Vol. 99, No. 44 (USPS 650-640)
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
PUBLISHED SINCE 1889 BY THE STUDENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS
Thursday October 27,1988
U.S., Soviet cooperation frees whales
The Associated Press
BARROW, Alaska — Two whales trapped for almost three weeks in the arctic ice pack were freed yesterday by Soviet and United States icebreakers.
"The whales are loose and in the channel and headed out," said Lt. Mike Haller, a spokesman for the Alaska National Guard. "They looked good all afternoon. To look at them, you'd have thought they had their bags packed and were ready to head south."
Ron Morris of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and rescue coordinator said, "They're in the main lead, and I can't help but think they'll keep on
truckin' I don't know how much more we can do
The work to free the migrating California gray whales progressed rapidly Tuesday when two Soviet ice-breaking vessels began smashing the ice that kept the pair imprisoned. A third trapped whale is thought to have died last week.
Morris, who followed the whales by helicopter, landed a little after 8 p.m. to say that the whales had moved from the final man-made breathing hole to the path the Soviet icebreaker Vladimir Arseniev cut Tuesday night.
Rescue officials were worried that the
whales would have trouble break air holes through the partly frozen cut, but about 4:30 p.m. rescue workers found the two whales that made a small breathing hole and were sharing it.
One of the whales was bleeding enough to stain the water red.
Spectators watched anxiously for several moments, waiting for the whales to surface in the new waterway cut today by the whales that have been sheltered by the whales broke the surface.
As darkness fell, the whales were swimming back and forth in the channel. Officials
nightfall
Scientists and others involved in the rescue might never know the whales' fate. Rescue officials decided not to put electronic tracking tags on the already stressed animals.
"A lot of people really didn't want to say," said Jim Harvey, a federal marine biologist.
Haller said plans were being made in Harrow to thank the Soviets with a party, but he didn't.
Before the whales were freed, as the Soviet icebreakers drew near, the whales were "acting in a very excited manner, almost like they can sense freedom," said Sgt. Ian
Robertson, an Alaska National Guard spokesman.
By midday, the Soviet icebreakers were a quarter mile from the line of breathing holes being cut by Americans working in the opposite direction, he said.
Later yesterday, rescuers began to use a tractor-like device propelled by pontoon augers to clear the ice cut by the icebreaker. Robertson said.
The breakthrough in the effort to free the whales caught in an early freeze came after more than a week of delays and disappointments.
Please see WHALES, p. 10, col. 1
Roof collapses at building site
Workers escape unharmed
By Mark E. McCormick Kansan staff writer
The roof of a partially constructed building in northwest Lawrence collapsed yesterday, as workers narrowly escaped falling
Hoobler said, "I've been around here 13 years, and the most I've run across was three or four."
roobler said the roof probably collapsed because of a loosely supported frame. The wind wasn't
Soviets to launch shuttle tomorrow
The Associated Press
MOSCOW - The Soviet Union said yesterday it will launch its space
this week, following months of its similar to those that plagued maiden voyage of its U.S. counter
government commission set the ich for 6:23 a.m. Moscow time urday (10:23 p.m. CDT Friday) r receiving reports from special-following several thousand tests he Buran and its booster rocket, Energia, the official news agency s reported.
Buran" is Russian for snow,
m, an appropriate name since
first snow of the season fell this
k in Moscow.
reparations for pouring nearly 4 tons of liquid hydrogen, oxygen hydrocarbon fuel into Energia, ed as the world's most powerful ster rocket, to begin today. We are moving more than 100 tons of cargo Earth orbit, and up to 20 tons to planets Mars and Venus.
wiet media did not say how long an 'mission would last. If the flight is successful, a mission two cosmonauts is to follow, but let officials have not said when. wiet officials have said the first crew is pilotless or not present like the Jan 28, 1966, lossion of the U.S. shuttle Challenger. Seven astronauts were killed in blast.
state-run television yesterday wed the white delta-shaped an, with its name emblazoned in attached to the Energaion a sch pad at the Soviet Union's konur Cosmodrome on the Cen- Asian steps of the republic of kashstan.
aunch was originally planned for first half of this year, but was tipped as technical problems se, officials said.
fraternity abolish ledgeship, and hazing
David Stewart san staff writer
KU fraternity will ablish its ige system after this year in onse to a national anti-hazing fraternity's president i yesterday.
in Greenfield, president of the Beta Tau fraternity, 1942 Stew-Ave, said yesterday that the ZBT council abolished pledge nationally for ZBT chapters at a last month in Chicago.
embers of the Supreme Council meet with local ZBT members in rence this weekend.
reenfield said that ZBT had iges this semester and would inure to have them in the spring, would begin the new system
eenfield said the decision was in response to a nationwide hazing movement.
the message to all the fraternis that hazing is out," he said. enefield predicted that other armites would follow suit.
Please see ZBT. p. 9, col. 6