}
The Battalion
188
Page
State/Local
Wednesday, Nov. 30, 1988 Page 3
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Delta pilot admits
possible detours
3efore take off
IRVING (AP) — The pilot of a
Delta Air Lines jetliner that
crashed Aug. 31, killing 14 peo
ple, testified Tuesday that some
rules might have been bent in re
adying the Boeing 727 for takeoff
but that preparations were ad
equate.
Larry Davis admitted seeming
deviations from the rules under
questioning by aerospace engi
neer Jeff Gorney as the National
Transportation Safety Board
opened an inquiry into the crash
on takeoff at Dallas International
Airport. Ninety-four people sur
vived.
For instance, the Delta veteran
of 23 years said he had used hand
signals instead of calling out com-
S letion of each item on the pre-
ight checklist and had made a
takeoff briefing at the gate in
stead of on the runway.
“I like to get as much done as
possible before we get into the
position of getting rushed,” Davis
said.
Gorney also said a flight atten
dant was allowed into the cockpit
when the jet was waiting to take
off, despite a Federal Aviation
Administration rule requiring a
"sterile” cockpit once the plane
has left the gate.
But he said the plane was
“waiting in a line of traffic” and
added: “I don’t believe it was a
critical phase of flight, but techni
cally it was (in violation).”
The FA A requires pilots to go
through a checklist but does not
specifically require a verbal a
“challenge and response” be
tween pilots. The agency, how
ever, has made clear on many oc
casions that such an exchange is
preferable.
According to NTSB docu
ments, Delta procedures Aug. 31
only suggested a verbal exchange
during some phases of the check
list.
FAA recently chastised Delta
for inadequate cockpit discipline
and poor coordination and com
munications among pilots, and
Delta has said that it will formal
ize the checklist process with in
creased emphasis on verbal chal
lenges.
Delta procedures say the pre
flight briefing should take place
“before takeoff’ but also says it
could begin during the “before
start check,” which normally oc
curs about five minutes before
the plane pushes back from the
gate.
Davis testified that he went to
full power as soon as he felt en
gine “compressor stalls” unlike
any he had ever felt before.
“It was like driving a car 60
mph down the highway and driv
ing into a water puddle. It was
pronounced deceleration,” Davis
he said under questioning from a
representative of Pratt & Whit
ney, manufacturer of the air
plane’s engines.
Investigators have ruled out
mechanical failure as a cause of
the stalls, and have focused in
stead on the position of the wing
flaps, which the NTSB said were
found retracted instead of ex
tended for takeoff in the wreck
age.
The wing flap lever in the
cockpit was in the wrong position
after the crash, the board said.
But in the cockpit recording, the
co-pilot can be heard saying “15,
15, green light” before takeoff to
verify the flaps’ proper deploy
ment.
Davis said Tuesday he did not
know if the other crew members
might have touched the flap han
dle as the plane was in trouble.
A pilots union contends a “split
flap configuration” may have oc
curred, placing one flap up and
one down. The union contends
that in that case, the takeoff
warning system of the 727 would
not necessarily alert the crew of
the danger.
GSS president: Organization
hopes to ‘blend into’ A8c M
By Richard Tijerina
Staff Writer
Not much has been heard of the
Gay Student Services lately, but the
organization’s president said the
group is still around, and trying to
“blend into the woodwork” at A&M.
The president, who asked not to
be named, said that although the
group is not very large, it maintains
a steady group of 15 to 30 members.
The group’s main function, he
said, is to provide services to help
both members and nonmembers live
more easily in the local gay commu
nity.
Among the services GSS provides
are roommate referral services for
gay people who want to live with
other gays, guest speakers at GSS
meetings and Texas A&M classes to
talk about gay relationships, AIDS
and dealing with homosexuality.
GSS is a support group, the presi
dent said.
Its primary goal is to make the
lives of gays in the local gay commu
nity a bit easier, he said.
“We try to help those individuals
new to the area become part of the
gay community,” he said. “This is a
way for people who cannot go to
bars, who are not 21 or older, to
come and meet people who have
something in common with them.
We are basically a support group.”
He said the GSS also holds peri
odic “rap sessions,” which serve as a
way for group members to talk in
formally about a variety of topics,
ranging from the latest gay movies,
first homosexual experiences and
the ways of talking to their parents
about homosexuality.
Discrimination and harrassment
are not problems to gays on campus,
the president said, although Larry
Hickman, the group’s faculty ad
viser, is trying to push an anti-dis-
criminatory bill through the A&M’s
Regulations and Rules committee.
“That (discrimination) has pretty
much stopped around here,” the
president said. “It has really died
down since some of the older people
in the organization, who were here
when A&M was trying to kick the
GSS off campus, have graduated.
But we have blended into the wood
work and are now a part of the Uni
versity.”
Attempts to make the organiza
tion blend in on campus met with
many hardships in the late 1970s
and early 1980s.
GSS was denied recognition in
1976 on the grounds that homosex
ual conduct was illegal in Texas.
University officials said they be
lieved it was wrong to recognize an
organization that was likely to “in
cite, promote and result” in homo
sexual activity.
However, a federal judge in Dal
las later struck down the section of
the Texas Penal Code forbidding
sexual acts between adults of the
same sex.
After the judge’s decision, the
University argued that GSS was a so
cial organization, and A&M does not
recognize social groups.
The Texas Court of Appeals later
stated that A&M’s refusal to give
benefits which are available to other
campus organizations to GSS denied
the group its First Amendment
rights.
However, in 1982, U.S. District
Judge Ross Sterling ruled that the
University had not violated any pro
tected constitutional right by deny
ing the group official recognition.
That decision was reversed on
Aug. 3, 1984, when the Fifth U.S.
Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that
A&M would have to recognize the
group as an on-campus organiza
tion.
The case wound up in front of the
U.S. Supreme Court in April 1985.
The Supreme Court ruled in fa
vor of the August ruling stating that
A&M must recognize the group.
Military expertise gives Tower
potential for defense secretary
WASHINGTON (AP) — John
Tower has been talked about as a po
tential defense secretary for the bet
ter part of a decade, so it’s no sur
prise that he’s now considered the
front-runner for that post in the new
Bush administration.
But it isn’t coming easily, with al
most daily reports of negotiations
over conditions President-elect
George Bush wants to set before
possibly appointing his fellow
Texan.
No one doubts the military exper
tise of the 63-year-old Tower. He
was chairman of the Armed Services
Committee when he retired from
the Senate in 1985 after 24 years.
And he served as an arms negotiator
for President Reagan after that.
By all accounts, despite apparent
opposition from some Bush aides,
Tower is the leading choice to head
the Pentagon for the new president.
However, he was mentioned as a
possible defense secretary for Presi
dent Reagan — a development that
never occurred.
A source close to the Bush tran
sition office said Tuesday that a deci
sion on Tower could come by
Wednesday.
The source, who spoke only on
condition he not be named, said
Bush likes Tower and thinks he
would do a good job at the Penta
gon. But some Bush advisers have
raised objections, partly because
they do not have a high regard for a
number of people who have worked
for Tower and might have an inside
track for top Pentagon jobs should
he be named. The negotiations sup
posedly concern who would control
which appointments on Tower’s
Pentagon team.
Tower himself has said little in
public in recent days. His aides say
each day, when asked: No call from
the White House yet.
Tower has worked for Bush be
fore. In fact, he was one of Bush’s
key emissaries to the platform com
mittee at the Republican National
Convention last summer — essen
tially speaking for Bush in the nego
tiations.
In the Senate, Tower championed
Reagan’s military buildup and in
crease in defense spending, but if he
gets the Pentagon job he’ll become
Bush’s point man.
And Bush, in publicly describing
the role of his Defense secretary,
said last week that his nominee must
be willing to take a fresh, tough look
in these times of budgetary crunch
at the Defense Department.
Also, the president-elect’s choice
for national security adviser, Brent
Scowcroft, suggested cuts of at least
$300 billion from the Reagan ad
ministration’s military spending
plans for 1990 to 1994. The sugges-_
tions were included in a report pre
sented to Bush by former Presidents
Ford and Carter.
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