state/nation/world
16 die, 5
By DAVID FOSTER
Associated Press Writer
HOMER, Alaska A commuter plane that
crashed short of a runway and plowed
through a chain-link fence, killing 16 people,
tilted severely during its approach and did
not have its landing gear down, a witness said
yesterday.
Five people were seriously injured in the
crash of the twin-engine turboprop Monday
evening at Homer Airport.
Investigators battled brisk wind and freez
ing cold yesterday while they began sorting
out the final moments of the Ryan Air flight.
“We’re just securing the scene, finding out
who the witnesses are,” said Jim Labelle of
the National Transportation Safety Board’s
Anchorage office. “It’s a matter of looking at
2nd big quake
shakes Calif.
By LYNN ELBER
Associated Press Writer
WESTMORLAND, Calif. - The
second powerful earthquake in 12
hours jolted this town near the
Mexican border yesterday, knock
ing jailers from foundations,
buckling walls and roads and injur
ing at least 44 people.
But experts said this sparsely
populated farming region got off
relatively easily from the twin
quakes, which registered 6.3 and
6.0 on the Richter scale, each
stronger than the quake that hit
Los Angeles last month.
Power was temporarily out in
65,000 homes and businesses, fires
flared in the border town of Mexi
cali and police were called out on
both sides of the border to prevent
looting.
The 5:16 a.m. quake, which mea
sured 6.3 on the Richter scale, was
centered about 14 miles west of the
town of Westmorland, at the tip of
the Salton sea 90 miles northeast of
San Diego, said scientists at Cali
fornia Institute of Technology in
Pasadena.
A 6.0-magnitude quake shook the
area at 5:54 p.m. Monday.
Yesterday’s quake was felt as
far away as the Palo Verde nuclear
power plant 50 miles west of down
town Phoenix, Ariz. It also jolted
residents of Palm Springs, San
Diego and downtown Los Angeles,
160 miles to the north.
But the damage appeared most
serious in an area around the bor
der town of Calexico and nearby El
Centro.
“We got off real lucky,” said
state Office of Emergency Serv
ices spokesman Mike Guerin, who,
like other experts noted a quake of
that magnitude would likely have
caused severe damage and many
injuries in a city.
Police in Imperial County re
ported four minor injuries ranging
Marisol Batills, of Miami, whose brother-in-taw is in prison, held the U.S. and
Cuban flags yesterday while she and about 100 other relatives of Cuban
detainees went to the Justice Department in Washington, D.C., to plead with
officials not to send 2,700 Marlel inmates back.
House approves abortion
HARRISBURG (AP) - Legislation
that would restrict abortions in Penn
sylvania was approved by the House
yesterday after a lengthy debate dur
ing which lawmakers touched on
morality and the law.
The measure would require a wom
an to notify her sexual partner before
having an abortion and force females
less than 18 years old to receive
parental consent or a court order for
an abortion.
The abortion measure was pro-
survive Alaskan commuter plane crash
everything and sifting through it.”
The flight originated in Kodiak, and after a
stop in Homer, was to continue to Kenai and
Anchorage, 150 miles to the north.
Labelle said the pilot checked in with the
airport’s flight service station when the plane
was about two miles from the runway, a few
minutes before the crash. Everything ap
peared normal then, Labelle said.
“There did not seem to be any problems
with the flight before the crash,” Labelle
said.
But witness Jon Kleine he said he watched
the plane pass overhead when it cleared an
80-foot bluff near the runway and said it did
not appear to be on a normal approach.
“That guy did not have his landing gear
down,” he said. “To my utter astonishment,
the plane did half a roll. The left wing went up
from broken bones to one person
whose finger was slammed in a
door. El Centro Regional Medical
Center doctors treated 20 people
and the Valley Urgent Care Center
in El Centro treated 20, spokesmen
said.
“We had varying injuries from
sprains to people cutting them
selves on broken glass,” said Nor
man Martin, administrator of the
El Centro Regional Medical Cen
ter. “Most of it was stress related,
some mild heart attacks. Fortuna
tely it happened real early in the
morning, so consequently not that
many people were out and about.
That probably limited (injuries) a
lot.”
Calexico Fire Capt. Carlos Esca
lante said the wall of a store col
lapsed, crushing four cars parked
outside.
Escalante said he believed the
temblor had sparked a number of
fires across the border in Mexicali.
“From here in Calexico we have a
clear view of all Mexicali, and in
looking over there we saw a lot of
black smoke,” he said.
The quake interrupted power to
65,000 households and businesses
served by the Imperial Valley Wa
ter District, but 95 percent of the
outage was corrected within 20
minutes, said district spokesman
Ron Hull.
Bulldozers worked to shore up
crumbled banks of the district’s
All-American Canal, which carries
irrigation water from the Colorado
River to the Imperial Valley, Hall
said.
Around El Centro, several house
trailers were jolted from their
foundations, and residents report
ed extensive damage to furnish
ings. Many stores closed
temporarily to fix windows and
pick up merchandise rattled from
shelves.
The two quakes triggered a low
level emergency declaration at the
posed by Delaware County Republi
can Rep. Stephen Freind, a long-time
foe of abortions, to an unrelated bill
that would rewrite the state’s sen
tencing guidelines.
The legislation now returns to the
Senate for consideration of the
changes.
Freind’s amendment to the bill was
easily approved on a 140-59 vote, with
surprisingly little debate. However,
the House spent hours on another
amendment that would require the
beyond vertical and then right back down.
And right at that same instant I could hear
the engines being gunned.”
The plane went down at a 45-degree angle,
Kleine said.
“It was a huge thud. I could hear it auger
mg in. A huge whumpf.”
Kleine said he dashed to the plane, saw
blood spattered over the cockpit’s instru
ments and assumed, correctly, that the pilot
and co-pilot were dead.
“I ran and looked in the back windows. I
had no idea there were so many people in the
plane,” he said in a telephone interview. “I
found the door behind the cockpit and opened
it.
“I couldn’t believe what I saw. Everybody
was jammed forward into a huge pile of
bodies and seats.”
■*— » >««*• * .... * *.
San Onofre nuclear power plant on
the coast, about 100 miles west of
the epicenter, said Southern Cali
fornia Edison Co. spokesman Da
vid Barron. The temblor caused no
damage or problems, he said.
Inmates at the Immigration and
Naturalization Service detention
Guards, inmates' wives recount riot origins
By JOSEPH B. FRAZIER
Associated Press Writer
ATLANTA Cuban inmates hold
ing the federal prison in Atlanta have
told their wives that they rioted after
guards taunted them about being sent
back to Cuba.
However, prison workers who es
caped from the insurrection that
started about lunchtime Monday said
Cubans refused to work and then
grabbed the guards.
Both sides believe the trouble
should have been anticipated after
the Reagan administration had an
nounced Friday it had concluded an
agreement with Cuba to send back 2,-
545 refugees.
Janet Lugo said her husband, Fer
nando, called her three times be
tween 2:15 a.m. and 3 a.m. yesterday.
“He got to a phone somehow. He
said there were wounded on both
sides but did not say who,” she said.
“Please tell everybody outside we
restriction legislation
abortion proposal to be approved by
voters in a statewide referendum.
The lawmakers twice defeated the
referendum proposal.
Freind argued the abortions regu
lations were needed because current
law allows young girls to get an
abortion without parents even know
ing their children were pregnant. He
also said men should have the right to
be informed of the decision before
their sexual partners have an abor
tion.
HS3I
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i HI.
center in El Centro were awakened
by toppling bookshelves and were
moved into a courtyard for their
safety, said INS spokesman Ron
Rogers. They were returned later,
after officials were satisfied the
building was safe.
Extra police were called out in
did not start this,” she quoted him as
saying.
Mrs. Lugo said her husband told
her the trouble started in the cafete
ria when guards harassed prisoners,
telling them they would be sent back
to Cuba. She said Lugo told her that
inmates then started turning over
tables and guards fired their guns.
“It was like putting a match to the
fire,” she said of the guard’s actions.
A guard, who spoke to The Atlanta
Constitution on the condition that he
not be identified, gave a very differ
ent account. He said inmates stopped
work for a time Friday as word of the
repatriation agreement spread.
About 300 Cubans stopped work
about 8 a.m. Monday at the prison
industries building. After about an
hour and a half, they “started grab
bing the guards,” he said.
“I heard (guards) yelling ‘triple
deuce’ (the prison signal for distress)
and I ran toward Unicor,” the prison
industries building, he said.
The guard reported seeing detai-
Opponents of the measure said it
was a violation of a woman’s right to
control her body.
“It’s just a cruel trick on poor
women and teenagers," said Rep.
Ruth Harper, D-Philadelphia.
Rep. H. William DeWeese, a
Greene County Democrat who chairs
the House Judiciary Committee, said
“the nub of the issue is where do we
draw the line.”
“I draw the line with the woman,”
DeWeese said.
The 37-year-old machinist said he dragged
two dead passengers aside trying to get into
the plane.
“There was a girl in back crying ‘Help me!
Help me!’ There was one other guy who was
conscious who was groaning, and saying,
‘What happened? What happened? The door
was just jammed, blocked with seats and
junk.
“Everybody else was dead or near-dead. I
knew there were people dying right then,
right then, and I couldn’t get in to help them.”
Homer Fire District Administrator Robert
Purcell said the injured, some unconscious,
initially were taken to South Peninsula Hospi
tal in Homer, a town of 2,200 near the mouth
of Cook Inlet. Seven were flown to hospitals in
Anchorage but two died en route, he said.
There was a high overcast but visibility
several cities to prevent looting,
but no incidents were reported.
The main road between El Cen
tro and Westmorland was closed
because of damage and state High
way 98 was closed in Ocotillo be
cause pavement buckled on a
bridge crossing Interstate 8.
nees assault another guard and take
his keys and communications equip
ment.
“I ran to help him, but they came
after me with a shank. We’re not
talking knives, we’re talking bayonet.
... I ran.”
The guard said he and about a
dozen others made it to safety in the
secure rear corridor behind the build
ing.
“They took, I’d say, anywhere from
15 to 20 hostages. Then they went to
AWB House (a cell block that housed
American prisoners) and A house
looking for more hostages,” he said.
He said inmates set fire to the
prison industry building, a storage
building and a building that housed
the prison pool table.
He said that inmates broke into A
and C cell blocks with blowtorches
and bolt cutters stolen from the pris
on industries building and then set
fires there.
Shuttle's orbit may be longer
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP)
The space agency said yester
day it is considering a plan to
modify space shuttles so they can
remain in orbit for as long as 16
days.
The longest shuttle mission to
date has been 10 days, but most of
the 25 flights have lasted a week or
less.
The plan was outlined in a report
that examines key aspects of an
Wednesday, Nov. 25, 1987
V ’ i
I :
AP Laserphoto
The Daily Collegian
was good at the time of the crash, Purcell
ScllCl.
Wilfred Ryan Jr., president of the state’s
largest commuter airline, referred all ques
tions about the crash to the NTSB. He said the
airline was working closely with the families
of the survivors and the dead, handling their
transportation and housing requirements.
Jim Michelangelo, head of the NTSB's
Alaska office, sent a team of investigators
from Anchorage and said others from Wash
ington, D.C., were en route.
Although the aircraft did not break up upon
impact, it was badly damaged.
The plane’s red-striped seats were heaped
in the snow next to the crumpled left wing
Tuesday. Baggage, including hunters’ sacks
of meat, a rifle, and a shattered dog carrier,
were piled behind the wing.
5 El Rukn
members
convicted
By WILLIAM C. HIDLAY
Associated Press Writer
CHICAGO Five members of the
notorious El Rukn street gang were
found guilty yesterday of conspiring
to blow up airplanes and U.S. govern
ment buildings as part of a terrorism
for-hire scheme to win $2.5 million
from Libya.
The U.S. District Court jury re
turned the verdict after six days of
deliberation, which followed a five
week trial.
El Rukn leader Jeff Fort and co
defendants Leon McAnderson, Reico
Cranshaw, Alan Knox and Roosevelt
Hawkins had contended the El Rukns
were a religious organization that
planned no violence and met with
Libyans only to raise money for a
mosque.
According to the indictments, seve
ral members of the gang traveled to
Libya, Panama and several other
locations and offered “their serv
ices” to Libyan representatives in
1986, hoping to get as much as $2.5
million in exchange.
Fort masterminded the conspiracy
through scores of telephone calls
from a Texas prison over a four
month period while he was serving
time on cocaine charges, prosecutors
said.
Federal authorities said the gang
initiated the contact with the Libyans
and that none of the terrorist acts
discussed in tape-recorded conversa
tions ever actually took place.
Seven members of the El Rukns,
once described by police as among
the nation’s deadliest and most so
phisticated street gangs, originally
were charged.
Gang member Trammell Davis,
who formerly served as security chief
for the gang, entered into a plea
agreement before the trial and be
came a key prosecution witness.
Davis also served as a translator
for the elaborate code gang members
used during telephone conversation.
A number of inmates tried to es
cape through a gate where deliveries
are made but guards fired shots and
forced the inmates to retreat.
“We should have known something
like this was going to happen,” the
guard said, adding that he believes
inmates should have been locked in
their cells until things calmed down.
“Everybody but the warden knew
this was going to happen,” said Joan
na Rackley, whose husband is an
American inmate at the federal pris
on. She said that when she visited her
husband Sunday, he told her to leave
early because hie was afraid of an
uprising that day.
Warden Joseph Petrovsky said yes
terday that things appeared calm at
the prison after the announcement
Friday and the riot that broke out in
Louisiana. As a result, he said he took
no extra precautions.
“If there’d been a lockdown it
would have blown up immediately,”
he said.
extended-duration shuttle, includ
ing technical aspects, impact on
the shuttle flight rate and the
possibility of commercial ven
tures.
NASA said in a statement that if
a decision were made to proceed,
a modification kit to provide extra
fuel, oxygen and other supplies
could be ready in about 45 months.
It estimated the development cost
at $126 million.