Monday, November 1, 1999
The University Daily Kansan
Nation/World
Section A·Page 7
EgyptAir plane crashes into Atlantic
Boeing 767 carrying 214 people goes down after takeoff for Cairo
The Associated Press
BOSTON— An EgyptAir plane with 214 people on board crashed at sea off the island of Nantucket early yesterday on a flight from New York to Egypt, and bodies and wreckage were found in the water.
EgyptAir Flight 990, a Boeing 767, plummeted from radar screens while heading to Cairo on a flight that originated in Los Angeles.
The search was focused in a 36-square-mile area about 60 miles south of Nantucket, Coast Guard officials said yesterday.
"The initial report was we had found seats, seat cushions, the flotation devices on the aircraft, life rafts and some other small parts that are not identifiable." Coast Guard Rear Adm. Richard M. Larrabe said at a news conference in Boston.
More than one body had been found by late morning, said Robert Kelly, avia-
ion director for the Port Authority, which runs New York's Kennedy airport, at a news conference in New York. At a news conference in Cairo, EgyptAir head Mohammed Fahim Rayan was asked about reports that the Federal Aviation Administration had warned his airline about a terrorist threat.
"We take all precautions, and we have plenty of warnings from everybody, including the FAA." he said.
A U.S. intelligence official said yesterday that agencies were pursuing the possibility of sabotage but that there was nothing immediately to point toward that. Another official said there had been no recent threats that seemed relevant to the EgyptAir disappearance. Pavan and Larrabee said they had no
Rayan and Larrabee said they knowledge of any SOS from the crew.
"Contact with the plane was cut suddenly, which indicates that something happened suddenly," said Ibrahim el-Dimeir, Egypt's minister of transport, communications and civil aviation.
Armed security guards routinely fly on EgyptAir flights. After the airline's passengers go through the normal airport security check, they again are subjected to baggage search just before they
Kyle Ramsev/KANSAN
Flight 990 took off from New York's Kennedy International Airport at 1:19 a.m. EST and disappeared from radar at 2 a.m. while flying at 33,000 feet, said Eliot Breiner, chief spokesman for the FAA in Washington.
board the aircraft.
An official familiar with air traffic control, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said controllers in the Boston Center in Nashua, N.H., who were observing the flight but not directly controlling it, saw the plane when it was at 33,000 feet.
The controllers said that during a second radar sweep 12 seconds later, the plane had dropped to 26,600 feet, and in a third sweep 12 seconds later, the plane was at 19,100 feet — a drop of 13,900 feet in 24 seconds.
Michael Barr, head of the aviation safety program at the University of Southern California, said that rate of descent would indicate the plane almost was out of control.
The plane, a Boeing 767-300ER, was delivered to the airline in September 1989, said Boeing spokeswoman Barbara Murphy in Seattle. The Boeing 767 is a twin-engine, wide-body passenger jet.
Rayan said the plane had 33,334 flight hours, and its condition was good.
EgyptAir, founded in 1932 as Misr Airwork, has a fleet of 38 planes and flies to 85 airports around the world.
Critics have called for the privatization of the company, one of the oldest in Africa and the Middle East, amid reports of bad management and bad service.
Sunday's crash comes after the Oct. 19 hijack of an EgyptAir flight between Istanbul and Cairo. That hijacking ended peacefully in Germany, where the hijacker was overpowered; none of the 46 passengers on board was harmed.
Bar blaze in South Korea kills 54, injures 71
The Associated Press
INCHON, South Korea — Fire swept through a three-story building crowded with weekend diners and drinkers in a South Korean port city late Saturday, killing at least 54 people, many of them teen-agers, police said.
Many victims were believed to have suffocated from toxic smoke. Most were trapped inside a second-floor bar and a billiard parlor on the third floor, police said. The victims mainly were high school students.
Police questioned four electricians following the discovery that the fire erupted after they left an underground karaoke salon where they had done renovation work during the day. The electricians were released Sunday after the questioning.
After the electricians departed the
salon, two employees used an incandescent light to clean the floor with brooms. One of them accidentally broke the light bulb, and sparks dropped into a nearby can of paint thinner, police said.
"This is our finding so far, but the final results of the investigation will take some time," said Park Myong-hwan, local police chief.
The fire quickly swept through the building in Inchon, the country's third largest city. It is located 30 miles west of Seoul on the Yellow Sea.
"It was a burning hell." Park said of the burned bar where most of the victims were found. "Some were moaning in pain. We brought them out first and practiced artificial respiration."
The building, located in an entertainment district in the city's center, was about 20 years old and lacked basic fire prevention facilities such as sprinklers.
state-run KBS-TV reported. Many disasters in South Korea have been blamed on lax safety regulations.
"All windows facing the street in the beer bar were blocked, forcing those inside to try to flee through the only door leading to the narrow corridor," witness Kim Jun-kyu said.
Police tentatively put the casualty figure at 54 killed and 71 injured. The death toll could rise because some of the injured were in critical condition, police said.
Everyone in a ground-floor restaurant managed to escape, but more than 120 people in upper floors were trapped, police said.
through a narrow corridor, burning plastic furniture and floor carpets. Toxic gas quickly filled the building, and most of the windows were blocked, police said.
"The fire spread so quickly that by the time we got into the beer bar, we found many people already dead. They appeared to have suffocated from the smoke." Park said.
Police said fire engines rushed to the scene and extinguished the fire in 40 minutes.
The flames raced quickly upward
"There were so many people carried out of the building, but there were not enough ambulances, and so firefighters left them on the pavement and rushed back inside to get more people out," witness Woo Sung-hwan said.
Saturday's fire was the worst in the country since a hotel fire killed 88 people in Seoul in 1974. Three years before that, another hotel fired killed 165 people in Seoul in 1971.
Just four months ago, 19 kindergarten children and four adults were killed in a fire that gutted a dormitory at a seaside summer camp in western South Korea.
Russian leader denies charges of targeting civilians in Chechnya
The Associated Press
GROZNY, Russia—Despite reports by medical workers and Chechen officials that civilian causalities were mounting across Chechnya, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin insisted yesterday that his forces were not targeting peaceful residents.
Federal jets and artillery blasted Grozny and other towns yesterday across the breakaway region, leaving dozens of dead and wounded, officials and medical workers said.
"Everything that concerns the bombing of peaceful residents is the ill-intended propaganda of terrorists," Putin said yesterday in an interview on the Echo of Moscow radio station.
Hospital and Chechen officials said 22 people were killed during the weekend in two bombings.
Putin claimed that Islamic militants were shooting civilians, but added that there may have been some mistakes by federal forces.
mined during the weekend in two bombings. Chechen leaders claim some 3,600 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in Russian attacks since September. No independent confirmation was available, although medical workers have reported hundreds of civilian deaths.
Also yesterday, Russian security officials worked to secure the freedom of a French journalist who was taken hostage in Chechnya. Russian officials didn't say how long Brice Latieu had been captive, but French news reports said it was since Oct. 1.
About 1,300 people have been kidnapped in and around Chechnya during the last three years by gangs seeking ransom. More than 700 of the hostages have been freed.
"Any hostage in a Chechen prison, be it a Russian soldier, civilian or a French journalist, undergoes enormous suffering." Zdanovich said.
A videotape that played on Russia's NTV television yesterday showed Latieu pleading for help and saying his captors beat him regularly.
Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov said yesterday that Russian warplanes were killing women, children and elderly trying to leave the battle zone to save their lives.
Russian and Chechen commanders both reported more fighting yesterday, with ground clashes around Gudermes, the breakaway republic's second largest town, and Grozny, the capital.
Russian officials said border crossings would be reopened Monday to allow some 20,000 Chechen refugees to cross. The refugees have been trapped on the Chechen side of the border since Russia closed the border last week.
The University Libraries will hold a series of booksales during the week of November 1, 1999. Please note that for the first part of each sale, access will be limited to those with a valid KUID See the details below:
Tuesday, November 2, 9:00 - 4:00 (KUID: 9:00 - 11:00)
Music Library (Murphy Hall): Music books and scores;
sound recordings
Wednesday, November 3. 12:00-4:00 (KUID: 12:00 - 1:00) Anschutz Library: Science and Engineering
Thursday, November 4, 8:00 - 4:00 (KUID: 8:00 - 10:00):
Library 2nd floor:
Anthropology
Business
History
English and American language and literature
Dance
Economics
Education
Political Science
Religion
Sociology
Reference books, including dictionaries and encyclopedias
Slavic language and literature
Women's studies
Smaller amounts of material in Classics, French literature Philosophy, Religion, and Spanish literature.
University of Kansas Libraries Publications Office · 350 Watson Library · 864-3378
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