Warding off warts
Each Wednesday and Thursday, physicians at Watkins Hospital work to wipe out the warts of KU students, faculty and staff.
Story, page 3
A train carrying the second shipment of radioactive waste from the Three Mile Island nuclear reactor passed through Kansas last night without a hint of protest.
Silent tracks
Wash your step
Story, page 9
Partly cloudy skies will bring a chance of thunderstorms today and tonight. It also might get a little breezy today as rain showers should move in by late afternoon.
Details, page 3
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Vol. 97, No. 8 (USPS 650-640)
Published since 1889 by the students of the University of Kansas
Wednesday September 3, 1986
Shari Oetting/KANSAN
Life is but a dream
The Kansas Crew team is looking for feet to fill the shoes of its eightman racing shell. Members of the crew were recruiting in front of Strong Hall yesterday.
Left, Shane Wood, Overland Park freshman, takes a turn on the team's ergometer. An ergometer, which was used in a demonstration, measures both speed and miles traveled.
Mike Horton/KANSAN
Silent reactor awaits federal word
Editor's note: This is the first story of a two-part series. The second story will deal with the University's development of a comprehensive plan for dealing with hazardous materials.
By ALISON YOUNG
Staff writer
KU's nuclear reactor stands silent among bright yellow barrels of radioactive waste and abandoned control boards and monitoring instruments.
Plans now call for the reactor room to be used for additional office space or for temporary storage of hazardous waste. The University shut down the reactor located in the Nuclear Reactor Center, adjacent to Learned Hall on West 15th Street, in 1964 and had the fuel rods removed in February.
The first plan would be to use the reactor room as the central collection and preparation area for all campus-generated hazardous wastes. The remainder of the building would probably be used as office space for the School of Engineering, Locke said.
had the tuxedo plumes on.
But action on the plans is at a standstill.
as the University awaits news on whether it will get a federal grant, University officials said last week.
Two uses have been proposed for the reactor center, which houses the inactive reactor and several offices and laboratories of the school of engineering, said Carl E. Locke, dean of engineering.
The second plan would be to use the entire building for office space. Locke said. The proposals are part of a plan for dealing with hazardous materials on campus.
Harold Rosson, professor of chemical and petroleum engineering, said the second
Neither of these plans, however, can start until the federal government acts on a proposal submitted this summer by KU asking for assistance in financing a new hazardous waste handling complex.
The reactor room is now being used for the temporary storage of campus-generated radioactive waste.
plan could include using the reactor room for office space. Rosson was in charge of the reactor's decommissioning
The University is asking for $330,000 in federal money and would find some way — still undetermined — to match the grant, said Robert Bearse, associate vice chancellor for research and graduate studies.
See REACTOR, p. 5, col. 4
Violent crime up 50 percent in '86, state report says
The Associated Press
TOPEKA - Violent crimes increased 50 percent during the first six months of 1986 compared with last year, while crimes against property jumped 13 percent during that time, according to statistics released yesterday by the Kansas Bureau of Investigation.
During the same time period, Lawrence reported a 16.3 percent overall increase in crime, according to the statistics.
Other statistics showed the number of assaults on law enforcement officers was on the rise from January to June with 511 cases in 1986 compared with 479 last year. However, the arson rate dropped with just 376 cases this year compared to 391 in 1985.
In the category of violent crimes, the state experienced increases in rape, robbery and aggravated assault with the number of aggravated assaults raising 71 percent. The murder rate declined during the first six months of the year. All three categories of property crime — burglary, larceny and motor vehicle theft — showed marked increase during the time period.
Here is a list of the major crimes, the number reported in Kansas during the first six months of 1986, the number reported last year and the percentage of change:
Violent Crimes
■ Murder: 52 reported January-June 1986; 62 during the same period of 1985; 16 percent decrease.
**Rape:** 341 reported in 1986; 338 in 1985; 1 percent increase.
Robbery: 982 in 1986; 901 in 1985; 9 percent increase.
**Aggravated Assault:** 4,774 in 1986; 2,786 in 1985, 71 percent increase
*Burglary* 15,709 in 1986; 11,530 in 1985; 36 percent increase
Property Crimes
*Larceny: 32,282 in 1986; 31,317 in 1985; 3 percent increase.
The incidents of aggravated assault showed the biggest increase of any category with a 71-percent jump during the first half of the year. Burglary and motor vehicle theft also showed significant increases in the 30-percent range.
- Motor Vehicle Theft: 3,154 in 1986; 2,395 in 1985; 32 percent increase.
The KBI said in its report that some of the increases were attributed to a new procedure for counting the various crimes. The statistics are compiled from reports filed by about 300 local law enforcement agencies.
Not only was the rate of property crimes up, but the value of the property stolen also increased. The property stolen during the first half of 1986 was valued at $30.1 million while the loot in 1985 came to $24.8 million — a 21 percent increase.
A similar increase was reflected in the amount of stolen property recovered by law enforcement agencies: $11.2 million recovered in 1986 and $8.1 million in 1985.
1500 and 25,414 million. Of the four major metropolitan counties, Shawnee County led all others with a 31.6 percent increase in all crime — largely in property crimes which jumped 34 percent while violent crimes increased 8 percent.
Johnson County followed with a 28.9 percent increase in crime: 36.5 percent in violent crimes and 24.8 percent in property crimes.
Wyandotte County was third with an overall 22.4 percent jump; 27.4 percent in violent crime and 21.6 percent in property crime. Sedgwick County had a 9.5 percent overall increase with nearly 10 percent jump in property crime and a 6.6 percent increase in violent crime.
While crime was lower in Sedgwick County than the other metropolitan counties, Wichita led all cities with the number of crimes reported at 10,678, a 9.7 percent hike over last year when 9,736 were reported through June
Kansas City, Kan., was second with 0.222 crimes in 1986, a 22 percent jump over 1985. Topeka had a 30 percent jump in crime.
United Press International
Pilot warned of plane a minute before crash
CERRITOS, Calif. — The pilot of Aeromexico Flight 498 was warned of an approaching aircraft more than a minute before the jetliner's tail was sliced off by a small private plane, sending both crafts hurting to earth, a federal official said yesterday.
The official death toll from Sunday's tragedy remained at 70 - 64 on the Aeromexico jet, three in the small Piper airplane and three on the ground in the residential area where the airline crashed — but there were indications that the final figure of ground casualties could climb.
John Lauber, spokesman and member of the National Transportation Safety Board, said a transcript of conversations between an air traffic controller and the pilot of the Aeromexico jet indicated that the pilot was warned of approaching traffic one minute and 15 seconds before the collision, enough time for the liner to take evasive action.
"Aeroemexico 498, traffic 10 o'clock, one mile
d the Aeromedical pilot.
*Roger, 498.* The pilot responded.
northbound, altitude unknown," the controller told the Aeromexico pilot.
"Roger, 488, the pilot response. Lauber said the Aeromexico pilot and copilot "did not acknowledge with any information that they had spotted the traffic."
by traffic, the board spokesman said the controller was referring to one aircraft, but he said investigators had not determined whether it was the Piper. "It cannot be ruled out that it could be the Piper aircraft," Lauber said.
Shortly after the conversation, the jetliner was given permission to reduce altitude from 7,000 to 6,000 feet. Lauber said.
Investigators will review readouts of radar transmission logged into the control tower at Los Angeles International Airport before the collision to try to determine whether the approaching traffic was the Piper, Lauber said.
Meanwhile, County Fire Capt. Gordon Pearson and county coroner's spokesman Bill Gold discounted a report that another 15 people were killed while attending a party at one of the houses demolished in the crash.
400 feared dead in Soviet shipwreck
United Press International
MOSCOW — A tourist-packed Soviet cruise ship, rammed and torn apart by a freighter, sank so fast that there was no time to deploy lifeboats and almost 400 people are feared dead, a maritime official said yesterday.
The cruise ship, carrying 1,234 passengers and crew to a holiday resort, sank Sunday 8 miles off the port of Novorossysk minutes after a cargo vessel almost double its size sliced through its hull, said Leonid Nediak, deputy maritime minister, describing the disaster in a rare news conference.
The accident was one of the worst in Soviet maritime history.
Nedik said there were grounds for hope some of the missing would be
saved but admitted that no one had been taken from the sea alive in about 24 hours.
"As a result of the measures taken, 836 people are rescued, all the victims have received the necessary medical assistance, 29 persons have been hospitalized and 79 dead persons have been found in the water," he said, adding that 319 persons are missing.
He said some 50 Black Sea Navy vessels and civil aviation planes were still involved in the rescue mission, which began almost immediately after the accident Sunday night.
When asked why so many people were missing, Nediak said, "I believe most of these passengers are still aboard the ship," which sank in waters 145 feet deep.
61-year-old ship was being considered by a government commission established to investigate the accident.
Sunday's accident appeared to be caused by the crew of the Pyrot Vasev, a 32,000-ton bulk carrier traveling at approximately 10 knots when it hit the Admiral Nakimov, Nedik said.
He said the question of raising the
The cruise liner's steersman told the newspaper Ivestia the crew saw the bulk carrier ahead as they left port and called it by radio. They took its bearing and realized the ship would cross their path, he said.
"After a certain break came the answer, 'Don't worry, we shall steer clear of each other.' In several minutes we repeated the call since the carrier continued its course," he said.
System delays building of box
Staff writer
By TONY BALANDRAN
On the window sill behind Arthur Thomas sits his favorite quote from Oscar Wilde: "A job worth doing at all is worth doing badly."
And it's a simple job — the installation of a $56 wooden box for homework assignments — that has led Thomas, the Arthur Young Distinguished Professor in the School of Business, into a four-month entanglement with what he called a "cumbersome bureaucratic process."
In fact, Thomas's project was so simple and so small that it may have gotten a little lost in a procedural process. University officials contacted yesterday acknowledged that they could not
Although he admits to being annoyed, Thomas still laughs about the whole situation.
remember specific details or dates about the project. And the officials wouldn't predict when the project would be finished.
the whole situation.
"I'm not mad at anybody," he said. "I'm just mad at the system."
In May, Thomas began planning a small addition to his financial accounting class taught in Wescoe Hall's Waggoner Auditorium — the wooden box.
In order to make his Tuesday and Thursday lectures run more smoothly, Thomas wanted to bolt the box outside of the auditorium so his students could submit their homework assignments before
entering class.
The box would keep teaching assistants from having to gather more than 60 assignments before class each day. Thomas said.
"The teaching assistants are doing a good job," said Thomas. "But there are still moments of confusion before each class. The boxes would allow me three or four more minutes each lecture. It doesn't sound like much, but it builds up."
Thomas drew a rough sketch of the rectangular box and included the specifications he wanted. The plans weren't professional, but they were clear, he said.
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See THOMAS, p. 5, col. 1
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