WORLD
BEIJING – China’s safety watchdog
confirmed Saturday that toy beads
recalled in the United States and
Australia after sickening children
contain a substance that can turn into
the “date-rape” drug after ingested.
The toys, coated with the industrial
chemical 1,4-butanediol, were made
by the Wangqi Product Factory in
Shenzhen, a city just over the border
from Hong Kong, the General Administration
of Quality Supervision,
Inspection, and Quarantine said in
a statement.
When ingested, the chemical
metabolizes into the “date-rape” drug
gamma hydroxy butyrate, also known
as GHB, which can cause breathing
problems, loss of consciousness, seizures,
drowsiness, coma and death.
Millions of units of the popular
toys, which are sold as Aqua Dots
in the United States and as Bindeez
in Australia, were recalled in those
countries as well as Britain, Malaysia,
Singapore and elsewhere this past
week after children began falling sick
from swallowing the toy’s bead-like
parts.
At least nine children in the U.S.
and three in Australia have fallen
sick.
The recall is the latest in a slew
of product quality scandals that
have tarnished China’s image as an
exporter of reliable goods.
Companies worldwide have increasingly
outsourced manufacturing,
often choosing Chinese factories for
their cost and quality. But heated
competition among factories and
the rising cost of labor, land and
fuel have sometimes put pressure
on profits, causing some producers
to cut corners.
NATION
OAKLAND, Calif. – Federal of-
ficials want a bird’s-eye view of San
Francisco Bay to observe environmental
damage caused by the area’s worst
oil spill in nearly two decades.
A preliminary Coast Guard investigation
found that “human error,”
not mechanical failure, caused the
cargo ship Cosco Busan to sideswipe
a support on the San Francisco-
Oakland Bay Bridge, leaving a gash
nearly 100 feet long on the side of
the 926-foot vessel.
The crash Wednesday ruptured
two of the vessel’s fuel tanks, which
leaked about 58,000 gallons of heavy
bunker fuel into the bay, killing
sea birds and spurring the closure
of nearly two dozen beaches and
piers.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has
declared a state of emergency. Rescue
teams raced to save hundreds of seabirds
tarred with black shipping fuel.
At least 60 birds were found dead,
while 200 live birds were recovered
and sent to a rehabilitation center in
Solano County.
As cleanup continued, so did
efforts to determine the oil spill’s
cause. Although Coast Guard officials
have not blamed a specific individual
or detailed mistakes that were made,
they have focused on possible communication
problems.
But a language barrier between the
vessel’s pilot, Capt. John Cota, and
the ship’s all-Chinese crew was not
likely a factor in the crash, since the
ship’s captain and officers are required
to speak English, officials said.
LOCAL
VIRGINIA BEACH – A small
cruise ship that was run aground to
keep it from sinking earlier this week
was re-floated Saturday and escorted
to a shipyard in nearby Norfolk, the
Coast Guard said.
The captain of the 207-foot vessel
ran the ship around in the Intracoastal
Waterway on Thursday after suffering
a foot-long gash in its hull and taking
on water. All 66 people on board
were rescued safely and no injuries
were reported.
The Coast Guard and a Virginia
Beach Police Department boat were
escorting the boat to the Colonna
Shipyard in Norfolk for repairs, said
Petty Officer Chris Evanson, a Coast
Guard spokesman.
The boat, The Spirit of Nantucket,
was on a 10-day cruise from Alexandria,
Va., to Charleston, S.C. It is
owned by Cruise West, a small cruise
line based in Seattle.