TUESDAY
September 26, 2000
Volume 107 ~ Issue 23
2 Sections
A 8 pages
B 6 pages
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STUART VILLANUEVA T ut: Battauon
Investigators inspect the wreckage of a single-engine, two- Monday morning. The crash killed two peolple. The plane
seater .plane that crashed in a pasture near Milican early took off from Sugarland, Texas.
Cessna plane crashes,
killing those on board
2 die when aircraft fails to reach Arlington, Texas
By Brady Creel ;
The Battalion
Two people died Monday morning when
the airplane they were flying crashed south
of College Station.
One of the victims was identifed as
Joseph Riemi Putter, and the other victim, a
Hispanic man, remains unidentified. Both
men were middle-age.
The Cessna 142 single-engine airplane
crashed in an open pasture about six miles
south of the College Station city limits near
Highway 6.
Texas Department of Public Safety
(DPS) spokeswoman Tela Mange said in
vestigators have not yet determined a
cause. The investigation may take several
weeks.
Sgt. Jim Mann of the Brazos County
Sheriff's office said the office received a call
at approximately 2:30 a.m. Monday report
ing a possible airplane crash.
Mann said authorities believed the phone
call came from air traffic controllers in
Houston who had lost communication with
the aircraft at 1:38 a.m., but it was possible
the call came from Easterwood Airport.
“Some airport was in contact and lost
communications,” he said.
Mann said sheriff’s deputies searched
county roads immediately after the report, but
were unable to perform an effective search
because of the stormy weather conditions.
The search resumed at 7:30 a.m., and the
wreckage was found one hour later. A DPS
helicopter equipped with a searchlight was
used before daybreak, but nothing could be
found until after sunrise.
The victims were students of the Airline
Training Academy at Arlington, said Brazos
County Sheriff Chris Kirk.
Mann said the plane flew to Sugarland
from Arlington and was on its way back
when poor weather conditions forced the
plane to land temporarily at Easterwood
Airport.
Mann said the geography of the area the
plane crashed in was “typical of southern
Brazos County.” He said the crash site was
far from any residential areas — the only
house around was a small farmhouse sever
al hundred yards from the site.
“The only people in danger were those in
the aircraft,” Mann said. “No one saw or
heard anything.”
The farmhouse residents did not hear the
crash because of the stormy weather and the
small size of the airplane.
The crash left a trail of wreckage in a
north-south general direction from the point
of impact.
“Everything was thrown pretty much in
a line,” Mann said.
The bodies of the victims were found just
beyond the wreckage, Mann said. The plane
did not catch on fire — it was just a “broken
aircraft,” he said.
The victims were two of a group of four
See Crash on Page 7A.
Corps study habits re-evaluated
\Academic Operations Committee suggestions will take time to implement
|By Courtney Stelzel
The Battalion
Changes in the scholastic policy of the Corps of Cadets, in re-
! sponse to an Aug. 29 forum among the Academic Operations
I Committee (AOC), the Corps unit commanders and their scholas-
[ tic personnel, may be slow and minimal. The meeting opened up
a line of discussion, comments and suggestions for the way study
j time is handled in the Corps. However, suggestions that were
! made have yet to result in change.
Philip Carson, Corps scholastic officer and a senior econom
ics major, said the idea for a meeting between the AOC and the
Corps came last spring.
“The Corps wanted to get their opinions and suggestions on
| how we run our study program,” Carson said.
The Corps has invited the associate deans from each college,
! one by one, to observe and walk through the Corps residence halls
during Call to Quarters (CQ).
“We hope to dispel any negative connotations,” Carson said,
“that the AOC deans might have about the Corps and their study
D NAV*
Ifc'? ; i
.
f
STUART VILLANUEVA/I n p. Battalion
See Corps on Page 7A. Clay Jacobson, a freshman history major in company G-1, hits the books.
Hemp activists
demonstrate
at Olsen Field
By Courtney Stelzel
The Battalion
Hemp, weed, boo, marijuana, grass,
Mary Jane, cannabis and mooch are all
names associated with the illegal plant
scientifically known as pistillate hemp,
or Cannabis sativa, and it might be
coming to a drug store near you, if a na
tional group gets its wish.
Journey for Justice campaigned in
the Bryan-College Station area Mon
day for support of its initiative to le
galize marijuana for medical use, bring
attention to the issue of for political de
bate and reduce the incarceration rate
of nonviolent drug-related convicts.
The group, en route to Austin where the
members plan to march on the Capitol
and present their case to the press, is
composed of people who were con
victed of marijuana use and possession,
medical marijuana patients and citizens
concerned about the issue.
They made a political state
ment at Olsen Field by placing
someone in a cage to represent
the injustice of convicting and
imprisoning nonviolent people
for marijuana possession.
Joe Ptak, a member of
Journey for Justice, said the
group is campaigning on the
Texas A&M campus because
of its extensive agricultural re
search facilities and large stu
dent population.
“Both of these factors can
help to raise awareness with the
possible commercial uses of
marijuana,” he said.
The group’s goal is to en
courage the agriculture depart
ment to find a way to extract
THC (tetrahydrolannabinol),
the illegal component in mari
juana, to make it less harmful
and more productive for con
sumer purposes. Hemp, the
fiber produced from Cannabis
sativa, can be used to produce
clothing, paper, hair care prod
ucts, and fuel, and for nutri
tional purposes, in addition to
other uses.
Dr. Dennis Reardon, senior coordi
nator for alcohol and drug programs for
the Department of Student Life, said
extensive marijuana use can have
many of the same side effects as alco
hol use and the legal consequences are
just as severe.
“Physicians
should be allowed
to use any sub
stance proven in
controlled studies to
help with ailing pa
tients and, whether
that is marijuaSa or
not, it doesn’t mat
ter,” he said. ^ «
However, ReJ||
don said in a survey
of the A&M student
body last year, only
7.4 percent of A&M
students admitted to
using the illegal
substance within the
last 30 days. Sixteen
percent of students
from other colleges
around the 'country
admitted to using it.
Sgt. Dan Jones,
public relations of
ficer for the College Station Police De
partment (CSPD) and a former mem
ber of the Brazos Valley Narcotics
Task Force, said marijuana contains
more than 420 chemicals, and that 63
of them are considered mind-altering
when heated. Therefore, he said all the
side effects have yet to be discovered.
However Judy Jones, program coor
dinator for Journey to Justice, said that
regardless of the misconceptions about
the use of marijuana, the drug serves yn
important purpose for those with med
ical needs.
“We go out in a bold way and tell
people we have patients on board that
will die without marijuana and this gets
our points across,” she said.
Jones added that Texas is the No. 1
incarcerator in the United States for
marijuana use.
“If Texas was a country it would be
the No. 1 country for incarcerations,”
Jones said.
Journey for Justice concluded its
campaign at A&M with a two-hour open
RYLA SKULL/The Battalion
Advocates for the legalization of marijuana
for medicinal purposes rallied at Olsen Field
Monday.
forum at the Koldus Building that in
cluded speeches and skits.
For more information on Journey for
Justice and its campaign visit
www.journeyforjustice.com.
CSPD officers host education pro
grams in the community to deter resi
dents from early-age drug use, such as
the national Drug
Abuse Resistance
Education
(D.A.R.E.) pro
grams, a nation
wide lecture that
aims to educate ele
mentary-school stu
dents. Speakers
from the Narcotics
Task Force speak at
various events
throughout the
community, hoping
to educate the pub
lic about the harms,
'effects and legal
consequences of
marijuana use.
Drug possession
is illegal according
to current law, and
people in an effort
to prevent drug use
Physicians
should he allowed
to use any sub
stance proven in
controlled studies
to help with ailing
patients and,
whether that is
marijuana or not,
it doesn't matter”
— Dr. Dennis Reardon
senior coordinator for alcohol and
drug programs for the
' 9 Department of Student Life
convicted of marijuana possession can
receive fines of up to $4,000 and one
year in jail for 2 to 4 ounces, depend
ing on the amount.
^ M
3 professors receive $1.2 million for technology research
IByRich Bray
. The Battalion
\ A day in a person's life can equal
| a month in the life of a computer and
[fast-growing technology. In an at
tempt to help researchers gain a
stronger footing in this field, the Na
tional Science Foundation (NSF)
granted more than $1.2 million to
three Texas A&M professors to en
able them to continue their techno
logical research.
Richard Gibson, an associate pro
fessor of geology and geophysics,
was awarded $437,927; Richard Fu-
ruta, an associate professor in the De
partment of Computer Science, was
awarded $498,207; and Wei Zhao, a
professor and head of the Depart
ment of Computer Science, was
awarded $343,806.
The money comes from a new
NSF program that will award $90
million in grants for technological
research in the United States, Gib
son said.
“It’s a new program called Infor
mation Technology Research (ITR),”
he said. “The key idea is to try to fund
some new research in several differ
ent areas. They’re looking for new
kinds of software — things related to
education programs, human-com
puter interfaces, information man
agement, advanced computational
science and the social and economic
implications of information technol
ogy,” he said.
Gibson said the program was cre
ated to assist research in technologi
cal advances.
“It’s a fairly broad program, but
with everyone talking about the In
ternet and how computers are chang
ing our lives, they wanted to sink
some money into this area to make
some big steps forward,” he said.
Gibson said the grant money
awarded to him will be used to de
velop a program to speed up com
puters used to find oil.
“One of the most challenging
See NSF on Page 4B.