RSF@SU-AI.ARPA (08/31/84)
From: Ross Finlayson <RSF@SU-AI.ARPA>
n013 0707 31 Aug 84
BC-RESCUE
By PHILIP M. BOFFEY
c.1984 N.Y. Times News Service
WASHINGTON - The Reagan Administration's budget office is trying to
cut in half the American commitment to an international satellite
rescue program.
The program uses American and Soviet satellites to carry French and
Canadian equipment that can pick up distress calls from planes,
ships, or marooned explorers. It has resulted in the saving of 247
lives in two years.
The future of the program, thus far deemed experimental, is to be
discussed at a meeting in Leningrad in October, leading to intense
behind-the-scenes jockeying among American agencies to determine what
the government's negotiating posture will be.
David A. Stockman, director of the Office of Management and Budget,
has recently urged Commerce Secretary Malcolm Baldrige to commit only
one American weather satellite to the rescue program instead of two.
Stockman's request, conveyed in a July 26 letter that has just
become public, expresses no antipathy toward the rescue program
itself but notes that the administration has been trying for years to
get rid of one of its two polar-orbiting weather satellites to save
money. Those provide the best coverage of the earth's surface.
The plan is meeting strong resistance in the Commerce Department,
the Air Force, and other agencies concerned that the rescue program
would be harmed and that an American cutback would allow the Soviet
Union, which currently supplies three satellites to the program, to
reap a propaganda victory.
Rep. James H. Scheuer, D-N.Y., who chairs the House Science
subcommittee with jurisdiction over weather satellites, charged today
that ''the inflexible position of OMB not only compromises the lives
and safety of Americans but also jeopardizes the reliability of our
commitments to our allies.''
The stiffest opposition appears to be emerging from elements of the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Commerce
Department agency responsible for weather satellites. In a background
paper, NOAA warned that if the United States cut its participation,
''people would die who would have survived.''
The background paper proclaims the program ''a total success'' that
has saved 247 lives, 177 in North America. Most rescues were
attributable to the Soviet satellites, according to the paper.
Ironically, not a single Soviet citizen has been among those saved.
nyt-08-31-84 1003edt
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