ECHOES AND UPDATES

High tech is not everything. US soldiers in Vietnam died with jammed rifles in their hands; sand in the Arabian desert is an even worse problem, still being researched by the Pentagon. But Doc-tors for Disaster Preparedness and Fighting Chance have come up with an easily manufactured and quickly removable lightweight plastic bag to cover an M16 and its magazines. Instructions for making it, together with instructions for the user and how to send them to specific servicemen, are available for a SASE from DDP, 2509 N. Campbell/#272, Tucson, AZ 85719. Or to help send them to US forces in general, send a donation to Rifle Bags/Fighting Chance, Box 1279, Cave Junction, OR 97523. They have already shipped over 200,000 of them.

GM's "Impact," an electric car planned to go into produc-tion and meant for two passengers on commuter-length trips, is now to be followed by an experimental electric vehicle, the HX3, which has a small internal combustion engine to extend the car's range. The main problem remains the (lead-acid) battery and its life (i.e. number of recharging cycles). The Big Three of Detroit plan [to] become the "Big We" in cooperating on electric cars (which activates a red warning light in my skull).

As noted before [AtE Mar 85, and often since], the EPA's 1984 ban on PCB's was based on highly doubtful evidence that it is a carcinogen; but its replacement by combustible mineral oil in transformers has caused countless costly fires and costlier outages ever since. PCB was also alleged to be undegradable and hence a permanent environmental threat. But in 1985 the EPA cited Cam-Or, an Indiana company, for PCB in three of its waste oil lagoons. The temporary cleanup by lime (to harden the waste) cost $15 million, which may be why Cam-Or went bankrupt shortly after-wards. In 1987 the EPA covered the lagoon with a tarp to prevent rain from washing the PCB it out. When they returned in 1988, says an AP dispatch of 12/16/90, they were stunned, for the oil sludge was still there, but the PCB was gone: not leached out, not evaporated, not overflown, just gone. Did it blow away through the ozone hole? Did the Hon. Marion Barry get stoned on it? Did Sen. Cranston steal that, too? It's downright eerie. Am I hearing creepy voices? Would it be Wm. Reilly singing in the transformer substa-tions? "Keep the oil fires burning, while my Greens are yearning. . ."

Nice to know things get around. An Australian subscriber who runs a radio news program in Sidney read about Dr Mielke's report "Oil in the Ocean" [AtE Feb 90] and broadcast an interview with him. That's the way!