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T Multfi Departmett vities ant of F® j.m.t ice Acgielife: Where have all the howdies gone • Page B Opinion: Big brother is watching • Page 7 THF RATTAT TON A LLJu AJZjl X X-TLXjXVyii Volume 110 • Issue 62 • 8 pages A Texas A&M Tradition Since 1893 www.thebattalion.net Monday, November 24, 2003 SHARON AESCHBACH • THE BATTALION Student bonfire burns By Sonia Moghe THE BATTALION The centerpole in this year’s off-campus stu dent bonfire collapsed at 3:13 a.m. Nov. 22, pre dicting that Texas A&M would beat the University of Texas in next week’s highly antici pated football game. Traditionally, if the centerpole of bonfire col lapses before midnight, it is predicted that A&M will lose to Texas, but if it collapses after mid night, A&M will win. This year marks the second year a bonfire was held off campus. Since the 1999 Aggie Bonfire collapse that resulted in the deaths of 12 Aggies and the injury of 27 more, Aggie Bonfire’s ties with the University have been severed. Approximately 13,000 people attended the bon fire, which took place on the privately-owned property of Brad Zimmerman, an Aggie support er, said Mack Lampton, Unity Project director. Paul Harding, a senior animal science major who helped build the bonfire, said the atmos phere Saturday night was one of anticipation and excitement. “People weren’t quite sure what to expect because it wasn’t a cake design like old bonfire,” he said. The event was a success, Harding said, bring ing together new and old Aggies. This year’s attendance exceeded last year’s. “When it lit, there was a moment of silence,” Harding said. “People were in awe at how amaz ing it looked.” One minor injury was reported at the bonfire, which was treated on site. None of the ‘gray pots’ — students who were tending the bonfire — were hurt, Lampton said. Aggie yells were conducted on autopilot in the absence of the yell leaders, as thousands of peo ple waited at the site for about 7,000 who were held up en route because of shuttle bus delays. “We probably should have had more buses,” said Aaron Stagner, spokesman for the Unity Project. “We even had lots of people walking down the road to get there.” Shuttle bus delays were due to a surge of peo ple heading to the bonfire around 7:30 p.m., Harding said. “We knew it was going to be a long trip, but the problem was that everyone showed up at the See Bonfire on page 2 Far left: Senior agriculture major Jim Bouse leads the crowd in Aggie yells during Unity Project's off-campus bonfire held Saturday night off Dilly Shaw Tap Road in Bryan. The lighting of the bonfire was originally scheduled for 8 p.m. but was postponed for nearly two hours due to the large amount of stu dents waiting to get in. At least 10,000 Aggies came out to show off their burning desire to beat the University of Texas. Near Left: Students take a knee during the off-campus bonfire Saturday. The bonfire was approximately 50 ft tall with a bright orange outhouse on top. This year was the Unity Project's second year to build and burn a student-run off-campus bonfire. SHARON AESCHBACH* THE BATTALION Two American soldiers pummeled by Iraqi teens By Mariam Fam THE ASSOCIATED PRESS MOSUL, Iraq — Iraqi teenagers dragged two bloodied U.S. soldiers from a wrecked vehicle and pummeled them with concrete blocks Sunday, witnesses said, describing the killings as a burst of sav agery in a city once safe for Americans. Another soldier was killed by a bomb and a U.S.-allied police chief was assassinated. The U.S.-led coalition also said it grounded commercial flights after the mili tary confirmed that a missile struck a DHL cargo plane that landed Saturday at Baghdad International Airport with its wing aflame. Nevertheless, American officers insisted they were making progress in bringing sta bility to Iraq, and the U.S.-appointed Governing Council named an ambassador to Washington — an Iraqi-American woman who spent the past decade lobbying U.S. lawmakers to promote democracy in her homeland. Witnesses to the Mosul attack said gun men shot two soldiers driving through the city center, sending their vehicle crashing into a wall. The 101st Airborne Division said the soldiers were driving to See Soldiers on page 8 Attacks continue Gunmen shot and killed two American soldiers driving in Mosul on Sunday. A crowd then looted their vehicle and pummeled their bodies with concrete blocks. Elsewhere, one American soldier was killed by a roadside bomb, just outside Baghdad. TURKEY Two American soldiers shot and killed SYRIA T IRAQ SAUDI X ARABIA 0100 mi 0 100 km Kirkuk * \ uk / sBagh