An inside look
LaVerne Krause gallery in Lawrence Hall
displays a different kind of exhibit. Page 3
Serve ace
The Oregon women’s tennis team finished
its season at the Duck Invitational. Page 9
Tuesday, November 13,2001
Since 1 900 University of Oregon Eugene, Oregon
Volume 103, Issue 56
American Airlines Flight 587 crashes in Queens
■While the cause of the crash in
New York remains undetermined,
officials said preliminary reports
point to accident, not terrorism
By James Kuhnhenn, Seth Borenstein,
Warren P. Strobel & Amie Parnes
Knight Ridder Newspapers
NEW YORK (KRT) — An American
Airlines jetliner bound for the Domini
can Republic from New York with 260
people aboard plunged into a seaside
neighborhood moments after takeoff
Monday morning, raising fears of an
other terrorist act and again rattling the
shaken airline industry.
The cause of the crash, which ap
pears to have killed everyone on board,
remained undetermined, but officials
said preliminary evidence pointed to an
accident — not an act of terror. Six other
people were reported missing on the
ground in Queens.
Eyewitnesses said the plane, a 13
year-old Airbus A300, appeared to ex
plode shortly after takeoff from John F.
Kennedy International Airport, then
broke apart and went into a nosedive. It
scattered debris, including an engine
that appeared to separate in-flight,
across several blocks and into a nearby
bay as it hurtled to the ground. A key is
sue for investigators will be whether the
engine, one of two on the plane, fell as a
result of mechanical failure or sabotage,
or whether the engine’s separation
helped cause the crash.
By midday, authorities had recovered
the plane’s flight data recorder, and Na
tional Transportation Safety Board offi
cials said it would be flown to Washing
ton for analysis by federal safety experts.
The fiery crash came two months and a
day after the terrorist attacks on the World
Trade Center and the Pentagon. Authori
ties, however, warned the public not to
assume the incidents were related.
“People shouldn’t speculate as to the
cause,” New York Mayor Rudolph Giu
liani told reporters at an impromptu
news conference near the crash. “It may
well have been an engine failure.... We
shouldn’t jump to conclusions.”
Nevertheless, U.S. fighter jets scram
bled to patrol air space above New York.
Bridges and tunnels into the city were
closed, and all three major New York-area
airports shut down for a period of time.
U.S. spy agencies also combed
through intelligence reports and eaves
dropping transcripts looking for any
clues that pointed to a terrorist attack, a
U.S. official said.
An estimated 175 of the passengers
on American Airlines Flight 587 were
Turn to Plane crash, page 8
Plane crashes in New York
American Airlines Flight 587 crashed about 5 miles from
Kennedy Airport, minutes after a 9:14 a.m. takeoff.
0 5 mi
5 km
0
Learning from Experience
■ Students can now follow their
wanderlust and get academic credit
on one of two Pacific Challenge trips
By Erin Cooney
for the Emerald
Swimming with hundreds of dol
phins, bungee jumping from the
spot where the sport was invented,
whitewater rafting, skydiving and
surfing are only a few of the activities
Emily Garten experienced on her trip to
New Zealand and Australia last winter.
Not only did Garten get to spend 60
days “down under,” but she earned 18
upper-division credits doing it. Garten
went on the trip through a nonprofit or
ganization called Pacific Challenge.
The organization offers two trips a year.
The New Zealand and Australia trip
leaves in the winter and a trip to South
east Asia, which the group offered for the
first time this year, leaves in the fall.
Pacific Challenge specializes in ad
venture tourism, focusing on what its
founder, David Wright, calls “experien
tial education.”
Jason Bussanich, a senior journalism
major at the University, found out just
what experiential education is when he
went on the New Zealand and Australia
adventure. Bussanich, who heard about
Pacific Challenge from a friend, said his
trip was “like (MTV’s) ‘Road Rules’ on
steroids.”
Participants in the New Zealand trip
set out at the beginning of January and
return in March. The itinerary consists
of 37 activities spread out over 60 days.
According to die Pacific Challenge
brochure, the first three days offer black
water rafting. Unlike whitewater rafting,
this sport involves inner tubing on an
underground river.
Bussanich said rafters wear helmets
with lights, but they turn off the lights
once underground. The natural light
from trails of glowworms light up the
caves for the rest of the trip. The adven
Turn to Challenge, page 8
Russell Weller Emerald
Whitewater
rafting is but one
activity students
can participate in
on one of Pacific
Challenge’s two
trips offered each
year to Australia
and New Zealand
and Southeast
Asia.
Ballot issues
plagued by
low student
participation
■ Students can have a say in how
more than $8 million in student
incidental fees are allocated
—and all they have to do is vote
By Kara Cogswell
Oregon Daily Emerald
The ASUO special election begins
today, but many students don’t seem to
know — or care — about the issues on
the ballot.
“I didn’t even know there was an
election,” sophomore Matt Klahn said.
Low student interest in campus elec
tions is nothing new. In last year’s
ASUO spring elec
tion, only 9 percent
of the student body
voted.
Two measures on
the ballot for the
special election af
fect how student in
cidental fees are al
located. This year,
more than $8 mil
lion — which works
out to more than
$170 per student,
per term — go to
fund programs such
as student unions, football tickets and
the Designated Driver Shuttle.
Students involved with the ASUO
have tried to get the word out about the
special election by posting bright yel
low fliers around campus. The ASUO
will also place a voter’s guide to the
ballots in today’s Emerald.
Turn to Student tees, page 5
ASUO
Special
Election
Vote on DuckWeb
today and
Wednesday
Monday: Measures
on the ballot this
week
Today: What
students think about
the incidental fee