 1988 calendar. Workshop officials who helped organize the calendar figured it was a great way to not only raise money for the agency, but to boost Paul’s self-confi dence as well. “The people here know all the things people could forget about if someone doesn’t draw them, so I asked them to help with ideas of what to draw," Paul said, few days to draw each one little longer to track down photos.” Workshop director Winnie who spotted Paul’s abilitiesajt up with the idea of putlingtie calendar, said she hunted up; graphs of a youngSilsbee fiild Model A Fords and a schooli that housed 10 grades in one V lrl g- And in the hands workshop’s now-resident arts tographs of the city’s first oii and a young Kirby Forest lull plant became delicate ings of an age gone by. “I drew'here at the workstii at home practically non-stop P thin said of the four months it feptacy to complete the 12 drawings. W theft “At borne, my mother wouBauth ‘No TV, go do some art,' ”P^piglef “She’s one reason I finished a |soutl endar.” Jones said many local peo| already begun to ask abou and when they can buy ikl endars, which should be aj before the end of the month, NEWS ENGINEERING & OFFICE SUPPLY^ Attention Students: The Drafting Board of Northgate has moved their entire inventory to EOS. Shop EOS for all your Back-To-School supplies. mm Wallace Secretarial Chair #SC45 • Pneumatic lift for height adj. • Black, Brown, Grey, Navy, Burgundy, or Beige req SALE $123“ $69 95 Wallace Drafting Stool • Pneumatic lift for height adjustment • Black, Brown, Navy, Grey, Burgundy, or Beige #SC75 Reg $165°° SALE $119 95 Staedtler Disposable Plotter Pens Reg SALE .30, .50, .70 6.15 ea 4.95 ea .25 5.15ea 4.15 ea For Houston Instuments or Hewlett Packard Plotters $32 49 Soft Kit EDG KIT Foremost Student i Desk K'f! ||lj #4541 ferfl 1 41x20 SALE Reg. $120°° $97 80 1 •Error Free •Performance •Lifetime Guar •Uniform Density ( •5!4 only SS/DD 7.99 bx SS/DD 8.45 bx Highland Diskettes 1418 Texas Ave S. Redmond Terrace 693-9553 (CORNER OF JERSEY & TEXAS NEXT DOOR TO ACADAMY)