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Show Page Two - The SpringviHe Herald - February 26, 2003 EDITORIAL li mi au. . Do you get lots of telemarketer phone calls? Everyday! We all do. Most of us would gladly do something to get rid of those unwanted calls. The trouble is how? Many of them come right at dinner time when you are busy and don't have time to call someone--anyone--and complain. A bill in front of the Utah State Legislature would create a DO NOT CALL list and make it illegal for telephone solicitors to call anyone who has registered to keep their name off all call lists. Is this a great bill! We hope that all citizens out there will call our local legislator, Calvin Bird, and tell them you support this bill 100 percent. The bill, Senate Bill 194, sponsored by Senator David L. Thomas, R-South Weber, will send a message to solicitors that if they call anyone on the DO NOT CALL list they will face stiff penalties. The penalties still need to be worked out. We hope that this bill will also include those miles of unwanted FAXES. A relative has a FAX machine in their home. It is used between two parties, the relative and another person. No one has been given the FAX number, yet they receive unwanted FAXES every day! How did they get the number? If the legislative bill goes through, consumers would pay a small yearly fee to be registered on a DO NOT CALL list. The list would be maintained by the Division of Consumer Protection. It does make one mad that the victims have to pay to keep those calls out of our homes and businesses. Telephone fraud through telemarketing is rampant across our country. And it is targeted at the elderly, disabled and low-income folks.. We hate those calls. It is even worse when the voice on the other end of the call is computer generated. Until the DO NOT CALL bill is implemented, and we strongly recommend that it will be, what you do is this. When you get one of those annoying calls, be polite and tell the caller that you have to turn off the stove or answer the door or something else. Then put the receiver on the cupboard and go about your business. That telemarketer will wait for you and time will pass and by the time they realize you aren't coming back, three other people won't get that annoying phone call! Be sure and call Calvin Bird about this one. (Police Chief at national FBI meet by Lt. Dave Caron On Wednesday, Feb. 19, SpringviHe Police Chief Scott Finlayson attended a briefing at FBI headquarters conducted conduct-ed by FBI Director Robert Mueller. Chief Finlayson, along with six other Police Chiefs and Sheriffs from around the country, was invited to attend a special preview of a new FBI program pro-gram designed to aid the FBI, state and local law enforcement in the war on terrorism. The FBI's new program will assist law enforcement officers in tracking and analyzing ana-lyzing intelligence data law enforcement receives. The program will provide a greater great-er measure of safety for residents in SpringviHe and Utah. Chief Finlayson was invited to participate in the FBI Director's Law Enforcement Enforce-ment Advisory Group in July of 2002. Representatives were chosen from various size agencies throughout the country to improve the working work-ing relationships between local and federal law enforcement en-forcement agencies. Unfortunately, Unfortu-nately, no one is free from the threat of domestic terrorism, terror-ism, but our local police department is determined to do all it can to protect our community and to assist in pringinUp Irralfi (USPS 513-060) Published Weekly by Art City Publishing Co., Inc. 161 South Main Street SpringviHe, Utah Publisher... Martin W. Conover Editor Patricia Conover - Periodical Postage Paid in SpringviHe, UT 84663 Postmaster send change of address notice to: The SpringviHe Herald, 161 S. Main, SpringviHe, UT 84663 Subscriptions in Advance per year $20 Out of County Subscriptions per year $23 Per Copy 50 C delivered by carrrier, per month $2 Member Utah Press Association finding solutions to these problems, both state and nationwide. We are fortunate that Director Mueller has chosen Chief Finlayson to represent law enforcement agencies of our comparable size. By serving on this committee the concerns and values of our community will influence law enforcement policy on a national scale. Volunteer to help seniors How Come? We have phones everywhere and can talk to anyone, any time, but we have many people who are lonely. Some are seniors, some shut-ins, some have debilitating illnesses, some are disabled. All are within a phone call of a friendly voice. Although some families keep in good contact, many would appreciate a friend of their own. If you know of someone who would like a friendly call-or, if you would like to become that encouraging friend to one in need, call Norman Smith at 798-1609, Retired and Senior Volunteer program. HIS by SFC Red Thomas (Ret) Since the media has decided de-cided to scare everyone with predictions of chemical, biological or nuclear warfare on our turf I decided to write a paper and keep things in their proper perspective. I am a retired military weapons, weap-ons, munitions and training expert. Lesson Number One: In the mid 1990s there were a series of nerve gas attacks on crowded Japanese subway stations. Given perfect conditions condi-tions for an attack less than 10 of the people there were injured. "60 Minutes" once had a fellow telling us that one drop of nerve gas could kill a thousand people, well he didn't tell you the thousand thou-sand dead people per drop was theoretical. Drill Sergeants exaggerate how terrible this stuff was to keep the recruits awake in class. (I know this because I was a Drill Sergeant too.) Forget everything you've ever seen on TV, in the movies or red in a novel about this stuff, it was all a lie (read this sentence again out loud!). These weapons are about terror, if you remain re-main clam, you will probably not die. This is far less scary than the media and their "Experts," make it sound. Chemical weapons are categorized as Nerve, Blood, Blister and Incapacitating agents. Contrary to the hype of reporters and politicians they are not weapons of mass destruction, they are "Area denial," and terror weapons that don't destroy anything. When you leave the area you almost always leave the risk. That's the difference; you can leave the area and the risk; soldiers may have to stay put and sit through it and that's why they need all that spiffy gear. These are not gasses, they .. are vapors andor air bowe particles. The agent must be delivered in sufficient quantity quanti-ty to killinjure, and that defines whenhow it's used. Every day we have a morning and evening inversion inver-sion where "stuff,", suspended suspend-ed in the air gets pushed down. This inversion is why allergies (pollen) and air pollution are worst at these times of the day. So, a chemical chem-ical attack will have its best effect an hour or so either side of sunrisesunset. Also, being vapors and airborne particles they are heavier than air so they will seek low places like ditches, basements and underground garages. This stuff won't work when it's freezing, it doesn't last when it's hot and wind spreads it too thin too fast. They've got to get this stuff on you or get you to inhale it for it to work. They also have to get the concentration of chemicals high enough to kill or wound you. Too little and its nothing, too much and it's wasted. What I hope you've gathered gath-ered by this point is that a chemical weapons attack that kills a lot of people is incredibly incred-ibly hard to do with military grade agents and equipment so you can imagine how hard it will be for terrorists. The more you know about this stuff die more you realize how hard it is to use. We'll start by talking about nerve agents. You have these in your house, plain old bug killer (like Raid) is a never agent. All nerve agents work the same way; they are cholinesterase inhibitors that mess up the signals your nervous system uses to make your body function. It can harm you if you get it on your skin but it works best if they can get you to inhale it. If you don't die in the first minute and you can leave the area you're probably gonna live. The military's antidote for all nerve agents is atropine and pralidoxime chloride. Neither one of these does anything to cure the nerve agent, they send your body into overdrive to keep you alive for five minutes, after that the agent is used up. Your best protection is fresh air and staying calm. Listed below are the symptoms for Eton 1 giDU nerve agent poisoning. Sudden Sud-den headache. Dimness of vision (someone you're looking at will have pinpointed pinpoint-ed pupils), Runny nose, Excessive saliva or drooling, Difficulty breathing. Tightness Tight-ness in chest, Nausea, Stomach Stom-ach cramps, Twitching of exposed skin where a liquid just got on you. If you are in public and you start experiencing these symptoms, first ask yourself did anything out of the ordinary ordi-nary just happen, a loud pop, did someone spray something on the crowd? Are other people getting sick too? Is there an odor of new mown hay, green corn, something fruity or camphor where it shouldn't be? If the answer is yes, them calmly (if you panic you breathe faster and inhale more airpoison) leave the area and head up wind, or outside. Fresh air is the best "right now antidote." If you have a blob of liquid that looks like molasses or Karo syrup on you; blot it or scrape it off and away from yourself with anything disposable. dis-posable. This stuff works based on your body weight, what a crop duster uses to kill bugs won't hurt you unless you stand there and breathe it in real deep, then lick the residue off the ground for a while. Remember they have to do all the work, they have to get the concentration up and keep it up for several minutes min-utes while all you have to do is quit getting it on youquit breathing it by putting space between you and the attack. Blood agents are cyanide or arsine which effect your blood's ability to provide oxygen to your tissue.The scenario for attack would be the same as nerve agent. Look for a pop or someone splashingspraying something and folks around there getting get-ting woozy falling down. The " telltale smells ! are bitter almonds or garlic where it shouldn't be. The symptoms are blue lips, blue under the fingernails and rapid breathing. breath-ing. The military's antidote is amyl nitride and just like nerve agent antidote it just keeps your body working for five minutes till the toxins are used up. Fresh air is . your best individual chance. Blister agents (distilled mustard) are so nasty that nobody wants to even handle it let alone use it. It's almost impossible to handle safely and may have delayed effect of up to 12 hours. The attack scenario is also limited to the things you'd see from other chemicals. If you do get large, painful blisters for no apparent reason, don't pop them, if you must, don't let the liquid from the blister get on any other area, the stuff just keeps spreading. It's just as likely to harm the user as die target. Soap, water, sunshine and fresh air are this stuffs enemy. Bottom line on chemical weapons (it's the same if they use industrial chemical pills); they are intended to make you panic, to terrorize you, to head you like sheep to the wolves. If there is an attack, leave the area and go upwind, or to the sides of the wind stream. They have to get the stuff to you, and on you. You're more likely to be hurt by a drunk driver on any given day than be hurt by one of these attacks. Your odds get better if you leave the area. Soap, water, time and fresh air really deal this stuff a knockout-punch. Don't let fear of an isolated attack rule your life. The odds are really on your side. Nuclear bombs. These are their only weapons of mass destruction on the earth. The effects of a nuclear nucle-ar bomb are heat, blast, EMP and radiation. If you see a bright flash of light like the sun, where the sun isn't, fall to the ground! The heat will be over in a second. Then there will be two blast waves, one out going and one on it's way back. Don't stand up to see what happened hap-pened after the first wave; Mmv anything that's going to happen will have happened in two full minutes. These will be low yield devices and will not level whole cities. If you live through the heat, blast and initial burst of radiation, you'll probably live for a very very long time. Radiation Radia-tion will not create fifty foot tall women or giant ants and grass hoppers the size of tanks. These will be at the most 1 kiloton bombs; that's the equivalent of 1,000 tons of TNT. Here's the real deal, flying debris and radiation will kill a lot of exposed (not all!) people within a half mile of the blast. Under perfect conditions this about a half mile circle of death and destruction, but when it's done it's done. EMP stands for Electro Magnetic Pulse and it will fry every electronic device for a good distance, it's impossible to say what and how far but probably not over a couple of miles from ground zero is a good guess. Cars, cell phones, computers, comput-ers, ATMs, you name it, all will be out of order . There are lots of kinds of radiation, you only need to worry about three, the others you have lived with for years. You need to worry about "Ionizing radiation," these are little sub atomic particles that go whizzing along at the speed of light. They hit individual cells in your body, kill the nucleus and keep on going. That's how you get radiation poisoning, poi-soning, you have so many dead cells in your body that the decaying cells . poison you. It's the same as people getting radiation treatments for cancer, only a bigger area gets radiated. The good news is you don't have to just sit there and take if, and there's lots you can do rather than panic. First, your skin will stop alpha particles, a page of a newspaper or your clothing will stop beta particles, you just gotta try and avoid inhaling inhal-ing dust that's contaminated with atoms that are emitting these things and you'll be generally safe from them. Gamma rays are particles that travel like rays (quantum physics makes my brain hurt) and they create the same damage as alpha and beta particles only they keep going and kill lots of cells as they all the way through your body. It takes a lot to stop these things, lots of dense material, on the other hand, it takes a lot of this to kill you. Your defense is as always al-ways to not panic. Basic hygiene and normal preparation prepara-tion are your friends. All canned or frozen food is safe to eat. The radiation poisoning poison-ing will not effect plants so fruits and vegetables are OK if there's no dust on 'em (rinse 'em off it there is). If you don't have running water and you need to collect rain or water from wherever, just let it sit for thirty minutes and skim off the water gently from the top. The dust with the bad stuff in it will settle and the remaining water can be use for the toilet which will still work if you have a bucket of water to pour in the tank. Finally there's biological warfare. There's not much to cover here. Basic personal hygiene and sanitation will take you further than a million mil-lion doctors. Wash your hands often, don't share drinks, food, sloppy kisses, etc., with strangers. Keep your garbage can with a tight lid on it, don't have standing water (like old buckets, ditches or kiddy pools) laying around to allow mosquitoes breeding room. This stuff is carried by vectors, that is bugs, rodents and contaminated contami-nated material. If biological warfare is as easy as. the TV makes it sound, why has Saddam Hussein spent twenty years, millions and millions of dollars trying to get it right? If you're clean of person and home, you eat well and are active, you're gonna live. Overall preparation for any Gfete terrorist attack is the same as you'd take for a big storm. If you want a gas mask, fine, go get one, I know this stuff and I'm not getting one and I told my Mom not to bother with one either (how's that for confidence). We have a week's worth of cash, several days worth of canned goods and plenty of soap and water. We don't leave stuff out to attract bugs or rodents so we don't have them. These weapons are made to cause panic, terror and to demoralize. If we don't run around like sheep they won't us; this stuff after they find out it's no un. The government is going nuts over this stuff because they have to protect every inch of America. You've only got to protect yourself, and by doing that, you help the country. Finally, there are millions of caveats to everything I wrote here and you can think up specific scenarios where my advise isn't the best. This letter is supposed to help the greatest number of people under the greatest number of situations. If you don't like my work, don't nit pick, just sit down and explain chemical, chemi-cal, nuclear and biological warfare in a document around three pages long yourself. This is how we the people of the United States can rob these people of their most desired goal, your terror. Mapleton Police report Mapleton Police had 45 calls last week including 17 that were animal related. There was a large amount of stray dogs. Please be mindful of the Mapleton City Ordinance Ordi-nance which requires all dogs be fully contained or on a leash at all times. Jay Dee Carrasco, 52 S. Sage, Orem, and Christopher Lagana, 394 E. 1640 N. Pleasant Grove, were both issued misdemeanor citations for contributing to the delinquency delin-quency of a minor. A female juvenile was issued a citation for curfew after she snuck out of her house late at night with the males named above. Brittney Tanner Warner, 710 W. 1600 North, Mapleton, Maple-ton, was arrested for possession posses-sion of stolen property, possession of a prescription narcotic without a valid prescription, theft and two outstanding warrants. Paul R. Jones 2407 E. 1035 South, Spanish Fork,, was cited for driving on a suspended license, no insurance insur-ance and expired registration. A dog owner was issued a citation for allowing their dog to run stray. A home was burglarized twice in the past week, making mak-ing a total of three burglaries since January at the residence. resi-dence. Prescription narcotics were taken, and the suspect was arrested for the crime. Two male juveniles were warned after they lit fireworks fire-works on school grounds. . In any contest between power and patience, bet on patience. Prescott It is not the length of life, but the depth of life. Emerson In the controversial literary liter-ary work, "Uncle Tom's Cabin" by Harriet Beecher Stowe, there is a character called Evangeline St. Clare. She is better known by the name Little Eva. CERT training class Feb. 25 A CERT training class concerning terrorism will be held Tuesday, Feb. 25, at 7 p.m. in the training room, 45 S. Main at the SpringviHe Fire Station. Everyone is invited. No charge. |