Tuesday, March 11, 1986
Page 2
Daily Nebraskan
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By The Associated Press
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WASHINGTON Three-fourths of the nation's
police and firemen are inadequately trained to
respond to accidents involving transportation of
hazardous materials, a new congressional study
says.
And even if a t rained team reaches the scene
of a ruptured tank truck, improper labeling of
the vehicle's contents can produce a wrong,
dangerous response, the Office of Technology
Assessment said in a study released Monday.
OTA quoted state officials as saying that from
25 percent to 50 percent of the identification
placards required on hazardous material ship
ments are incorrect and that shiping documents
"are sometimes incomplete or inaccessible."
"Emergency crews must assess the risks of
the hazardous material and make decisions on
how to respond based on information that may or
may not be accurate," said OTA, a nonpartisan
congressional agency.
"The wrong response to a hazardous material
endangers both emergency personnel and the
neighboring communities," said the study, which
urged adoption of federal training and response
standards to replace a mishmash of state re
quirements. Asked why so many placards are incorrect,
Edith Page, who directed the study, said: "In
some cases it's ignorance. In some cases it's
carelessness."
OTA said the most pressing need is to develop
better ways of training safety personnel to han
dle accidents involving the 500,000 daily ship
ments of hazardous materials on U.S. highways,
rail lines and waterways.
"Three-quarters of the first responders are not
adequately trained to deal with hazardous sub
stances," Page told a news briefing.
She said t hat a joke among response person
nel is that you bring tennis shoes and binoculars
to a toxic or nuclear material spill using the
shoes to quickly get a safe distance away and the
binoculars to read the placard.
"Then you call for expert help," Page said.
"This is often said in jest, but there's a strong
element of truth in it."
OTA said that while some states and metropoli
tan areas have good response programs, "most
first responders in smaller urban and rural areas
have not been trained to deal with hazardous
materials, despite many existing training pro
grams." Although it did not specifically urge more
federal spending, OTA said continued support
for state enforcement programs "is important,
since federal inspection forces are shrinking due
to budget constraints."
OTA recommended better training and a national
license for operators of vehicles carrying hazard
ous substances in an effort to reduce the average
of 11,462 accidents the Transportation Depart
ment says occurred yearly between 1973 and
1983.
In most states, Page said, a truck driver needs
no special license for hazardous cargoes. "The
nephew or son of the owner can drive a gasoline
truck," she said.
Page said OTA doesn't trust Transportation
Department figures indicating that the inci
dence of accidents involving hazardous mate
rials is decreasing.
FAA admits more trained
controllers are needed
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Federal
Aviat ion Administration acknowledged
Monday that more fully trained air traf
fic controllers are needed, but insisted
its existing workforce is keeping the
skies sale.
FAA Administrator" Donald Engen
was to appear before a Senate "air
safety task force" to respond to a criti
cal report by the General Accounting
Office. The study suggests there are not
enough controllers for peak traffic
loads in some parts of the country
and that flights should be curtailed.
The congressional report released
last week has renewed lawmakers'
concern about air safety. The Senate
task force, par' of the Republican Con
ference, includes a number of senators
involved in aviation issues.
Meanwhile, a House investigations
subcommittee on aviation has sheduled
a hearing next week on the GAO's
findings.
Rep. James Oberstar, D-Minn.,
chairman of the investigations sub
committee of the House Public Works
and Transportation Committee, said
the GAO report ". . .shows clearly that
t here are serious stresses on the nation's
air traffic control system."
An FAA spokesman conceded that
controllers still are working "too much
overtime" at some busy control centers
and that FAA planners know "they
don't have enough controllers, includ
ing enough full performance level
controllers."
Buckhorn said that in the meantime,
air traffic is being regulated through
'flow control techniques designed to
keep controllers from being overbur
dened. The GAO study, however, suggests
that those flow control measures should
be examined to determine whether
they are adequate.
"The track record of air traffic con
trol is excellent," Buckhorn said. He
cited statistics which show a 3 percent
increase in air traffic in 1985, but an 18
percent decline in flight delays and a
26 percent drop in operational errors,
instances where controllers allow planes
to come closer to one another than
regulations permit.
The GAO report urges the FAA to
impose restrictions on air traffic until
the agency gets as many fully trained
controllers into the workforce as it
wants, and overtime is reduced.
"Limiting air traffic before condi
tions worsen seems to be the prudent
choice," said the study, which was
based largely on questionnaires sent to
more than 5,500 controllers and super
visors, as well as interviews with the
respondents.
Rulo trial .
OMAHA A man whose body
was found on a survivalist cult's
southeast Nebraska farm was skinned
alive, a prosecutor said Monday at
the murder trial of a father and son
accused in the torture slaving.
In his opening statement, Otoe
County Attorney Randall Rehmeier
said cult leader Michael Ryan and
his son Dennis used a "razor-like"
instrument to skin the legs of James
Thimm, 26.
The bodies of Thimm and 5-year-old
Luke Stice were found in
unmarked graves last August at the
farm near Rulo. Michael Ryan will
be tried later on a first-degree
murder charge in the death of young
Stice.
Both Ryans sat impassively during
the opening statement. Dennis Ryan,
16, yawned several times.
Herb in Hasting
KEARNEY, Neb. - A Hastings
man who won $5,000 for spotting
Burger King's Herb in the fast-food
chain's Kearney restaurant says he'll
spend his winnings on his family.
John Coats, 25, said he was in
Kearney on Sunday with his wife
Renee, and their infant daughter,
Ashley, to visit his sister.
Coats said he was on his way to
the restroom when he spotted Herb,
decked out in his usual black
rimmed glasses and too-short trou
sers. "He came in the side door and I
followed him from the door, probably
20 feet," Coats said. "1 grabbed him
by the arm and asked him if he was
Herb.
"He said, Congratulations. You've
just won $5,000.' "
Teaching test
AUSTIN, Texas Teachers may
be used to flunking students, but
Monday the instructors themselves
faced that prospect as an estimated
,205,000 teachers took a state-mandated
test.
About 10,000 were expected to
fail, but early finishers said it wasn't
so tough.
Teachers protested the Teachers
Examination of Current Adminis
trators and Teachers, which was
mandated by the 1984 public school
reforms passed by the Legislature in
an effort to improve the quality of
instruction in Texas schools.
Hostage photos
BEIRUT, Lebanon Islamic Jihad
Monday issued photographs it claim
ed depicted the body of Michel Seu-
rat. the French hostage the under
ground terrorist group claimed to
have killed last week.
The Shi'ite Moslem fundamental
ists said the photographs, one show
ing Seurat lying bare-chested with
his eyes half-closed and another
showing a blanket-wrapped body in
a coffin, were issued because of
"skepticism about the seriousness
of our earlier claim."
Yurchenko rumor
WASHINGTON The Soviet
Embassy denied reports Monday
that Vitaly Yurchenko, the Soviet
KGB agent who returned to Moscow
last November after three months in
CIA custody, has been executed.
"Vitary Yurchenko is alive, in
good health and he works in Mos
cow," said Boris Malakhov, the
embassy spokesman. He called the
report that Yurchenko had been
killed by firing squad "a crude
concoction," and a "deliberate,
malicious lie."
The account of Yurchenko's al
leged death was first reported by
National Public Radio, quoting uni
dentified Reagan administration
sources. NPR's report said that Yur
chenko's family had been billed for
the ammunition, according to Soviet
custom.
NelwaMcan
34 Nebraska Union
14C0 R St.. Lincoln. Nb. 6853-0448
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ALL MATERIAL COPYRIGHT 1986 DAILY NEBRASKAN
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