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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 7, 1997)
News Thursday • August 7, Natives arrive in Guam hoping Hutchison: Mor find survivors of olane crash tax cuts needed Authorities said at least 13 Americans were on board AGANA, Guam (AP) — The nighttime world beyond Customs at Guam International Airport harbored unequal measures of hope and horror for the anguished relatives of the injured and the dead from Korean Air Flight 801. Just arrived Thursday on a special flight from South Korea, they faced grim 9-1 odds: Were their relatives among the 29 Korean Air reported had survived Wednesday’s crash? Or were they among the more than 220 dead? They veered between optimism and despair. “I have hope,” said Kim Moon-Hyun, who de clined to say which of his relatives had been on the flight. Then: “I don’t even want to imagine what I will face outside.” The Boeing 747 from Seoul, South Korea, crashed in a deep ravine three miles from its air port destination on this U.S.-governed Pacific is land. Seventeen hours later, rescuers said they had found all the survivors. Flight 801 was carrying mostly Korean tourists, including many families heading to Guam’s tropical beaches for vacation, when it crashed in a driving rain just before noon Tues day EDT. On board were 23 crew members and at least 13 Americans. Korean Air said the survivors included three Americans, identified as Grace Chung, Hyun Seong Hong and Angela Shim. Their hometowns were not immediately available. Sixty-nine bodies had been recovered from the wreckage by the time the rescue effort was called off for the night, said Ginger Cruz, a spokeswoman for Guam Gov. Carl Gutierrez. “We scoured the whole area all day today,” Air Force Col. A1 Higgle said. “We know there are some bodies still down there, but it’s smolder ing too hot.” ^ ^ We know there are some bodies still down there, but it’s smoldering too hot.” Air Force Col. Al Riggle Many among the 300 relatives — flown in on several flights as a courtesy by Korean Air — wore black. They stared ahead numbly, ruddy faces damp with tears. Some embraced each other. “Right now there’s a lot of anxiety, a lot of dis belief, a lot of shock,” said Elena Scragg, head of Guam’s department of mental health and sub stance abuse. The survivors, some of them severely injured, were being treated at two hospitals on the island. Burn experts were being flown in from the U.S. mainland, and among the passengers arriving from Korea on Thursday were nurses and doc tors, apparently sent to help the survivors. National Transportation Safety Board in vestigators were due to arrive Thursday morn ing to examine the wreck site in the thick, tropical underbrush where the plane went down, and officials from the Los Angeles County coroner’s office were on their way to help process the dead, many charred beyond immediate recognition. The voice and flight-data recorders have been sent to Washington for analysis. The survivors had been seated in the front of the plane, which was largely intact. But the plane’s pilot and co-pilot were missing and pre sumed dead, the airline said. “I join with all Americans in expressing our deepest condolences to the victims of the terri ble plane crash in Guam,” President Clinton told reporters in Washington, pledging assistance from the Federal Aviation Administration and other agencies as needed. The Boeing 747-300, delivered used to Kore an Air in 1984, had attempted a landing at an airport that lacked both a main landing system and a government-staffed control tower. r -T AUSTIN (AP) — New federal tax breaks will help many working peo ple, U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison said Wednesday. But she added that deeper cuts are needed and ac knowledged that some people won’t see any benefit. “My hus band pointed out to me that it really wasn’t that great for everybody. If you are a smok er who lives in an apartment who doesn’t have children and flies a lot, this is not foryou,” Mrs. Hutchison quipped at an appearance before a chamber-of-commerce crowd. The $152 billion tax cut legisla tion, signed into law Tuesday by President Clinton, offers tax breaks including a tax credit for children Hutchison 16 and under anti a dropi capital-gains tax rate. It also the cigarette tax and revises extends airline ticket taxes. Along with a budget-bal measure, the tax cut billisa touted bipartisan effort, Hutchison, a Republican, she’d like to see further chan including the elimination heritance taxes, which she “unAmerican.” “We have welcomed peo| this country and we have sai you work harder, you can ter and you can give your chl( a little bit better chance than had to start. That’s theAmeri dream,” she said. The tax bill phases in an crease in the individualexeni| on estate taxes, to SI million the current $600,000. Fai owned businesses and farms ify for a $1.3 million exemi starting next year. Ozone levels still higti Businesses seek Clinton’s intervention in strike desp,te em,ssl0ns tes: President said he lacks legal authority to stop the UPS walkout WASHINGTON (AP) — Business leaders clamored for the White House to step in and end the Team sters strike against United Parcel Service on Wednesday. But in a twist of history, one of the nation’s most anti-labor laws is thwarting the company’s appeals. President Clinton intervened swiftly to stop the American Airlines pilots’ strike in March, and UPS maintains that he would not have hesitated to order the Teamsters back to work if its union contract fell un der the labor law designed to protect the movement of commerce by rail ways and airlines. Clinton said Wednesday he was concerned about the inconve nience the UPS strike was causing, but said he lacked the legal author ity to intervene. The UPS-Teamsters pact is cov ered by the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act, under which the standard for gov ernment inter vention is much stricter than that of the 1926 Na tional Railway Labor Act. “It’s an anom aly of history,” said Rutgers Uni- Clinton versity econom ics professor Leo hoy. But he said, “I don’t think anyone would demand that the two sectors be brought un der one labor law today.” UPS, which began as a trucking company but has grown to rely in creasingly on its 2,000 pilots and planes, has argued in court that it now belongs under the railway act, according to spokeswoman Gina Ellrich. Rival FedEX Corp. is covered by the railway law. But UPS’ only recourse now would be special legislative relief, Ellrich said. “It’s kind of a moot point,” she said. “We have to live with things as they exist.” Congress began regulating rail way labor relations towards the end of the 19th century, when it already was clear' that railroads were involved in interstate commerce and therefore fell under federal jurisdiction. The Railway Labor Act granted the president authority to stop a strike that could profoundly affect the economy. But during a news conference Wednesday, Clinton stressed that the work stoppage had not met the “ high standard” oftheTaft-HartleyAct. In the case of American Airlines, the company dominated many air routes and rival carriers couldn’t be expected to replace the airline. “It’s a totally different law from the law that affected the American Airlines case,” he said. Former Labor Secretary Robert Reich said presidents should allow the collective bargaining process to work. The Railway Labor Act, he said, was intended to deal with na tional monopolies. lOUSTON (AP) — Environ mental watchdogs are question ing the effectiveness of the state’s year-old vehicle-emissions test ing program because of a lack of any noticeable improvement in air quality in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Ozone levels in the Dallas-Fort Worth area have reached unhealthy levels as many times this year as in all of 1996, despite a vehicle-emis sion testing program intended to control air pollution. The state program has been op erating in Dallas and Tarrant coun ties for one year now — a test thousands of automotive polluters have failed. Nevertheless, ozone levels have reached unhealthy levels on four days this year, matching the 1996 total, the U.S. Environmental Pro tection Agency reports. he Wail Street Journalrepcr j in its Texas Journal onWedns that it was unclear what eftec any, the testing programhashail pollution. However, critics! testing program are unappeai since EPA surveys show that 1! art I than half of the region’s sitiolortl| caused by motor vehicles. |om| “They settled for a subpai spection and maintenance pi gram, and now air quality isn't iifeti ing the projected improvemem says Ramon Alvarez, a list at the EnvironmentalDeh he I it heal ifstt Fund in Austin. “They need 102 Hi vise their program.” hop Since July 1996, nearlyZli herd lion Texas cars have been tested excessive emissions levels.0/dios jfy/j 7.3 percent failed, while for son jhj rt; late-model cars the ratehasreachi 25 percent. In Houston, the fail rate is 8.9 percent. Documents show cigarette makers worried about lawsuits decades ago Weather Outlook n SATURDAY SUNDAY MONDAY WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — Cigarette makers have been working for more than 30 years to protect them selves from the kind of lawsuits that now threaten the in dustry, internal documents released Wednesday show. The eight documents from the Liggett Group, the maker of Lark and L&M cigarettes, include attorney memorandums on how to defend the industry against charges of misconduct, and show how cigarette mak ers plotted to manipulate data and shape public opin ion. One document said the ingredients in cigarettes could be likened to those in a Hershey bar. The documents, totaling 69 pages, were made pub lic after the tobacco industry exhausted all appeals to keep them private. The documents are part of Florida’s lawsuit against the industry. Forty states have sued the industry; this is the first such case to go trial. The oldest of the documents, an unsigned confi dential memo from an unspecified Jan. 20,1964, meet ing, recommended the industry not distribute any in formation on cigarettes and health without running it by their attorneys. “It was recommended that The Tobacco Institute not distribute any new health material without clearing first with the Special Lawyers Committee in the first in stance,” the memo said. The institute is the lobbying and public relations arm of the tobacco industry. The seven-page memo randum came out just after the surgeon general re leased a report on smoking and health. A year later, Congress passed the law requiring the surgeon gener al’s warnings on cigarette packs. A May 1964 document from Philip Morris Cos.’ attor neys detailed how the industry might show there was no need for labeling by conducting a survey to prove the public already knew about any health risks. The memo described efforts to ensure that lawyers held all the re search documents to keep them from falling into the hands of Congress or other government agencies. The lawyers suggested the surveys could be destroyed. “If the returns were unfavorable they could be de stroyed and there would be no record in any office of the nature of the returns,” the document said. Attorneys for the state of Florida conceded the docu ments contain no smoking gun. However, they said the papers show that industry lawyers engaged in efforts to hide smoking’s dangers — efforts that other secret docu ments so far have pinned solely on tobacco executives. Partly Cloudy High: 95° Low: 75° .Jm Partly Cloudy High: 94° Low: 75° Partly Cloudy High: 95° Low: 75° 11 Sk@fch By Quatn HOLD iff FLOYD'S GOT SAND IN HiS £Y£S AGAIN. „ OH, GREAT! 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