Show V The Her i Joumal U)ganp Utah Wednesday December 24 2003 v Pixel imperreci CbqtbipedlhMnAl fa die An aerial photo of the White Houm Sept 11 a 2001 ' airplane In April 2002 : ‘ ' SOURCE: tion” shesaid Mad cow disease known also as bovine spongiform encephalopathy eats holes in the brains of cattle ft sprang up in Britain in 1986 and spread ' through countries in Europe and Asia prompting massive destruction of herds and deci' mating the Europfai beef industry ' - A fptmofmadcdw disefa can be contracted by humans if they eat infected beef or nerve' : tissue and possibly through blood transfusions The human : form of mad cow disease so far has killed 143 people in Britain and 10 elsewherenone indie United Stales Blood donors possibly pt risk for die disease ' v! ate bannedfirfa giving Waiypf the potentialecor- nomic impact on dfar Aniaiican " market bref producers quickly sought Tuesday to reassure con-sutlers that infected meat 'Wouldn't reachdieirtables “There is no risk' to consumers based upon the product that " came from this animal” said Terry Stokes diief executive of ‘ the National Cattlemen’s Beef ' Association'' " " Veneman also assured Ameri-can- s the screening system worked and no fail play was ' suspected “This incident is not terrorist-relateshe said “I Cannot stress this point strongly : : - d” enough”' '? Prfadent Bush was briefed a few times oo the development ' Tuesday and was confidejit Veneman’s department handling the matter properly the White House said y With an election year approaching die news con- cerned some in Congress Rep a member TunHolden a of die Hquse Agriculture Corih mittee said he expected law- - ' makers to hold hearings when they return to Washington in D-P- 1 “We’re going to look into this T’mfae there willbeexten- sive oversight hearings to see '' what we can do to assure die American people the safety of the food chain” Lawmakers are keenly award ' that a case of mad cow disease in Canada last May — which ’ single' imbtaH inrufent — Mi Kivi devastating ecaaaauc coose quences “If it’s amdimg like what happened in Canada it will be bacL The protdem won’t be that people will stop eating meat in die United Shies the proUem is the exports wid be abut down like we Ad with Canada” said Rep Collin PetenooD-Min- n y u:s The tops of thei huntings haw been dlgHaly covered -- hiding any detaL f The dome and other detail have been blurred making them Megkte The affected images bluried AP Gaotogteal Sunwy tographs with other commer-ciaJly available images of downtown Washington that haven’t been altered The Secret Service ordered Still some allies like Japan and South Korea banned imports of U providing an early indication of die potential economic damage the discovery could cause The farm near Yakima- Wash where the cow original- -' ed has been quarantined as offi' cials trace how the animal disease and contracted the where its meat wraL “Even though therisk Jo human health is minimal we 'will take all appropriate actions out of an abundance of cau- - andseethe pofability ofhow this happened” Holden said altered' 2002 Where such flights have the photographs degraded as a condition of perinitting a con-- v been heavily restricted since tractor’s twin-engithe2001 tenor attacks Piper ( Secret Service spokesman ' Navajo Chieftain to fly direct- John Gill said the agency wor-ly over Washington in April ne V1 : The Washington pho-- ‘ tographs were part of a nation- al project to create images of 133 cities including New York Los Angeles Miami St i Louis Lais Vegas and Dallas : About half the cities already ' been photographed and none of the images were deliberately degraded for" i i: security reasons said Scott Harris a spokesman fa the Geological Survey! - include: : The White House where ' thereof is obscured to hide objects in plain view y The nearby Old Executive Office Building where many ' presidential aides work The roof on that photo is obscured and interior courtyards from V' lateJauiary main building and five nearby congressional office buildings are blurred The Naval Observatory compound where the vice ' 4 presidential residence is which is blurred The US Geological Sur--' vey which paid for the pho tographs has been distributing! them publicly since last December without formally acknowledging they were de ' Continued from Al v t ' 1 ' 0 high-altitu- of others' seen anything like this” said Chris Becwar of GlobeXplor-erLL- C of Walnut Creek Calif which makes satellite and aerial photographs avail-- able over popular Web sites “We’d prefer that it not be there”Becwar said the company will consider replacing the degraded government pho-- ' ' B V ‘This is the first time we’ve ‘ photo of the Capitol buidkig lend national Studies “The knee- jerk reaction is to turn it off Once in a while that makes sense but not very often” Some private companies that already purchased this most recent collection of detailed photographs did not know some had been degraded by the government until contacted by The Associated 'Prats An aerial Infrared Washington-base- d Center fa Strategic pho-tographs so detailed that pedestrians can be seen in crosswalks “may expose security operations’’ ' vice Maty Hiatt a president for EarthData International of : Maryland LLC fad the Secret Service “gave us guid- juice as to what they had con-V' cents about” and the company used commerciid software to blur parts of some i photographs landobsc ried that die Bowing to Secret Service concerns over terrorism thegovemment detiberataty degraded the Nghestquatty aerial photographs of Washlnglon to obscure objects fa plain view atop federal buildings A9j‘ ' K Y The Treasury Department' next door to the White House ' where the roof also’ is v :' obscured and nterior Court- - ' 1 yards blurred1 The Capitol where the V high-resoluti- on ' On the Web: USGS National Map: http:seamlessijsgsgov r- : - " |