FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Wednesday, September 12, 2001
Contact: Chuck McFadden
(510) 987-9193
Chuck.McFadden@ucop.edu
UC PROVIDES HELP, EXPERTISE IN THE WAKE OF TUESDAY'S TERRORIST
ATTACKS
As the nation begins to recover in the wake of Tuesday's terrorist
attacks, University of California campuses are providing a
wide range of services to their communities, the state and
nation.
Some 3,000 persons attended a candlelight vigil at UC Berkeley Tuesday night. At UCLA, the public is invited to a memorial service to honor and remember those killed in the terrorist attacks; the service is scheduled for noon on Thursday, Sept. 13, on the steps of Royce Hall at UCLA. The event will feature the UCLA Brass Quintet. UC Riverside faculty, staff and students will participate in a memorial service scheduled for Friday, Sept. 14 at the Riverside City Hall. Additional services, campuswide gatherings and special counseling for arriving students are planned or have already been held at UC San Diego, UC Davis, UC Santa Barbara, UC Irvine, UC San Francisco and UC Santa Barbara.
- Full-scale blood drives are underway at UC San Francisco,
UC Berkeley, UC Irvine and students are organizing one at
UC Davis. Because of long lines, UC San Diego campus blood
donors have been requested by the San Diego Blood Bank to
delay participation until the community blood drive on Oct.
15, 16 and 17. All other campuses are encouraging students,
staff and faculty to contribute blood, with instructions
on how to go about it. The national laboratories at Livermore,
Berkeley and Los Alamos managed by UC are also advising
staff members on blood donations, and Lawrence Livermore
National Laboratory has a drive scheduled late in September.
- At UC Berkeley, an assistant professor and two computer
science students have set up a web site - http://safe.millennium.berkeley.edu.
-- to let the public know if loved ones are safe.
- Seven campuses - Berkeley, Davis, Riverside, UCLA., Irvine,
San Diego and Santa Barbara - are providing faculty experts
to the news media and other organizations. The expertise
ranges from high-rise engineering to terrorist tactics.
- The UC San Diego Disaster Medical Assistance Team has been placed on "Advisory" status by the Emergency Operations Center of the National Disaster Medical System in Rockville, Maryland. The next status would be Alert and then Activation.
At least two UC-connected victims of the Tuesday events have been identified:
- Mari-Rae Sopper, recently appointed women's gymnastics
coach at UC Santa Barbara, was among those who perished
on American Airlines Flight 77, bound from Dulles Airport
in Washington D.C. to Los Angeles International Airport.
Sopper was appointed to her post on August 31, and was making
the trip to California to begin her job as the Gaucho women's
gymnastics coach.
- Mark Bingham, a 1993 graduate of UC Berkeley, who owned Bingham Associates, a public relations firm with offices in San Francisco and New York City, died in the crash of United Airlines flight 93 from Newark to San Francisco. That plane went down in Pennsylvania.
In addition, Robert LeBlanc, professor emeritus of geography at the University of New Hampshire, died on United Airlines Flight 175, bound from Boston to Los Angeles. He was traveling to UC Santa Barbara to attend the Association of Pacific Coast Geographers annual meeting, underway at the campus.
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