Thursday, February 3,2000
Page 2
Editor: Lindsay Young
(402) 472-1763
• ___ • •'
Flight 261 voice recorder found
Flight data recorder still sought, but search for survivors called off
PORT HUENEME, Calif. (AP) -
Searchers recovered one of the “black
box” recorders Wednesday that could
reveal more clues about what caused
an Alaska Airlines jet to crash in the
ocean off the California coast.
A remote-controlled underwater
robot called Scorpio broke the surface
of the Santa Barbara Channel shortly
before sundown clutching the cockpit
voice recorder, which contains tape of
conversations between crew members,
air traffic controllers and any other
sounds in the cockpit.
National Transportation Safety
Board spokesman Terry Williams con
firmed the box was the cockpit
recorder. The search continued for a
companion box - the flight data
recorder - that records data on the
plane’s mechanical operation.
Alaska Flight 261 plunged into the
Pacific on Monday as the pilots strug
gled with a jammed horizontal stabiliz
er on the tail of the plane, according to
radio conversations between the pilots
and air traffic controllers. Killed were
88 crew and passengers on the flight to
San Francisco and Seattle from Puerto
Vallarta, a Mexican vacation spot.
Investigators confirmed
Wednesday they were looking into a
report that the plane had problems with
a part of the stabilizer on the flight
down to Mexico. The device keeps the
plane flying level. The airline said it
was unaware of any problems with the
plane.
Authorities also began analyzing
recordings of the pilots’ conversations
with a Seattle maintenance crew made
while the pilots tried to control the
plane in the terrifying moments before
it nose-dived into the sea.
Earlier Wednesday, dozens of
Coast Guard and Navy ships were
ordered to abandon the search for sur
vivors and shift their focus to recover
ing flight recorders and wreckage.
The wreckage is about 700 feet
down. Divers cannot operate below
about 300 feet, so the search is being
carried out by three unmanned vehi
cles.
The search for survivors was called
off over the protest of some family
members who held out hope that some
of the plane’s passengers and crew
might still be alive in the chilly waters
of the Santa Barbara Channel.
“We have far exceeded our esti
mate of survivability,” Coast Guard
Vice A dm. Thomas Collins said.
On shore, investigators inter
viewed airline employees about a
report in The Seattle Times that a dif
ferent crew of pilots complained of
problems with the aircraft’s horizontal
stabilizer as they headed toward Puerto
Vallarta.
Alaska Airlines spokesman Jack
Evans in Seattle denied the report: “We
stand by what we said earlier this week,
which is that we’re not aware of any
maintenance anomalies with this air
craft.”
NTSB member John
Hammerschmidt said the agency is
** We have far
exceeded our
estimate of
survivability."
Vice Adm. Thomas Collins
United States Coast Guard
investigating the newspaper report and
is interviewing pilots from the earlier
flight.
Meanwhile, a jammed horizontal
stabilizer forced an American Airlines
MD-80 to land in Phoenix 20 minutes
after takeoff Wednesday, said Phil
Frame, a spokesman for the NTSB in
Washington.
The plane, which had been headed
toward Dallas, is part of the same series
of aircraft as the Alaska MD-83 that
crashed.
Israel debate turns confrontational
■ Lawmakers walk out
in protest over nuclear
weapon arsenal increase.
JERUSALEM (AP) - The first
public parliamentary debate of Israel’s
top-secret nuclear weapons arsenal
degenerated into an ugly confrontation
- Wednesday when an Arab legislator
announced that Israel has up to 300
nuclear warheads, prompting Jewish
lawmakers to call him a spokesman for
terrorists.
Military censorship has always for
bidden reports in the local media about
Israel’s nuclear arsenal. But Issam
Mahoul’s speech, broadcast live on
television, gave Israelis their first
opportunity to hear details from one of
their own.
Most Jewish lawmakers marched
out of parliament in protest.
A visibly uncomfortable Cabinet
minister, Haim Ramon, responded to
Mahoul by repeating Israel’s well
known, yet vague nuclear policy state
ment, and refuting Mahoul’s premise
that the public has the right to know.
Ramon said Israel would not be the
first to introduce nuclear weapons into
the Middle East, a decades-old policy
known here as “ambiguity,” implying
that Israel has nuclear arms capability,
but not actual bombs.'
Two diplomats from the Egyptian
embassy in Tel Aviv watched the
debate from the gallery. Egypt has
been pressing for Israel to sign the
nuclear nonproliferation treaty and get
rid of the weapons it has never admit
ted having.
Jewish members interrupted
Mahoul’s speech with catcalls as he
declared: “All the world knows that
Israel is a vast warehouse of atomic,
biological and chemical weapons that
serves as the anchor for the Middle
East arms race.”
Some lawmakers called him a
spokesman for Arab terrorists.
“You are committing a crime
against Israeli Arabs today,” shouted
Ofer Pines-Paz, an Arab and chairman
of Prime Minister Ehud Barak’s coali
tion in parliament.
Undeterred, Mahoul went on to
claim that Israel’s three new German
built submarines “will be fitted with
iVyfclAl H£lK —|
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# - ALLMATERIAL COPYRIGHT 1999
THE DAILY NEBRASKAN
• You are committing a crime against
Israeli Arabs today.”
Ofer Pines-Paz
ciiairman of Prime Minister Ehud Barak’s coalition in parliament
nuclear weapons” to provide Israel the
capacity to retaliate if hit with a nuclear
attack.
Mahoul said the policy under
mined government claims that its
nuclear threat is a deterrent to attack.
He warned that the nuclear stock
pile is a hazard, turning “this little piece
of territory into a nuclear garbage bin,
poisoned and poisoning, that could
send us all up in a mushroom cloud.”
Mahoul said Israel’s vague policy
statement had lost all credibility, point
ing to disclosures by Mordechai
Vanunu, who worked at Israel’s desert
nuclear reactor before revealing
nuclear weapons secrets to die London
Sunday Times in 1986. He was sen
tenced to 18 years in prison for treason.
A dozen Israeli antinuclear
weapons activists, invited by Mahoul’s
Hadash party, sat in the gallery. One of
them, Gideon Spiro, said the govern
ment’s ambiguity policy was wearing
thin.
“The difference is that the same old
lies are being told against the back
ground of more transparency from the
point of view of information that’s
available to us,” he said.
The debate was raucous and hitter
even by the standards of Israel’s unruly
parliament. It created a rare public split
down ethnic lines, with Jews from
almost all political backgrounds
opposing the Arab members, though
Barak’s party often sides with the Arab
members and counts on them for polit
ical support.
Arab lawmaker Ahmed Tibi said
the Jews consider themselves Israeli
patriots, but “they see us as traitors.”
Arabs make up about 16 percent of
Israel’s citizens.
Senate approves bill to
raise minimum, wage
■ The current $5.15
hourly wage likely to rise
before Election Day.
WASHINGTON (AP) - Teeing up
for an election-year fight, the Senate
approved a Republican bill
Wednesday that would boost the mini
mum wage by $1 an hour over three
years, a period of time President
Clinton and Democrats say is too long
to wait.
With many Republicans - espe
cially in the House - eager to avoid
repeated campaign-season attacks on
the widely popular issue, some
increase in the current $5.15 hourly
minimum seems likely to become law
before Election Day.
But with the White House and
Democrats also objecting to the mea
sure’s $18 billion in tax cuts over five
years - mostly for small business own
ers - it is unclear what the final ver
sion will look like.
The GOP’s desire to avoid making
the proposal a campaign issue gives
Democrats little incentive to quickly
settle for anything less than what they
want: a two-year phase-in, with a
much smaller tax package.
The minimum wage boost was
included in a bill that would overhaul
the nation’s bankruptcy laws that the
Senate approved by 83-14.
The House approved its own ver
sion of the bankruptcy legislation last
May, but it lacked any minimum wage
provisions. v
Last November, the House Ways
and Means Committee approved a
separate GOP bill that would increase
the minimum wage by $ 1 over three
years and includes a $30 billion, five
year package of tax cuts. Some $16
billion of that price tag is a reduction
in the estate tax paid by upper-income
people who inherit substantial assets.
But the fate of the House legisla
tion is unclear.
With defections likely by moder
ate Republicans from urban, north
eastern districts, GOP leaders so far
lack the votes to move their version of
the bill through the House.
■ new jersey
Investigators believe Seton
fire set deliberately
NEWARK, N.J. (AP) -
Investigators of the deadly Seton
Hall University dormitory fire
believe the blaze was deliberately set,
The Star-Ledger ofNewark reported
Wednesday.
Authorities have identified at
least four suspects in the Jan. 19 fire
that killed three freshmen, the news
paper reported, citing law enforce
ment sources it did not name. No
charges have been filed.
The investigators believe the
incident may have resulted from a
feud between a group of students and
some non-students who were visit
ing the building on the night of the
blaze, the newspaper reported. But
they have not concluded whether the
third-floor lounge fire was started as
a prank or an attempt to harm some
one.
The smoky predawn blaze
injured about 60 people and forced a
chaotic evacuation by hundreds of
others.
■ Russia
Albright fails to make
headway with Putin
MOSCOW (AP) - In the highest
level U.S. contact with Russia’s new
leader, Secretary of State Madeleine
Albright failed to persuade Vladimir
Putin during three hours of debate
Wednesday to pull back in
Chechnya.
“I don’t think we are any closer to
a political solution on Chechnya,”
Albright said after the Kremlin meet
ing, originally scheduled for about
60 minutes. “Neither of us minced i
words.”
She complimented Putin as a
Russian patriot with a “problem- j
solving approach,” while expressing
frustration at her inability to con
vince the former security service
chief that the blitz in Chechnya was
isolating Russia diplomatically.
For his part, Putin said at a pic
ture-taking session that “the United
States is putting certain pressures on
Russia,” but that he remained com
mitted to his policies.
■ Washington
Senate vote doesn’t need
lore’s tie breaker
WASHINGTON (AP) - The
Senate voted Wednesday to prevent
people who violated laws protecting
abortion clinics from escaping Fmes
or civil judgments against them.
Republicans abandoned their
vigorous opposition to the
Democratic proposal after
Democrats summoned Vice
President A1 Gore from die presiden
tial campaign trail to break a possible
tie vote.
But the 80-17 roll call denied
Gore a chance to vote on the measure
as president of the Senate, as well as
a needed opportunity to reaffirm his
pro-choice credentials.
Former Sen. Bill Bradley, oppos
ing Gore for the Democratic presi- j
dential nomination, has questioned
Gore’s commitment to protecting
women’s right to choose abortion.
■ New York
Super Bowl pushes ABC
ahead in ratings 4
NEW YORK (AP) - A super
week put ABC ahead of its rivals for
bragging rights as the season* most
watched television network - proba
bly for good.
IBP" ABC crushed its competition last
week behind Sunday’s competitive
Super Bowl game between the Sit.
Louis Rams and Tennessee Titans
and another record-setting perfor
mance by “Who Wants to Bela
Millionaire.”