Section A · Page 8
The University Daily Kansan
Wednesday, April 8. 1998
Tests show that trucks are not all like a rock
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON—In television commercials, pickup trucks look indestructible, so much so that one automaker brags they're like a rock. But back them into a loading dock or bump them into another vehicle, and it can be a different story.
An insurance-industry study released yesterday found that some popular small pickups racked up sizeable repair bills in crash tests at just 5 mph. Leading the way was the Toyota Tacoma, which sustained $4,361 in damage in four low-speed tests.
The best of the lot, the Chevrolet L-10 LS, had $2,246 in damage. The other trucks tested by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety were the Ford Ranger XLT ($2,952 in total damages), the Dodge Dakota Sport ($3,863) and the Nissan Frontier XE ($3,867).
The institute, which is sponsored by the insurance industry, said the trucks sustained the damage because most are equipped with rigid bumpers. By contrast, cars have bumpers that contain energy-absorbing materials such as foam.
"People may think that pickup trucks are tough. But they quickly find out this isn't true when they bump into something at a slow speed and then have to shell out thousands of dollars to repair the damage," said Adrian Lund, the institute's senior vice president.
Truck makers took issue with the test results, as well as the group conducting them.
"The Tacoma meets all the general requirements for crash worthiness," said Julie Alfonso, spokeswoman for Toyota Motor Sales USA Inc. Last year the company sold 145,911 Tacomas, little brothers to the full-size T-100 pickups.
In its tests, the institute drove the trucks four ways: forward and backward into a flat barrier, forward into an angled barrier and backward into a pole.
Even at 5 mph, the lack of energy-absorbing bumper materials led to crash damage on the sheet metal of the Nissan and the Toyota during the forward-impact tests. In tests of the Toyota and the Dodge, the cargo beds on the trucks slammed into the passenger compartment when the vehicles were backed into the barrier.
El Niño leaves winter weather warmer and wetter than before
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Because of El Niño, the first two months of 1998 were the warmest and wettest in 104 years, providing a taste of what might be expected if global warming predictions come true, the chief of the government's climate research agency said yesterday.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued a report saying what many people in rain-drenched California and across much of the country already suspected: There has been too much rain, and for most of the eastern part of the country, winter never arrived.
But the agency provided some details about what climatologists have called one of the major climatic events of this century
the El Niño-driven winter of 198.
In January and February, the national average U.S. temperature was 37.5 degrees Fahrenheit, 5.4 degrees higher than normal and the highest since the government began keeping records 104 years ago. Sixteen states reported record average temperatures.
The two months also saw an average rainfall of 6.01 inches, or about 50 percent more than the normal average of 4.05 inches. Precipitation records were set across the Southeast, in Oklahoma and in California. The relationship between the El Nine now
The relationship between duced weather patterns and long-term climate change is not clear, said the report. But it said the December-February weather patterns were unusual even when viewed as part of a 100-year climate history. The report said it also followed a general trend of warmer temperatures.
projections panned out as some climate models predicted.
"We can't draw a causal link between El Niño and global warming," said Baker. "But our modeling tells us that global warming may first manifest itself in
"This record-breaking El Niño is consistent with a worldwide trend over the last 40 years toward a warmer and wetter world," said Commerce Undersecretary James Baker, administration chief and professional oceanographer.
"We can't draw a casual link between El Niño and global warming."
He called the winter of 1998 a possible window on the future if overall warming
James Baker
Commerce Undersecretary
changes in weather patterns. This El Niño is a taste of what we might expect if the earth warms as we now project."
From December through March, the report found, some California coastal areas and the Sierra Mountains
got up to 6 feet of rain, while parts of Florida and the Appalachian region saw up to 3 feet of rain.
The overall winter — December through February — was the second warmest and seventh wettest on record. The 1991-92 winter was slightly warmer, and the winter of 1932 was wetter.
The warm weather produced the lowest
amount of snowfall ever recorded in a dozen cities in the Midwest and East, including only 1.8 inches in normally snowbound Buffalo, N.Y., according to the report.
Ironically, El Niño brought unusually dry conditions in two states — Hawaii and Alaska. Hawaii got one-fourth of its normal rainfall. Alaska had less snow and warmer weather than usual, with Juneau recording the second-warmest February on record.
Many scientists believe the continued growth of manmade greenhouse chemicals in the atmosphere, mainly carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels, will cause a significant warming of the earth and major climate changes.
But some skeptics of global warming argue that current computer models cannot fully explain the impact of ocean currents, clouds and other factors that may mitigate the warming process.
Industrial countries, including the United States, agreed at a December climate conference in Kyoto, Japan, to slow the flow of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere as a first step to deal with the potential threat.
Proper foods provide needed vitamins
Nutrient excesses or deficiencies cause problems
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Americans are getting most of the B vitamins they need in the average diet, but women who might become pregnant should eat specially fortified foods or take vitamin supplements, says a nutrition report.
To ensure against birth defects, women of childbearing age need an extra 400 micrograms of folic acid every day, either in a vitamin supplement or in fortified breakfast cereals, grains and other foods, the Institute of Medicine said yesterday.
That is in addition to the folate-rich diet all Americans should eat, full of citrus fruits, beans and dark green, leafy vegetables, the institute said.
"In a country where the top two vegetables are french fries and iceberg lettuce, people need to make better food choices," said Chris Rosenbloom, a Georgia State University nutrition professor representing the American Dietetic Association.
The Institute of Medicine, a private organization that advises the federal government, is reviewing the nation's recommended daily allowances, or RDAs, for nutrients.
Its review of complex B vitamins, including folic acid, B-12, B-6 thiamine, riboflavin and niacin, found good news: Most Americans get plenty, particularly since many B vitamins are in fortified cereals and grain products that are dietary staples.
But the institute's expert panel cautioned against popping huge doses. There is not enough evidence that large amounts protect against heart disease or cancer to urge big increases in Americans' diets, the institute said. And they recommended the first maximum doses for four nutrients to protect against side effects.
The report said that before this year, many Americans did not eat enough folate, a trace
nutrient important for cell production also called folic acid.
But starting in January, extra synthetic folic acid was added to all fortified cereals and grain products. Most adults now will get enough, said institute expert Barry Shane of the University of California at Berkeley.
Women who may become pregnant still are at risk. Folic acid, particularly in very early pregnancy, helps prevent certain brain and spinal birth defects that afflict about 2,500 babies a year.
So those women must eat an extra 400 micrograms of synthetic folic acid on top of a folaterich diet, the institute said, by taking a daily vitamin or eating lots of fortified foods.
Doctors have long warned pregnant women about folic acid, but yesterday's report stressed that the synthetic type, in addition to the kind from spinach and oranges, was vital because it was absorbed twice as well and that the newly fortified cereals were a good source.
Some breakfast cereals provide 400 micrograms of folic acid in a single bowl. Other folate options include: a half-cup of spinach provides 130 micrograms; a half-cup of navy
beans 125; a sandwich 80; a cup of orange juice 45; and one ounce of peanuts 30.
As for vitamin B-12, people need 2.4 micrograms a day, the amount in three ounces of beef. But up to 30 percent of Americans older than 50 cannot absorb the vitamin from regular food, so the institute recommended they eat fortified foods or take a vitamin supplement.
The institute also recommended upper limits of four nutrients:
No more than 100 milligrams of vitamin B. Higher doses can cause painful nerve disorders.
No more than 1,000 micrograms, or 1 miligram, of folic acid. People who are deficient in vitamin B-12 can suffer crippling neurologic damage if they take high doses of folic acid.
No more than 35 milligrams of niacin, a little more than twice the daily recommended dose. The higher doses cause blood vessels to dilate.
No more than 3.5 grams a day of choline, a related nutrient important for maintaining cell membranes. Higher doses can cause low blood pressure, sweating and a fishy body odor.
Observatory finds more water in space
Discovery reveals possibility for life on moons, planets
The Associated Press
LONDON — Orbiting high above Earth, Europe's infrared space observatory has discovered water around stars, planets and in many other surprising places, raising expectations of life elsewhere in the universe, the European Space Agency said yesterday.
The discovery of water vapor in the atmosphere of Saturn's largest moon, Titan, has generated the most excitement because that moon may duplicate the conditions that led to the creation of life on Earth, said Roger Bonnet, the agency's director of science.
"Now that water has been discovered ... this lends more support to the possibility that we
have all the conditions which prevailed on Earth 4.5 billion years ago to give birth to life," he said. "These conditions may also exist on Titan, and the only thing you need is a little heat to heat up Titan."
For two and a half years, the European Space Agency's Infrared Space Observatory, known as ISO, has been exploring the universe at wavelengths that can't be seen with the human eye, giving astronomers a new view of the solar system.
Astronomers have been able to see water throughout the universe, to see where stars are forming, to shed light on distant galaxies and to solve riddles that have puzzled astronomers for centuries, said Reinhard Genzel, chairman of the agency's Astronomy Working Group.
"With ISO, for the first time, you could see water." Genzel said at a news conference yesterday. "In fact, it has been a spectacular vista to see water everywhere."
The observatory found water around dying stars, around newborn stars, in interstellar space, in other galaxies and in the atmospheres
around Mars and all the outer planets, particularly the Titan moon, Genzel said.
"Now you may say, 'So what?' Well, that's actually quite surprising because it's so cold out there. So, water should normally freeze out. So, the fact that there is water in these atmospheres is really rather remarkable," he said.
Genzel said the explanation probably had to do with the fact that something in space was bringing water to the icy outer planets all the time — possibly comets.
"And that is important because maybe that's the way water came on Earth in the early part of the solar system when there were many more comets around, and the Earth was bombarded by these icy objects, bringing in water," he said.
Athena Cousenist of the Paris Observatory said scientists knew Titan's atmosphere contained carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide, so they expected water vapor too.
The U.S. space agency's planetary explorer Cassini, which was launched in October, promises the best look yet at Saturn and its icy
moons
When the plutonium-powered spacecraft arrives at Saturn in 2004 after a 2.2 billion-mile journey, it will release the Huygens probe, built by the European Space Agency, which will land on Titan.
"After ISO, the Huygens probe will reveal the actual degree of complexity in a mixture of elaborate organic molecules, closely resembling the chemical soup of the young Earth," Coustenis said.
Last month, American scientists reported that closer-than-ever pictures of Jupiter's moon Europa showed a 16-mile-wide crater that may have been filled with water and large frozen plates.
The photos, taken in December by the spacecraft Galileo, bolstered the theory that an ocean that possibly could contain life existed beneath Europa's icy crust, scientists said.
With the European infrared telescope, Genzeli said, scientists also unexpectedly discovered remarkably high concentrations of water around young stars in the Orion constellation.
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