Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

national briefs

U. Penn Student Aids in New York Rescue Effort

By Caroline Dube Daily Pennsylvania

(U-WIRE) PHILADELPHIA – Before he had even seen the dramatic footage of the World Trade Center collapsing, University of Pennsylvania freshman Matt Klapper had already rushed out the door, on his way to offer his services as part of a volunteer squad from Springfield, N.J.

Klapper said he saw the attack and felt compelled to go join the Springfield volunteer rescue crew he had worked with and do what he could to help.

“As soon as I saw it, I got all my stuff and ran down to the train station,” said Klapper, originally from Brooklyn.

When he got to 30th Street Station, he was unable to board a train to New York but managed to get rides with various police officers and other officials to Chelsea Piers, a nearby location that served as a staging area for volunteers and rescue workers. edical staff and equipment had been set up to deal with victims, but most of the victims who were not up and walking around had died.

“It was almost surreal because there was all this destruction … but nobody was coming in,” Klapper said. “Then I realized nobody coming to the hospital means nobody’s coming.”

After only half an hour giving first aid at Chelsea Pier, he joined six firefighters from Massachusetts to head to the front lines – the World Trade Center itself.

Klapper, who has worked with the Springfield First Aid Squad for the last eight months as a first responder, has training in CPR, first aid and defibrillation. He had worked at the sights of car crashes and other emergencies before, but had not seen anything like the scene in lower Manhattan on Tuesday.

“There were shoes all over the place, parts of clothing,” he said. “The hardest things to see were the fire trucks that were burned out and the police cars with parts of the towers on them.”

He worked into the night, aiding other rescue workers by treating minor injuries and giving them eye wash to help combat the dust in the air.

“Our eyes were burning like you wouldn’t believe,” he said. “When I’d shine my pen light through the air, I’d see small particles flying around everywhere.”

Klapper described the experience as frustrating.

“It was a lot of standing around,” he said. “At times we were picking up rubble, but they were mostly letting the heavy machinery in.”

Klapper left New York on Wednesday, but he said that since hearing reports of more survivors and buildings in danger of collapsing, he plans to return Friday to continue helping.

“When I was leaving [New York] there was a big line of New Yorkers with signs saying `Thank You’ and cheering us on,” Klapper said.

The Penn Outing Club is also planning to join in the rescue efforts. According to Club President and College senior Tico Gangulee, four or five members will be using some of the club’s limited funds to head to New York Friday to help the American Red Cross. They will help with administrative services, debris removal and high-angle rescue work.

The efforts were organized in response to an e-mail sent out by the club, asking for volunteers to give blood and help the Red Cross.

“We had a tremendous amount of responses,” Gangulee said. “Pretty much the entire membership gave blood at one point or another.”

Gangulee added that though the New York area seems to be staffed for the next several weeks, aid – especially from nurses – is still needed in the Washington area.

He urged those interested to go to the regional Red Cross Center at 23nd and Chestnut streets to sign up to give blood and find out about other volunteer opportunities available.

Reno Encourages U. Miami Students to Remain Strong

By Aubrey Andel and Danielle Scott The Miami Hurricane (U. iami)

(U-WIRE) MIAMI – University of Miami students and administration alike showed up in droves to show their support and come together after the devastating events of last Tuesday.

Over 80 students showed up for the InterVarsity Christian Fellowship prayer meeting on Tuesday night.

Last Wednesday, more than 600 members of the UM community came to the candlelight vigil in support for the victims and their families who have been affected by Tuesday’s terrorist attacks, last Wednesday. President Shalala and Dr. Whitely attended and former Attorney General Janet Reno was invited as a guest speaker.

“It took off on its own,” said vigil co-chair elissa Dolinsky. The vigil was organized by numerous student organizations such as LINK, COISO and student government.

“We expected a large crowd. Student government has been spreading the word,” said Jose Diaz, student government president. “We knew that a lot of people were grieving and they needed to grieve together.”

The somber face of one was mirrored in all that attended. A sea of lights and bowed heads spilled into the breezeway as the crowd thickened so that there was standing room only.

“How could I not be here?” asked senior Kim Clong.

“Out of all the good things we can give, I think the greatest gift is fellowship and love,” junior Mary Heffner said.

Dolinsky gave the introduction and lit the first candle. The candles were left over from last year’s Homecoming Weekend.

In a symbolic gesture of unity and cooperation, students lit their candles from their neighbors’.

School of music student Lance Rhodes performed his own composition, “In Search of a Dream,” before the one minute of silent meditation out of respect for all those who have and were still suffering.

Reno gave a six-minute speech, incensing UM students to band together and remain strong.

“It is a wonderful privilege for me to stand on the land of this university knowing that you have the strength, the commitment, the boldness, the daring to stand up to any attack against this nation,” Reno said.

“We must stand as one united against the vile evil that launched these attacks. We must stand as one with our president, President Bush, and make sure the world knows we are united.

“The scars of these days will last forever. We will be needing the healing support of the nation for as long as we can remember.”

Representative student speaker Tammy Wilsker encouraged UM students to remember each other’s humanity.

“Too many times, we are at each other’s throats. We look for issues that divide us-black versus white, Catholic versus Protestant, Arab versus Jew,” Wilsker said.

“We forget some of the basic things-that we are all people. If we are cut, we all bleed the same way. No one is born a monster.”

Students appreciated this show of solidarity in a time when they felt despair and hopelessness.

“It gives people who don’t know what to do something to do,” said junior, Mike Mazzaco.

“I think it boosted people’s morale to support each other. I hope people realize how important lives really are,” said freshman Kylee Maywald.

“We woke up this morning to a different world-one filled with more uncertainty and apprehension,” said Wilsker.

After the 23rd psalm was read, all those present were asked to join in in singing the national anthem.

As voices raised in unison, students fought back tears.

“It’s a sad day in history when students have to meet like this,” said junior Sushli Samtari.

After the vigil came to an end, the crowd raised their voices in a rousing rendition of “America, the Beautiful.”

Food was provided for attendees in the International Lounge by the department of International Education and Exchange Programs who were supposed to host an event tonight, which was cancelled.

University chaplain Ed Ollie led the InterVarsity (IV) prayer meeting group and shared his thoughts on the day’s tragic events.

“It makes us ask: What is life all about?” he said. “It’s about relationships with one another and with God, Ollie said.

Ollie passionately spoke to the group while a guitar quietly strummed and sobs of grief filled the air.

“The reality that we’re a broken and fallen people is real,” he said. “But do you know what else is real? It’s real easy to hate people who do heinous acts, but the reality is, we’re not much better.”

Students formed small circles with their heads bowed and hands linked to create an intimate setting in which to share their prayers and express their feelings.

Ollie asked the groups to focus on praying for victims and their families, leadership of our country, and our campus and for ourselves.

Freshman Sabrina Joseph, a member of IV, said the meeting’s attendance was the strongest she has seen, but it shouldn’t have to take a tragedy to have people come together.

“It’s horrible, but it opens your eyes,” she said. “When this happens, people want to get closer to God.”

Roman took the floor and said a prayer in Spanish that transcended language barriers. Tear-stained faces were a testament to the power of prayer, in any language, at a time like this.

“Violence affects more than the person you did it to,” Mywald said.

It was great to see so many different people of different religious backgrounds come together for the same cause.”

“Everyone has different beliefs, but in the end everyone believes in family,” said senior J.D. Barbarossa.

Experts Say Date of Terrorist Attacks Not a Coincidence

By Crystal Bolner The Maroon (Loyola U. – New Orleans)

(U-WIRE) NEW ORLEANS – The United States’ reaction to the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and Pentagon on Tuesday is critical, experts say. While people are watching and waiting to see what, if any, military action will be taken, some say the United States should be careful not to overreact to the attack.

Political science professors Ed Renwick and Conrad Raabe said they initially were horrified by the calamities in New York and Washington, D.C. Renwick, director of Loyola’s Institute of Politics, said he thinks that it is no coincidence that the attack took place around the 22nd anniversary of the Camp David accords.

The accords were two agreements made Sept. 17, 1978, between Israel and Egypt, orchestrated by former President Carter at the U.S. government retreat house.

The treaty formally ended a war between the two countries. Israel agreed to withdraw from the Sinai Peninsula.

The treaty also provided for the establishment of normal diplomatic relations between the two countries. These provisions were carried out, but Israel failed to implement the provisions calling for Palestinian self-rule in the West Bank and Gaza areas.

“I don’t think it’s a coincidence that they [the terrorists] used a day they didn’t like,” Renwick said.

As far as the government’s reaction to the situation thus far, Renwick said he never thought to worry about the United States overreacting, but that “most of the time we have underreacted.”

After President Bush’s address to the nation the evening of the attack, Renwick said the most significant part of Bush’s speech was a resolve to punish the perpetrators of the crime.

“We will make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbor them,” Bush said.

That statement was a significant change in U.S. foreign policy, Renwick said, because in the past, the nation has not taken action against countries that harbor terrorist groups.

The feeling among experts on campus is that the attacks in New York and Washington, D.C., are unlike any the United States has ever faced.

History department chairman David Moore said the event “doesn’t compare, but it far exceeds anything that has happened in the past” because of its boldness.

Moore said he wouldn’t equate the situation with the one the United States faced in Pearl Harbor or World War II, but more along the lines of the more recent Persian Gulf War, and that talk of an impending war often is taken out of context.

“This talk of war, it’s used to describe how heinous we deem the deed to be rather than any description of hostilities, because there’s no other country we can point to as behind this,” he said.

Raabe, an international politics expert, said that if the United States ever needed “justification to act impolite on the international scene, this is it. “

He described the terrorists who implemented the hijacking at Boston’s Logan International Airport and later crashed two planes into the twin towers, a third into the Pentagon and a fourth plane 80 miles south of Pittsburgh, as “the silent enemy. “

Catherine Wessinger, religious studies chairwoman who has expertise on terrorists and their motives , said she wants to warn everyone about jumping to conclusions without hard evidence.

Wessinger said the details of the situation seem to lend themselves to signs of Muslim terrorists, but notes that it is all speculation until the government determines the perpetrators.

If the crime did have religious motives, she said, the way the United States reacts would be paramount to resolving the situation.

“Religious violence – this is always an interactive situation. The way we act makes some people feel like they are being pushed into a corner. They feel like their only option is a violent one, ” she said.

Al-Qaeda Rumors In Missouri False

By Renee Fullerton The Maneater (U. Missouri)

(U-WIRE) COLUMBIA, Mo. – Reports that a cell of Osama bin Laden’s terrorist organization, Al-Qaeda, exists in Columbia, o., are greatly exaggerated, according to Columbia Police Department Chief Randy Boehm.

“There is no evidence to support the presence of Al-Qaeda in Columbia,” Boehm said.

The Columbia Police Department was flooded with calls from concerned citizens who had read The Boston Globe and The Wall Street Journal articles citing Columbia as having an Al-Qaeda cell operating.

The articles said Columbia was one of six cities in the United States with an Al-Qaeda cell. The newspapers based this on evidence gathered during the trial of members of Al-Qaeda involved in the bombings of the US. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

Boehm has been in contact with the FBI and said there is no connection between Columbia and the attacks in New York.

“[The FBI] are not at this time conducting investigations in the Columbia area,” Boehm said. “The Columbia Police Department doesn’t have information of any type of credible threat to Columbia.”

Paul Wallace, a professor of political science, said he had not heard of any terrorist groups operating out of Columbia.

“I have no knowledge of any organized group in Columbia, issouri, that advocates violence against the United States,” Wallace said. “If there were operatives in Columbia, they would be part of a deep plan. The university is an entrance point for international groups who spend a few years here before moving on to other cities.”

Al-Qaeda is a multinational group that funds the activities of terrorists around the world. It was founded in 1988 by bin Laden. Based in Afghanistan, the group’s primary goal is to overthrow what it sees as the corrupt and heretical governments of uslim states and replace them with the rule of Sharia (Islamic Law).

The group is divided into a system of “cells.” The cells operate completely independent of one another, Wallace said, and are controlled from above.

“Cells were developed in Russia during the Czarist period,” Wallace said. “Even if a cell member is caught and tortured, they cannot reveal information about other cells.”

Wallace said if the attacks in New York were carried out by Al-Qaeda, each hijacking group might very well not have known about the other hijackings.

On Thursday, Secretary of State Colin Powell named bin Laden as the prime suspect in orchestrating the attacks.

– Gieson Cacho contributed to this article.

Columbia University’s New Radio Space Occupied by NPR

By Ben Casselman Columbia Daily Spectator

(U-WIRE) NEW YORK – On Tuesday, Columbia University seemed on the verge of losing a radio station. Instead, for at least the next week, it has gained one.

When the World Trade Towers were destroyed on Tuesday, WKCR, Columbia’s radio station, had its broadcast antenna fall with them. WKCR officials were originally concerned that the station might be off the air for weeks or even months.

But with a new antenna installed on top of Carman Hall, WKCR was back on the air by Friday evening, in time for its weekend programming.

For the past five years, WKCR has been broadcasting from temporary headquarters in Riverside Church. The station was set to move into its brand new headquarters in Lerner Hall Monday, but those plans have been delayed as an unexpected impact of last week’s tragedy.

WNYC, New York’s leading National Public Radio station, has been unable to broadcast its own shows since the towers’ collapse because the station has not been able to access its headquarters in New York’s Municipal Building at One Centre Street, just blocks from the site of Tuesday’s attacks.

WNYC will resume broadcasts Monday out of temporary quarters: Columbia’s Lerner Hall.

Starting at 4 p.m., WNYC will broadcast three of its shows – “Morning Edition,”New York and Company,” and “On the Line” – from WKCR’s new space in Lerner Hall.

WNYC will occupy the space until it can move into its new offices, most likely a span of one to two weeks.

Associate Director of Special Projects Jeremiah Stoldt said WNYC contacted Columbia last week to see if the university could help them. As it turned out, Columbia had a brand new radio facility that, because WKCR had not yet moved in, was available for WNYC’s use.

“It’s an opportunity we thought would be great for [WNYC] and also for us,” Stoldt said.

According to Executive Vice President for Administration Emily Lloyd, her office contacted Dean of Columbia College Austin Quigley to see if WKCR would be amenable to the offer. WKCR had no objection, so Lloyd seized on the opportunity to help the well-respected station.

WKCR Station Manager Eugene Sit, called the offer to WNYC “an offer of goodwill,” but added that it would not be much of an inconvenience to WKCR’s staff.

“It basically gave us more time to move in a less hectic fashion,” Sit said.

Sit said there would be some benefits as well. WNYC will be able to test the new Lerner equipment for WKCR, reducing the chance of serious glitches when WKCR moves in. And, Sit said, having WNYC on campus will give WKCR’s staff a chance to “see how a really professional-level station is run.”

In the meantime, WKCR will continue to occupy the space it has used since it moved out of Ferris Booth Hall before the building’s destruction five years ago. It will be broadcasting using a replacement antenna on the top of Carman Hall, a weaker signal that will give them about 20 miles of coverage, as opposed to the 50 to 60 miles the station reached with its World Trade Center antenna.

IUPUI Experts Shed Light On Recent Terrorist Attacks

By Warren Sobat The IUPUI Sagamore

(U-WIRE) INDIANAPOLIS – Four commercial aircraft fall from the sky in a coordinated attack and rip away the cloak of security Americans once knew.

As they watch a collage of carnage flash across their television screens, many are left to wonder what could motivate anyone to wreak such destruction on the United States.

“It is long overdue,” said Patrick McGeever, political science professor at Indiana University Purdue University at Indianapolis, saying it was only a matter of time before America began to reap what it has sown.

This country has made quite a few enemies by supporting military dictatorships, death squads and questionable governments during the last few decades, McGeever says.

Motivations, however, vary among different terrorist factions, says an expert from IUPUI.

“Groups like the IRA [Ireland] and ETA [Spain] are motivated by nationalism,” said Robert White, professor of sociology.

With religious fundamentalists like known terrorist Osama bin Laden, the motives extend beyond geographic and national borders.

“They have demonstrated how clever they are and this is not an isolated event,” White added.

In 1993 a group of extremists with suspected ties to bin Laden, detonated a bomb in the underground parking garage of the World Trade Center. Two of the nine suspects in that attack were tried and convicted.

As the horror of attack begins to bleed away, people may begin to realize there is a gaping hole in the security of the nation.

Terrorists’ choosing of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon also sends a message about the perceived security of America, says White.

President Bush has said the government will hit back and that no differentiation will be made between the attackers and those who would harbor them.

“A response needs to be cautious and reasoned,” said White. “If we make assumptions and act on it you can make things incredibly worse. We need to focus on the victims,” said White.

U. of Michigan Graduate Dies on 93rd Floor

By Jacquelyn Nixon Michigan Daily

(U-WIRE) CANTON TOWNSHIP, Mich. – When Patricia Whalen’s daughters – 23-year-old Meredith and 21-year-old Kristen – returned to their childhood home for Labor Day weekend, Whalen never anticipated this would be the last time she would see one of them again.

“You always think it happens to somebody else,” Whalen said Sunday.

Meredith, a 2000 University of Michigan Business School graduate, worked as a research analyst for Fred Alger Management, Inc., on the 93rd floor of World Trade Center tower one.

“She thrived in New York,” Whalen said. “Her presence, confidence … made her able to handle one of the firm’s biggest clients.”

Whalen received a call Tuesday morning from Kristen, a student at the University of North Carolina, who alerted her that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center.

“I saw the antenna and I knew it was her tower,” Whalen said. “I was trying to count down how many floors, but there was too much smoke.”

She was momentarily hopeful, as she believed her daughter began working at 8 a.m. on Mondays and 9 a.m. the rest of the week.

She called Meredith’s roommate, Mary Kowalczyk, to confirm the time her daughter had left for work that morning, and Kowalczyk told her 7:30 a.m.

Whalen later learned that Meredith’s friend on the West Coast received an E-mail from Meredith the morning of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center. The E-mail confirmed that eredith was at her desk at 8:20 a.m.

According to a statement released by Meredith’s firm, all administrative and sales staff and a small core of research analysts survived. Whalen probably did not survive due to the fact that she was at work prior to her 9:00 a.m. start time.

“I was in shock,” she said. “You know, she’s too young to die.”

Whalen says she is sure Meredith was killed because the plane entered the building on the floor Meredith worked on and the heat would have been too intense for her to survive.

“I would have liked to hug her body,” she said. “I don’t think I’m going to have anything to bury. I feel gipped … because she had so much promise.”

Whalen said Meredith loved the fast-paced interactions with heads of major corporations, saying her boss, David Alger, described Meredith as “a rising star.”

Boston U. Family Takes Ill-Fated United Airlines Flight

By Ray Henry The Daily Free Press

(U-WIRE) BOSTON – Sue Kim Hanson, a Boston University doctoral candidate, her husband Peter, a School of Management alumnus, and the couple’s 3-year-old daughter, Christine Lee, died Sept. 11 when terrorists crashed United Airlines flight 175 into the World Trade Center in New York City.

Mr. Hanson was 32. His wife was several years older, said Dr. Hardy Kornfeld, her doctoral thesis adviser and a professor at the BU Medical Center and division of Graduate Medical Sciences.

At the time of her death, Mrs. Hanson was finishing work on her doctoral thesis, a series of three-year experiments designed to produce a mouse without the gene for InterLeukin-16, a molecule that triggers immune systems responses between white blood cells. The research has applications in asthma and AIDS treatments, Kornfeld said.

“She basically did pretty much all of this on her own,” he said.

Mrs. Hanson and Kornfeld were just months away from publishing reports on the experiments, he said.

“It’s going to be very difficult. It’s vitally important to me and the lab,” he said.

Kornfeld said Mrs. Hanson was his most capable technician and was known for helping her colleagues with their lab problems. She was kind, enthusiastic and even found time to supervise a laboratory intern from Wellesley College this summer, he said.

Kornfeld said people across campus have reached out to his department as news of her death has spread.

“It just knocks me over that guys in the mailroom know her,” he said.

Prior to working in Kornfeld’s lab, Mrs. Hanson was employed by Cetus Corp. in Berkeley, Calif. She graduated from the University of California at Berkeley and earned a master’s degree from BU’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in 1992.

BU officials are working to establish an annual lectureship in rs. Hanson’s honor, Kornfeld said. Additional information should be available soon.

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