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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 18, 2000)
shuttle crew p living space CANAVERAL, :e shuttle Fla. (AP) Atlantis’ :s closed the doors to lational space station ly after accomplishing) h\rdc- onH hores and more, olanned to pull awayj Atlantis late Sunday I did a fantastic job,” Mission Control, "and the Expedition One really appreciate all t you put in ge.tting home set up.” tion One — the first it space station crew aduled to blast off Oct. rd a Russian rocket e at the complex two r for a four-month stay, their five days inside, le astronauts stocked :e station with more iOO pounds of food, soap, toothbrushes, s, pens, notebooks, igs, radios, vacuum power converters and ir. ‘ven men installed the xygen generator and in the new Russian- g quarters and, during jrsion outside last! hooked up power and >. They also plugged in itteries and boosted 240-mile-high miles higher llonday, September 18, 2000 Show the THE BATTALION Page 5B money Message of Olympic Games lost in financial gain and personal greed >n into a out 14 >re. VING ttinued from Page It canopies of jumpers 11 iancial gain md Georse. W NICHOLAS ROZNOVSKY hile orga nizing the first mod em Olympic Games in 1896, founder Pierre deCoubertin hoped to establish “a four-year ly festival of the springtime of mankind.” For more than 100 years, the Olympic Games have united athletes from around the globe to compete in a variety of athletic events and foster peace among the nations of the world. Now that the 2(XX) Summer Olympic Games are underway in Australia with more than 10,(XX) athletes competing in more than 300 events, it would seem that Coubertin’s dream has been realized. Along the way, however, other dreams tiave been realized, too. For many of the ities and companies involved, the Olympics are the ultimate celebration of r evenue and profit. Over the past 104 years, the Olympics lave grown from a simple athletic festival nto a multibillion dollar industry, and busi- tesses all over the world are trying to get a liece of the Olympic gold for themselves. The true motivation behind the modern apparent — fi- Id for a series of jumps,ik t five victims will be® Carnes is becoming all toe For this year's Games, the Sydney ice to do what they lov ht their for life. r roommate, Carol Geon d to make their first Mail Call st time you get backintlt Olympic Games Organizing Committee have to deal with aloto: SOGOC) will receive $627 million from emotions." Hajovskysaid )6 sponsors and suppliers, lends loved w’hat they wetr Surprisingly enough, this large sum is there's no reason (orlistless than the amount The Atlanta Games ac- jally helped a lot of peopl|cumulated in four years. In 1996, 102 com be grief" Hianies paid $826 million to be part of the e Aggies who will neve Olympic Games. Considering that these figures do not in- riends a newaf- r | ll( j e t| ie economic boom created for _ , )lympic cities by increased tourism, it is no itch. Class ot 92. dieda vender that Houston and Dallas are trying iy. 1 he jump was a bir!ijt 0 | lire fhe Olympics their way in 2012. t from her brother. -I The International Olympic Committee Vlilller, a treshman, wmoq, the administrating body of the t first jump as an Aggi;:o ames< a i s0 get its fair share of sponsorship penues. „ J Eleven major sponsors, including Coca- 1 together. Alter knowi# 0 i ai visa and IBM, have paid a combined for only two weeks.t become the closest m e jump was to be one mot ;ir friendship. • ryear. Class of ‘99 was# [ • Cessna 182 and a fciis Vatican message n Warden, Class oN miSCOnStmed debrated his one-year ail res p 0nse £ 0 Mark Passwa- vith his wife, JoLynn. jlers’Sept. 14 column. Goodings, Class ot ‘94.1c ader, is described by H. Passwaters seems to have an individual who missed the intentions of the Vati- ort of incredible. Woo: |; an jhe Catholic Church has fluent German, was a®' £)een teaching the notion of no >iano and was an avid si salvation outside the Church for wned Ags Over Texas,® fe| m0 st 2,000 years, hat sponsored Aggies! Yet, when it tries to lead the ef- fort to bring peace among differ- the Sky Diving Club w- fc n t religions of the world, many oLynn’s house to rente® people view this as the Church ac iends. cepting salvation by any religion, was two weeks before# Just because you do not agree ■ divers knew what thej with someone’s beliefs, it does Get back in the air. Ho" hot mean you hate them. We are ime it would be without |o love all people, whether we I and with an even biggf agree with their beliefs or not. ;. ■ The Church is not trying to rec- s nothing that makes o® oncile doctrines of different re I i- life and beauty more that gions, but people’s attitudes to- 4 world, not to mention tk -Ward each other, pus, from 13,000 feet ini The fact that people now see ■lajovsky said. the Church contradicting itself p members began thelod shows that they have completely :overy, grief continued® missed the pope’s attempt to students were killed by! bring religious tolerance to the ' world. $605 million to be recognized as ‘‘Olympic Partners.” Although such sponsorship provides companies with incredible marketing expo sure, IBM has decided that the price is be coming too high and will end its partner ship with the IOC after the 2000 Games. The company in the United States most visibly making money off of the Games is General Electric Co., the parent company of television network NBC. The network has exclusive Olympic broadcast rights in the United States through the 2008 Games. For this year's Olympics alone, NBC paid $705 million dollars for broadcast rights. Despite the large cost. NBC an nounced one week before the opening cere mony in Australia that it had turned a profit by selling a record $900 million in advertis ing for the Games. The Olympic Games are certainly bigger and more profitable than ever, but are they better? In its quest to expand the Games and maximize the revenue, the IOC has ignored Pierre du Coubertin’s vision of the Games as a showcase of amateur athletics. Professional athletes now make up the majority of Olympic basketball and soccer teams and a sizable percentage of tennis competitors. One cannot watch 15 minutes of Olympic coverage on NBC without see ing at least one ad featuring world-class sprinter Michael Johnson. In addition, it seems that the average Olympic athlete today is far less an amateur than his predecessors. While the Olympic Games purport to spread athletics and friendly competition around the world, the IOC has been ex tremely vigilant in cracking down on Inter net broadcasts of the Games. Web broadcasts of the Games have been effectively banned because Olympic broad casting contracts prevent companies from sending video or audio signals outside their own national or regional territories. Instead of embracing the new medium as a way of increasing viewership of the Games, the IOC is buckling under the pres sure from its broadcast licensees (like NBC) to protect its investments. “If someone has the capacity for major distribution, it’s a copyright violation and we will find some way to close it down,” said IOC vice president Richard Pound. The IOC has apparently chosen lucrative television contracts over unprecedented coverage. So much for spreading good will and sports. The upcoming 2002 Salt Lake City Win ter Olympics created a crisis within the IOC when it was revealed that committee mem bers received over $1 million in gifts from the Salt Lake City organizers. The incident prompted a congressional investigation and resulted in the resignation of key Salt Lake City Organizing Commit tee officials. Although the IOC has revised its selec tion process and prohibited its members from visiting potential host cities, the IOC has a long way to go before greed is purged from its ranks. For the athletes who have spent years training and preparing for the Sydney Olympic Games, the next two weeks still represent a chance to prove themselves as world-class athletes. To Americans watch ing at home, however, the Games are just a two-week festival of capitalism. It does not matter who wins the gold, sil ver, or bronze — the corporate world al ready has captured the green. Nicholas Roznovsky is a senior political science major. The pope is trying to stop death and persecution because of religion,’not create a new view of salvation by any religion. Besides — if people do not be lieve the Catholic Church to be cor rect, then why does one statement affect so many non-believers? Louis Mandanici Class of ‘02 ver the following ^nths after the plane crasli ifire collapsed, killing 1* es. ;gies would not return It ; eld until Memorial Da) or a boogie, an event U > divers together for an eit j id of jumps and fellowship f ct that the crash took on ’ made it even harder,” saii ky diving adviser Jai We were no longer abletc ; place we felt most coni' Coulter Field. That firsi there was a statement that urn.” turn will take place first le fly over at 7 p.m. andl ;end as the club hosts af the crash site in memorj Miller, Puryear, Warder ings. mt to make sure canopies ) fly over Coulter Field mid. “If s what they wot# ;d.” The Battalion encourages letters to the editor. Letters must be 300 words or less and include the author’s name, class and phone number. The opinion editor reserves the right to edit letters for length, style, and accuracy. Letters may be submitted in person at 014 Reed McDonald with a valid student ID. Let ters may also be mailed to: The Battalion - Mail Call 014 Reed McDonald Texas A&M University 1111TAMU College Station, Texas 77843 Campus Mail: 1111 Fax: (979) 845-2647 E-mail: battletters@hotmail.com Columns and letters appearing in The Battalion express the opinion of the authors only. They do not necessarily reflect the opin ion of other Battalion staff members, the Texas A&M student body, regents, adminis trators, faculty or staff. CIT A Tjf OF T1TF TST AIVTF i- . , , . JlA.lvJl. Ur 1H11 IS 1.AJY111 Engineering board not free from fault in Bonfire collapse, hypocritically blaming others o: MARK PASSWATERS ne of the most re markable things about the Bonfire tragedy*is so few people have been looking for someone to blame. Unfortunately, that situation has changed in the past few weeks. “You tell me who that you have heard say, T was at fault,’ ” said Dr. John Breen, father of collapse vic tim Christopher Breen. Nancy Brans, whose son Do minic was injured in the collapse, was quoted by The Dallas Morning News as saying, “There has to be somebody responsible for letting it happen. It wasn’t a freak accident.” People looking to point fingers for the cause of the collapse got their wish. On Sept. 8, the Texas Board of Professional Engineers released its findings on the col lapse and included harsh words for the students who worked on the project and the Texas A&M administration. What it failed to do, however, was recognize its own culpability in the tragedy due to its unwilling ness to take action. Engineers are supposed to be proactive, not reactive. If an engi neer recognizes a problem, he or she is supposed to take action to rectify the situation before the pub lic is harmed. Otherwise, he or she will have violated his or her social contract with the public. The board stood by and did nothing for decades while Aggies continued to build a structure that it knew violated engineering guide lines. For the highest review board in the engineering profession to be forced into action by a trage’dy is deplorable, as is the board’s gen-’ eral attitude regarding the entire situation. In its findings, the board noted that the students building Bonfire were in violation of the 1937 Texas Engineering Practice Act, which prevents anyone from practicing engineering without a license. Victoria Hsu, the,ex ecutive direc tor of the board, said that the as sumption was made that such a viola tion existed in previous Bonfires. “It’s possi ble, because it was a simi larly complex structure in past years,” Hsu said. If this is indeed the case, such a finding is more damn ing to the administration and to the board itself than it is to the stu dents. The “wedding-cake” design had been in use for more than four decades, yet no questions were asked concerning its safety. Any violation of engineering canons should be considered a seri ous matter. When the violation takes place in the creation of a totally unique structure, it should send up warn ing signals. The board also criticized the University administration. While it is still uncertain whether the Uni versity technically broke the law. The board criticized the University for not paying closer attention to the project. If A&M spent more than $8,000 on Bonfire, it violated a clause in the Engineering Practice Act that states that any public work costing more than $8,000 must be designed and supervised by a professional engineer. The board has the ability to for mally repri- The boord stood by and did nothing for decades while Aggies continued to build a structure that it knew violated engi neering guidelines. For the highest review board in the engineer ing profession to be forced into action by a tragedy is deplorable. mand the school and the students, as well as im pose a fine, but declined to do so at the Sept.- 8 meeting. Instead, it appeared content to ex ert its power over the Uni versity and others. “Our ob jective is to send a clear message to the rest of the state that we will not tolerate this,” said Kathleen Walk er, Chairwoman of the enforcement committee. Its primary target would appear to be Keep the Fire Burning (KTFB). Members of the board said they would request a cease and desist order against KTFB. If the board had acted this way several years ago, it is highly likely that last year’s collapse would not have happened. Instead, the board had to be roused from its slumber by an event that could have been prevented. The board has considered sanc tioning members of A&M’s Col lege of Engineering for not previ ously voicing their concerns about Bonfire. This accusation is not true; sev eral members of the University’s faculty did voice their concerns in previous years, and they were ig nored by all — including the Texas Board of Professional Engineers. Among those who voiced their concerns were Larry Grosse, for mer head of the Department of Construction Science and faculty adviser for Bonfire until 1994. Grosse, along with civil engi neering professor emeritus Louis J. Thompson, repeatedly mentioned possible problems, which fell on deaf ears. It seems odd that such a well- researched report would make such an incorrect assumption, un less the board is embarrassed about ignoring criticisms about Bonfire’s design from engineering professionals. The Texas Board of Profession al Engineers is perfectly within its bounds to pass judgment on the student body and A&M’s adminis tration for their mistakes leading up to the Bonfire collapse. However, it should be remem bered that the most powerful engi neering review board in Texas was either unwilling or unable to take a stand against a situation that was in plain violation of engineering laws. Its silence allowed young men and women to put their lives at risk' building a structure they believed was safe. Now that those victims are gone, the board has found its voice and is capable of pointing fingers. In this case, it should keep one finger pointed squarely at itself. Mark Passwaters is a senior electrical engineering major.