SEARCH STARTS FOR NUCLEAR DEBRIS
Russian satellite down in Canada
WASHINGTON (AI’) — U.S.-government sources said the Soviet satellite powered by n nuclear reactor which fell from earth orbit over the Northwest Territories Tuesday was a military spy unit.
The sources said the vehicle was a spy satellite launched Sept. 18 under the designation Cosmos 951. It was designed to keep track of U.S. Navy ships and submarines through radar, the sources said.
OTTAWA (CP) — Defence Minister Harney Danson said today there is a ‘‘98-per-cent chance or more" that a Soviet nuclear-powered satellite thought to have headed toward an uninhabited part of the Northwest Territories today disintegrated while re-
entering the earth's atmosphere.
“Hut we’re not taking any chances,” Danson said at a news conference.
In Washington a National Security Council official said the Soviet Union has launched at least 10 nuclear-powered satellites and the U.S. had launched one. but the fallen satellite was the first that had posed a threat of nuclear contamination.
Danson said tougher procedures should be established to protect the public from "this type of incident" recurring in the future.
He said this matter will be pursued by Prime Minister Trudeau, who was notified at 7:15 a.m. by President Carter of the fallen satellite. External Affairs Minister Don Jamieson was advised at the same time.
Hut the immediate concern is to de-
termine if any of the satellite and its reported 100 pounds of nuclear material landed in an area about 60 miles east of Yellowknife.
Canadian nuclear response teams and aircraft are standing by to help comb the area and determine any possible damage but “I don’t think there's any cause for hysteria," Danson said.
He said he has been aware since last
week that the Soviet satellite, a radar spacecraft the Russians say was used primarily for surveillance of the oceans, was losing its orbit, but Canada had not been officially notified of this by the Soviet Union.
Danson said the satellite could have landed anywhere, including populated areas, but original predictions were “surprisingly accurate" and pinpointed
exactly the day and area where the satellite would land.
Despite the predictions, Danson said it was decided that Yellowknife residents should not be notified of the possible impending threat because it could have caused “unnecessary hysteria."
The chances that Yellowknife would be endangered were "somewhat less than being struck by lightning." Danson said. One prediction Monday said the satellite would land in the Atlantic Ocean, he added.
He said, however, the path of the wobbling satellite had been followed "very closely" by his department and the North American Air Defence Command (NORAD) because of the possibility it could fall on a populated area.
If any fallout has occurred from the satellite, contamination could spread over an area of hundreds of thousands of feet, threatening lives and the natural environment. Danson said.
He said he hoped it would be known by later today if any of the debris from the satellite had hit the area and if any contamination had occurred.
Danson said there are provisions for obtaining compensation from the Soviet Union if damage has occurred.
Hut he would wait until later before attaching “a price tag" on any of the possible damage, because the immediate priority is to locate the remains, if any, of the satellite and search the area for possible radioactive contamination.
Witnesses describe ball of fire
YELLOWKNIFE, N.W.T. (CP) — A Soviet satellite falling from its orbit created a fireball display over northern Canada today and was seen in a number ol communities in the Great Slave Lake area.
At Hay River, on thesouthshoreof Great Slave Lake. Constable Phil Pitts of the local RCMP detachment said he saw a big ball of fire followed by about 20 smaller balls of fire before dawn.
“There was this mass of light just as I was walking out of the office. There had been falling stars earlier in the night so I figured it was something very logical."
lie said the ball of fire seemed to land just northeast of Hay River.
In Yellowknife, Mrs. Marie Human, who runs a janitorial service, said she saw a bright object flashing across the sky when she was driving home from work.
"The main part was like a bright fluorescent light. When it came overhead and we could get a good look at it, I could see dozens and dozens of parts.
“All of the pieces were bigger than shooting stars. As it was disappearing the main piece turned bright red. It was just fantastic."
Sky was falling, but nobody knew
by JOHN ASLING
Citizen Staff Reporter
You’d think it would be easy to get a little information from a Canadian defence radar sta-tion just outside Prince George, right?
Wrong.
First a spokesman at Baldy Hughes said curtly no information was available when I tried to find out if the Soviet satellite which crashed in the Northwest Territories had been picked up on the equipment there. Its path was across Central B.C.
“You’ll have to phone the 25th NORAD Headquarters in Tacoma, Washington,” he said.
Reasonable.
An information operator in Tacoma had never heard of the NORAD headquarters and said it wasn't listed. Instead she gave an air force base administration office.
There a woman asked “\S hat satellite?” And a male a few minutes later echoed her question with a slight difference. "Which one do you mean?” he asked.
"How many satellites do you have crashing?” he was asked.
“You’d be surprised how many things are up there and how many are falling down,” he said encouragingly.
"When did they see the satellite at Baldy Hughes?,” he wanted to know.
Another call to Baldy Hughes was about to merit a number in Victoria, when it came out: “I’ve just been
Booze
fight
pledged
WHITEHORSE, Yukon (CP) — Government leaders for Alaska, British Columbia, and the Yukon said Monday they have agreed to combine forces to fight alcoholism and drug abuse plaguing northern communities.
Yukon commissioner Art Pearson said the first day of a two-day meeting with Premier Bill Bennett of B.C. and Alaskan governor Jay Hammond resulted in agreement to pool the information and resources of the three governments to fight a problem all feel could be aggravated by construction of the Alaska Highway natural gas pipeline
The
Tuesday, January-24, 1978 Vol. 22: No. lfi
Citizen
15' Copy
Prince George. British Columbia
informed you’ll have lo call Tacoma. Washington.
Thanks.
This time at McCord Air Force base in Tacoma I was told to call the State Department press department in Washington, D C.
Another call.
There John Rattner said, “That’s the kind of information we don’t have. And we can’t really tell you where it is that you might be able to find out.”
Eventually he advised calling the prime minister’s office in Ottawa.
Fair enough.
A usually reliable source gave this reporter the PM’s number in Ottawa but when the number had been dialed, a woman in Belleville, Ontario answered.
1 gave up.
City tax
argument
raging
by TOM NIXON
Citizen Staff Reporter
Lafreniere residents, t jreatened with property-tax hikes, told council Monday they don’t want the increase if they don’t get anything for it
“‘Right now we receive nothing," said residents’ spokesman Hilda Lehto.
“We’d like to stay rural because we don’t have anything but a road that tears the undercarriage out of your car.”
Council last week began consideration of changes to the boundaries of the three tax districts in the city. Lafreniere was to be changed to suburban from rural meaning a higher tax rate.
The change, along with a number of others, w as reconsidered and then set aside while council decides how to differentiate between rural, suburban and urban tax designations.
“If you change us from rural to urban that means we can't have logging trucks parked in our area,” said Lehto, “you'd change all the bylaws, wouldn’t you ”
Lehto was told the tax desig nation has nothing to do with zoning or any other regulatory bylaws. The tax districts are related only to the amount of property tax owners pay.
In 1977 the rural mill rate
See TAXES, page 11
V s>-
Ciltarn photo by Duve Milne
Overboard
A $50,000 skidder lies smashed on the ice of the Fraser River in Prince George after it fell off a flatbed truck Monday evening. Police said the flatbed, driven by Walter Woodrow Bough, 53, was crossing the old Fraser bridge when a chain which held the skidder on the back caught in the bridge railing, pulling the skidder over the side. The rig is owned by Trey-Products. There’s about S10,000 damage to the bridge, while the skidder is probably a total loss.
FRENCH CHARTER
PQ loses in court
MONTREAL (CP) - Chiel Justice Jules Deschenes of Quebec Superior Court struck down today a section of the Charter of the French Language which proclaimed French the language of Quebec's courts.
Deschenes ruled that Chapter 3 of the language charter, passed last year by the Parti Quebecois government as Bill 101, was unconstitutional because it directly contradicted Article 133 of the British North America Act.
He said it was the duty of the court to set aside a law which unilaterally repealed a reciprocal constitutional guarantee that had stood for a century.
In his ruling, favoring a case brought against the chapter by three Montreal-area lawyers,
Chief Justice Deschenes said:
*‘We must not forget that Article 133 was the fruit of a joint political decision.
“If one of the parties wants to amend it, it is through the same process that it must do so. Quebec’s attorney-general tried to obtain a constitutional
modification through a judicial interpretation, but the court cannot accept this interpretation.”
Nothing would justify the court’s interpreting the texts in order to extract a meaning that their authors never intended, he said.
Hostage saga continues
OAK LAKE. Man (CP)-A man who took three hostages after a fatal shootout with police Monday remained holed up today in a doctor’s office in this southwestern Manitoba community.
Police on the scene said the situation had not changed overnight and no further incidents w ere reported Oak Lake
NORTHEAST OF CITY
McGregor dam plans scrapped
is about 250 kilometers west of Winnipeg.
The gunman, who identified himself as a 42-year-old British Columbia man named Cliff, was given the opportunity to talk by telephone with a minister and a lawyer and had been in periodic contact with the RCMP.
See also page 7
by DON MORHERG
Citizen Staff Reporter
B.C. Hydro has delighted environmentalists by cancelling its massive McGregor River diversion project.
Hydro announced Monday it was suspending the controversial scheme which would have seen a 460-foot dam on the McGregor River 80 km northeast of Prince George and water diverted into the Parsnip River to feed Peace River hydroelectric projects.
Hydro cancelled the project when it learned of a danger of transferring fatal parasites from Pacific salmon stock in the McGregor and Arctic salmon in the Parsnip, part of »he Peace River system.
The project, first proposed in late summer 1975, had been bitterly opposed by environmentalists and Northwood PulpandTimber Ltd., because the damming would have flooded 50,000 acres of the McGregor Valley. The provincial fish and wildlife branch also objected, as did local governments in the Prince George area, hunters and trappers.
Graham Farstad, director of the McGregor Action Group, called Monday’s decision "monumental” and said he was, “extremely gratified that B.C. Hydro and the provincial government realized our position was correct all along."
He noted it was only the second time Hydro had ever dropped a project. The first was the Moran Dam on the Fraser.
"There were three unnamed reasons for the McGregor cancellation, Farstad said, "First, the federal fisneries minister said he was opposed and would veto the project. Second, the massive economic losses had to be taken into account. And third, there was province-wide opposition.”
Farstad said he was surprised and puzzled about Hydro’s reason for the cancellation.
**We mentioned parasites; but did not stress it. We were using reports and were talking about the possibility there could be parasite problems if the waters were mixed,” he said.
"We based our campaign on the irresolvable fact that if there is less water going down the Fraser, water temperature would go up with the result ihat salmon would have a lower survival rate.”
Farstad said the parasite excuse, "may be just a convenient out for Hydro, a technical problem which they can solve at a future date.” He said his group would continue to keep an eye on Hydro.
Despite a little apprehnsive-ness, Farstad said he feels the McGregor project will not be revived at a future date.
I would like to see three more acts accomplished,” Farstad said. Hydro’s reserve should be lifted from the river to show they have no more interest in the land, reforestation should start below what would have been the water level and a salmon enhancement program should be started in the area. The salmon enhancement
See McGKEGOK page 2
TODAY
'Dear Editors: Talk that everyone is leaving Quebec is ridiculous. Did you get that. Miss Jones?'
FEATURED INSIDE
% The National Hockey League might not provide a team for the world hockey championship. Page 15.
« The Northern Toyota Midget Kings lost a heart breaker in their first Canadian championship game Monday. Page
15.
Bridge................. ...............21 ......10-11
Business............ .................8 Family................... ...........2(>
City, It.C............ .........2, a, H Horoscopes........... ...........11
Comics................ ...............10
......15-17
.................4 ...........11
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THE WEATHER
J
A Pacific frontal system continues over the Central Interior and is expected to bring Prince George cloudy skies with snow flurries today. Wednesday’s forecast is for cloudy skies with snow flurries in the morning only.
The forecast high today is 0, the low -7. The high Monday was-2, the low -11, with 8.4 cm of snow. On this date last year the high was -1, the low -8.
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NOW HEAR THIS)
• Citizen sports writer Mike Trickey had a cute French greeting all worked out for his phone call this morning about the Prince George Midget Kings’ results in the minor hockey championships in Verdun, Quebec. But he was concentrating so hard on the French, he gave the operator the wrong number, and, instead of calling The Citizen, he woke up his girlfriend.
• The cad of the week award goes to whoever left a small kitten in a bag in the Bay washroom Monday. Whoever did it should know the kitten had to be put to sleep because ot its condition atter its rescue.
• The city’s Fort George Railway in the park — entertainment for next summer’s youngsters — was described Monday by Alderman Vic Litnosky as "something we’ll be proud of sometime in the future.” "Say,” quipped an observer, “Didn’t a former premier say something like that about the BCR?”
• Setting up a rough timetable for council to meet various people Monday it was found that Steve Sintich, school trustee and well-known talker, was to be heard at 8 p m. It was suggested another audience could be set at 8:30 p m. giving Sintich’s matter plenty of time. "Oh no.” said Mayor Harold Moffat, “8:05, 8:05.” As predicted , Sintich got just five minutes of council time to appeal a requirement to pay excessive cost fees He lost, too