The Michigan Daily -- michigandaily.com

Monday, March 11, 2013 - 3A

The Michigan Daily - michigandailycom Monday, March 11, 2013 - 3A

NEWS BRIEFS
LANSING
Snyder proclaims
Michigan Maple
Syrup Month
Gov. Rick Snyder has declared
* March "Michigan Maple Syrup
Month" in honor of the indus-
try's contribution to the state
economy.
According to the state, Michi-
gan ranks seventh in the U.S.
with an average yearly maple
syrup production of about
100,000 gallons.
The season starts in February
in the southern counties of the
Lower Peninsula and runs into
April in the Upper Peninsula.
State Department of Agri-
culture Director Jamie Clover
Adams says "Michigan Maple
Syrup Month is a special time to
acknowledge and recognize" the
state's "vast, integrated network
of" maple syrup "family farm-
ers, processors, wholesalers and
retailers."
CAMBRIDGE, Mass.
Harvard secretly
" searches e-mails of
16 deans last fall
Harvard University admin-
istrators secretly searched the
emails of 16 deans last fall, look-
ing for a leak to reporters about a
case of cheating, two newspapers
reported.
The email accounts belonged
to deans on the Administrative
Board, a committee addressing
the cheating, The Boston Globe
and The New York Times report-
ed, citing school officials. The
deans were not warned about the
email access and only one was told
of the search afterward.
Harvard will not comment
on personnel matters or provide
additional information about the
board cases that were concluded
during the fall term, Michael
Smith, dean of the Faculty of Arts
and Sciences, said in an email Sun-
day. If the committee's work were
compromised, Harvard College
would protect the process, he said.
SAN FRANCISCO
Studies tie stress
from storms, war
to heart risks
Stress does bad things to the
heart. New studies have found
higher rates of cardiac problems
in veterans with PTSD, New
Orleans residents six years after
Hurricane Katrina and Greeks
struggling through that country's
financial turmoil.
Disasters and prolonged stress
can raise "fight or flight" hor-
mones that affect blood pressure,
blood sugar and other things in
ways that make heart trouble
more likely, doctors say. They also
provoke anger and helplessness
and spur heart-harming behav-
iors like eating or drinking too
much.
"We're starting to connect

emotions with cardiovascu-
lar risk markers" and the new
research adds evidence of a link,
said Dr. Nieca Goldberg, a cardi-
ologist at NYU Langone Medical
Center and an American Heart
Association spokeswoman.
STOCKHOLM
Princess whose
secret love gripped
Sweden dies
She was one of the better kept
secrets of Sweden's royal house-
hold: a commoner and divorcee
whose relationship with Prince
Bertil was seen as a threat to the
Bernadotte dynasty.
In a touching royal romance,
V Welsh-born Princess Lilian and
her Bertil kept their love unofficial
for decades and were both in their
60s when they finally received the
king's blessing to get married.
Lilian died in her Stockholm
home on Sunday at age 97. The
9 Royal Palace didn't give a cause
of death, but Lilian suffered from
Alzheimer's disease and had been
in poor health for several years.
-Compiled from
Daily wire reports

Six teens
killed in
Ohio crash

People queue outside tie military academy where Venezuela's late President Hugo Chavez is lying in state in
Caracas, Venezuela, Sunday. Chavez died on March 5 aftera nearly two-year bout with cancer.
In wake of Chavez's death,

April election to
decide successor
to controversial
but beloved leader
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP)
- Venezuelan opposition lead-
er Henrique Capriles is set to
announce he will run in elec-
tions to replace Hugo Chavez,
setting up a make-or-break
encounter against the dead
president's hand-picked succes-
sor, a close adviser to the candi-
date says.
"He will accept" the nomi-
nation, the adviser told The
Associated Press. He spoke Sun-
day on condition of anonymity
because he was not authorized
to discuss the decision publicly
ahead of a formal announce-
ment scheduled for later in the
day.
Other opposition sources.
refused to comment, buta polit-
ical consultant at ORC Consul-
tores, which advises Capriles,
also said he would run.
"He will put himself for-
ward," said Oswaldo Ramirez.
"History is giving Capriles
Radonski an important role."
Venezuela's election com-

mission has set April 14 as the
date of the vote, 'with formal
campaigning to start just 12
days earlier. Ramirez said the
40-year-old opposition leader
would demand that officials
extend the campaign period
by moving up the start date by
more than a week, and that act-
ing president Nicolas Maduro
not be allowed to abuse state
resources to boost his chances
during the campaign.
Maduro has already
announced his intention to run
as the candidate of Chavez's
socialist party.' On Sunday he
picked up the support of Ven-
ezuela's small communist party
as well.
In a speech accepting the
party's nomination, Maduro
insisted he was running for
president out of loyalty to
Chavez, not vanity or personal
ambition, and called on the peo-
ple to support him
"I am not Chavez," Maduro
said, wearing a simple red shirt.
"In terms of intelligence, cha-
risma, historical force, or capac-
ity to lead ... But Iam a Chavista
and I live and die for him."
Capriles faced a stark choice
in deciding whether to compete
in the vote, which most analysts
say he is sure to lose amid a fren-

zy of sympathy and mourning
for the dead president.
Some say a second defeat for
Capriles just six months after
he lost last year's presidential
vote to Chavez could derail his
political career. If he waits, a
Chavista government led by
Nicolas Maduro, the acting
president, might prove inept
and give him a better shot
down the road. But staying on
the sidelines also would have
put his leadership of the oppo-
sition.
"If he says he doesn't want
to run I could totally under-
stand that," said David Smilde,
'an analyst with the U.S.-based
think tank the Washington
Office on Latin America. "He
is likely going to lose and if he.
loses this election he's prob-
ably going to be done."
On a personal Twitter
page that bore all the rah-rah
adornments of a campaign
site, Capriles wrote Saturday
afternoon: "I am analyzing
the declaration of the (elec-
toral commission setting the
date) and in the next hours I
will talk to the country about
my decision." A spokesman
said Capriles would make an
announcement in the early
evening.

Two.teens escape
after SUV crashes
into guard rail
WARREN, Ohio (AP) - A
sport utility vehicle carrying
eight teenagers crashed into a
guardrail Sunday morning and
flipped over into a swampy pond
in northeast Ohio, killing five
boys and a girl, while two other
boys escaped, the state highway
patrol said.
The Honda Passport veered
off the left side of a road; hit a
guardrail and overturned just
south of the city of Warren,
about 60 miles east of Cleveland,
Lt. Anne Ralston said. Investi-
gators say it came to rest upside
down in the swamp and sank
with five of the victims trapped
inside. A sixth who was thrown
from the SUV during the crash
was found under it when the
vehicle was taken out of the
water.
The, two survivors escaped
and ran to a nearby home to call
911, the highway patrol said.
Ralston didn't know where
the teens were headed when the
crash happened at about 7 a.m.
She didn't have any information
to release on possible causes
or factors in the crash, but the
highway patrol planned a news
conference for Sunday night.
"All Iknow is mybabyisgone,"
said Derrick Ray, who came to
the crash site after viewing his
15-year-old son Daylan's body
at the county morgue. He said
he knew that his son, a talented
football player who was look-
ing forward to playing in high
school, was out with friends, but
didn't know their plans.
A pile of blue, green and cop-
per-red stuffed bears grew ata
makeshift memorial at the crash
site along a two-lane road tight-
ly bordered with guardrails on
either side in an industrial area.
The sport utility vehicle had
sheared off tall cattails along
the guardrail.
There were also notes at the
memorial, including a letter
from Daylan Ray's 12-year-old
half-sister, Mariah Bryant, who
said she had learned they were
related only in the past year.
"It hurts, it really does,
because they are so young and;
like, they could have. had so
much more to life," she said.
"We just really started getting
close, and it's hard to believe
he's eone."

Two of the teens, both 15,
were brought to a hospital in full
cardiac arrest, St. Joseph Health
Center nursing supervisor Julie
Gill said, and were pronounced
dead there. She said they were
treated for hypothermic drown-
ing trauma, indicating they had
been submerged in cold water.
The two who survived,
18-year-old Brian Henry and
15-year-old Asher Lewis, both
of Warren, were treated for
bruising and other injuries and
released, she said.
Allthosekilledwere ages14to
19, authorities said. State police
identified them as 19-year-old
Alexis Cayson; Andrique Ben-
nett, 14; Brandon Murray, 17;
and Kirklan Behner, Ramone
White and Ray, all 15. The High-
way Patrol said Alexis was the
only female in the vehicle. It
wasn't clear who was driving.
Rickie Bowling,. 18, a friend
of Behner, sobbed at the crash
scene as she recalled his playful-
ness and reputation asa cut-up.
"He was one of a kind," she
said. "Everyone knew him in
the neighborhood. In school, he
always made everyone laugh."
Bowling said the tragedy
highlighted the importance of
savoring life. "Basically, enjoy
every second in life," she said.
"Enjoy life while you've got it
and while you're here and enjoy
people that you love."
She said she would rely on her
faith in the difficult days ahead.
"The only way to look at it is on
the bright side: he's in a better
place," she said.
Jasmine McClintock, 22, a
friend of a victim, visited the
crash scene and said it should
serve as a warning for parents
to be aware of their children's
activities.
"I hope it's an eye-opener for
parents," she said while watch-
ing the slow ripple of the pond
water littered with debris, some
apparently from the crash.
McClintock said she was
troubled by the question of what
the victims were doing out at
that hour, not knowing if they
had been out all night or left
home early.
"That's the part that boggles
my mind. It's like on a Sunday if
you're not going to church, what
are you doing at 7 a.m. out driv-
ing," she asked.
All eight were from Warren.
It's not believed that any of them
were closely related, the high-
wav natrol said.

Japan's cleanup lagsbehind
after tsunami, nuclear accident

Debris contains
asbestos, lead
threatens region
NARAHA, Japan (AP) -
Two years after the triple
calamities of earthquake,
tsunami and nuclear disaster
ravaged Japan's northeastern
Pacific coast, debris containing
asbestos, lead, PCBs - and per-
haps most worrying - radioac-
tive waste due to the crippled
Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear
plant looms as a threat for the
region.
So far, disposal of debris
from the disasters is turning
out to have been anything but
clean. Workers often lack-
ing property oversight, train-
ing or proper equipment have
dumped contaminated waste
with scant regard for regula-
tions or safety, as organized
crime has infiltrated the clean-
up process.
Researchers are only begin-
ning to analyze environmental
samples for potential health
implications from the various
toxins swirled in the petri dish
of the disaster zone - includ-
ing dioxins, benzene, cadmium
and organic waste-related,
said Shoji F. Nakayama of the
government-affiliated Nation-
al Institute for Environmental
Studies.
Apart from some inflam-
matory reactions to some
substances in the dust and
debris, the longer-term
health risks remain unclear,
he said.
The mountains of rubble
and piles of smashed cars and
scooters scattered along the
coast only hint at the scale of
the debris removed so far from
coastlines and river valleys
stripped bare by the tsunami.
To clear, sort and process the

rubble - and a vastly larger
amount of radiation-contam-
inated soil and other debris
near the nuclear plant in
Fukushima, the government
is relying on big construction
companies whose multi-layer
subcontracting systems are
infiltrated by criminal gangs,
or yakuza.
In January, police arrested
a senior member of Japan's
second-largest yakuza group,
Sumiyoshi Kai, on suspicion
of illegally dispatching three
contract workers to Date, a
city in Fukushima struggling
with relatively high radioac-
tive contamination, through
another construction company
and pocketing one-third of
their pay.
He told interrogators ' he
came up with the plot to "make
money out of clean-up proj-
ects" because the daily pay for
such government projects, at
15,000-17,000 yen ($160-$180),
was far higher than for other
construction jobs, said police
spokesman Hiraku Hasumi.
Gangsters have long been
involved in industrial waste
handling, and police say they
suspect gangsters are system-
atically targeting reconstruc-
tion projects, swindling money
from low-interest lending
schemes for disaster-hit resi-
dents and illegally mobilizing
construction and clean-up
workers.
Meanwhile, workers com-
plain of docked pay, unpaid
hazard allowances - which
should be 10,000 yen, or $110, a
day - and of inadequate safety
equipment and training for
handling the hazardous waste
they are clearing from towns,
shores and forests after melt-
downs of three nuclear plant
reactor cores at Fukushima
Dai-Ichi released radiation
into the surrounding air, soil

and ocean.
"We are only part of a
widespread problem," said
a 56-year-old cleanup work-
er, who asked to be identi-
fied only by his last name,
Nakamura, out of fear of
retaliation. "Everyone, from
bureaucrats to construction
giants to tattooed gangsters,
is trying to prey on decon-
tamination projects. And the
government is looking the
other way."
During a recent visit to
Naraha, a deserted town of
8,000 that is now a weedy no-
man's land within the 20-kilo-
meter (12-mile) restricted zone
around the crippled nuclear
plant, workers wearing regu-
lar work clothes and surgical
masks were scraping away top-
soil, chopping tree branches
and washing down roofs.
"They told me only how to
cut grass, but nothing about
radiation," said Munenori
Kagaya, 59, who worked in
the nearby town of Tomioka,
which is off-limits due to high
radiation.
Naraha's mayor, Yukiei Mat-
sumoto, said that early on, he
and other local officials were
worried over improper han-
dling of the 1.5 trillion yen ($16
billion) cleanup, but refrained
from raising the issue, until
public allegations of dozens
of instances of mishandling of
radioactive waste prompted an
investigation by the Environ-
ment Ministry, which is han-
dling decontamination of the
11 worst-affected towns and
villages.
"I want them to remind
them again what the cleanup
is for," Matsumoto said in an
interview. "Its purpose is to
improve the environment so
that people can safely return to
live here. It's not just to meet a
deadline and get it over with."

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