The Clarksdale Press Register from Clarksdale, Mississippi • 1

iff FIASS 115th Year-Number 89 Clarksdale, Mississippi Monday Afternoon, April 14, 1980 12 Pages 15 Cents Red Cross, others visit U.S. hostages By The Associated Press Two representatives of the International Red Cross and a group of Iranians visited the 50 American hostages in the U.S. Embassy to against Iran. They announced last December that they had mined the embassy walls with explosives. Carter told a group of European television correspondents on Saturday that if further U.S.

action were necessary to free the hostages, it "would be very strong and forceful and might well involve military means." He also had a warning for the embassy militants, saying, "if our hostages are injured or any of them are killed, then we would not delay in taking much stronger action of an incisive nature." After their meeting with Bani-Sadr, the Japanese and West European ambassadors began returning home for "consultations" with their governments in accordance with a procedure worked out by the Common Market governments at a meeting in Lisbon, Portugal, last week. Just in case Residents of a trailer park In Jackson emptied their home of valuables Sunday. They were making preparations for the worst a repeat of last Easter's flood that forced the evacuation of 17,000 persons. A rising Pearl River threatened to spill over its banks, but officials said flooding would not be as extensive as In the past. -AP Laserphoto check on their condition and report their findings to the families of the captives.

The Red Cross representatives were Harald Schmid de Gruneck, the permanent Red Cross representative in Tehran, and Dr. Bernard Liebeskind, a physician. Both are Swiss. They were accompanied by an official of the Red Lion and Sun, the Iranian equivalent of the Red Cross, and Iranian Health Minister Moussa Zargar. Hojatoleslam Seyyed Ali Khamenei, the Moslem clergyman who leads the weekly Sabbath prayers in Tehran, also was scheduled to be a member of the group, but it was not known if he was already inside the embassy.

A spokesman for the militants occupying the embassy since Nov. 4 said he was added to the group at their insistence. A spokeswoman at the Geneva headquarters of the Red Cross said the Iranian government agreed to three conditions set by the organization that its representatives meet with all the hostages, that they be allowed to make a list of their identities and that they be allowed to notify the captives' families of the state of their health. Today was the Americans' 163rd day of captivity. The militants' spokesman said the visit was "imposed" on them by the Iranian government.

Apparently the government hoped it would help to undercut President Carter's campaign to get Japan and America's major European allies to take the same economic and diplomatic sanctions against Iran that he ordered. The ambassadors of Japan and the nine European Common Market countries on Saturday called on President Abolhassan Bani-Sadr and relayed demands from their governments for the immediate release of the hostages. A press aide said Bani-Sadr rejected the demand and warned the foreign governments against taking punitive action against Iran. But he said he would ask some international organization to check on the condition of the captive Americans and report to the world on their treatment. The Americans' last foreign visitors were three American clergymen who held Easter services eight days ago and reported they were in excellent physical and mental shape.

The militants also renewed their threat to kill all the hostages, saying they would "blow them sky-high," if the United States took military action Calender MONDAY, APRIL 14 7:30 p.m. --The Coahoma County Conservation League will meet at the Coahoma County Court House. 7:30 p.m. -The Clarksdale Elks Club will meet at the Elks Lodge on Mississippi 322. 7:30 p.m.

-As part of National Library Week the Carnegie Public Library will sponsor a "Self Protection for Women" demonstration with Lt. Jim bullard of the Memphis Police Department. TUESDAY, APRIL 15 12 noon-The Clarksdale Rotary Club will meet at the Regency Restaurant. 4 p.m.-The Community Development Council will meet at the offices of the Coahoma County Chamber of Commerce. Weather Cloudy with a 30 percent chance for light rain today.

Decreasing cloudiness and cold late tonight. Mostly fair with a warming trend beginning on Tuesday. High today near 50. Low tonight upper 30s. High Tuesday near 60.

Winds westerly 10 to 25 mph and gusty today, becoming 5 to 15 mph tonight and Tuesday. Generally fair Wednesday becoming partly cloudy Thursday. There Is a chance for showers returning on Friday. Lows near 50 north to upper 50s south. Highs mostly tow to mid 70.

In Clarksdale, the water and light department recorded the following weekend temperatures: Friday, high 63, low 52 with 1.65 in. rain; Saturday, high 67, low 44 with 0.6 in. rain; Sunday, high 46, low 37, with 1.40 In. rain. River The Mississippi River at the Helena gauge was recorded this morning at 37.8 ft.

which is a fall of 0.3 ft. during the past 24 hours. Many Jackson residents move to higher ground moved into an evacuation center on Sunday. While officials said the flooding in Jackson would not be as extensive at last Easter, many residents were not taking any chances. "That's what they told us last time, said an employee of a Jackson nightclub as she watched for the first signs of flooding.

Hundres of residents of northeast Jackson, a neighborhood of middle-class to expensive homes, methodically filled trailers, cars, trucks, vans anything they could find with their belongings, preparing to get out before they would be trapped by water-filled streets. Flood from the heavy weekend rains had sent water into more than 40 Jackson streets and officials estimated another 40 would be flooded by late Tuesday. Most of the streets are in the flood-prone northeast section of the city and just south of Jackson's central business district. Flooding was reported in some homes and businesses in Richland, Continued on Page 2 JACKSON (AP) Additional families packed their possessions and moved to higher ground today ahead of the advancing Pearl River as Jackson braced for the worst flooding since the 1979 Eastor flood that drove 17,000 persons from their homes. Exactly one year ago Sunday, the Pearl River reached 43.25 feet at Jackson, sending muddy water to the rooftops of hundreds of homes and businesses.

Officials said, however, that the current high water was not expected to climb than within six feet of the 1979 flood. Officials at the Jackson-Hinds Emergency Operations Center said an estimated 1,000 persons had evacuated by early today and that more evacuations were anticipated as the river climbed toward a crest of 37 The tower at Gulfport Regional Airport was back in service after an hour although some windows were broken and some equipment damaged, a Federal Aviation Authority official said. Jack Barker, an FAA official in Atlanta, said the radar and some of the equipment used to control instrument landing approaches was still out, but that operations are the airport were near normal. "Houston air traffic controllers handled our area while we were out," he said. "But there was little traffic at that hour." Twister damage widespread on Coast Mississippi to continue slow drop Rainfall, as recorded by the Clarksdale Water and Light Department, totalled 3.65 over the last three days and there remained a chance today that still more rain will be coming.

Since April 1, rainfall here has totalled 3.76 inches. The average rainfall for April is 4.82 inches, but in April 1979 precipitation measured 10.79 inches, and in 1978 the total for the month was 6.07 inches. Last night, the forecast included a chance for snow, which apparently didn't develop, and temperatures in the high 30's. Today's high reading was expected to remain in the low to mid-40's. The heavy rainfall of the last three days might slow the fall of the swollen Mississippi River, which dropped .3 foot on the Helena gauge during the 24-hour period ending at 7 a.m.

today. The reading at Helena this morning was 37.8 feet, well below the 44-foot flood stage. Joe Mooney, Chief engineer of the Yazoo-Mississippi River Levee Board, said that information furnished to him today indicates that the river will drop slowly for the next five days and should be at about 36.5 feet in Helena at the end of this week. Continued on Page 2 said. I had just reported for work and it got real dark and then I heard the wind blowing," she related.

"It was frightening. Windows blew in and the lights went out. I couldn't raise anyone on the radio for a while." Just across U.S. Highway 90 from the substation, the Westside Community Center was demolished by the storm. "There's just boards sticking up," said Ms.

Pittman. Ms. Pittman said the substation was put back in operation later in the morning with a generator at the site supplying needed power. Harrison County sheriff's deputies said the damage around the city was mostly confined to broken windows and damaged roofs. ---a Guice said, adding 17 persons were injured in the tornado, but none seriously- Authorities declared a state of emergency in Gulfport and imposed a 6 p.m.

to 6 a.m curfew. Additional police and deputies were called in to patrol the city. Controllers and technicicans at the Gulfport Regional Airport abandoned the tower when the tornado approached in the early morning hours Sunday. The Mississippi Highway Patrol substation in Gulfport was also extensively damaged and the experience proved terrifying for dispatcher Helen Pittman, the only person on duty when the storm struck. "It was frightening," Ms.

Pittman to 38 feet sometime Tuesday. Flood stage at Jackson is 28 feet. "We estimate the river will reach 36 feet by this afternoon, then push to 37 or 38 feet sometime Tuesday," a spokesman at the center said. "We already have a few streets baracaded and more streets are being threatened." The river reached 35 feet two weeks ago, sending water into a few businesses and surrounding about a dozen homes along a creek near the city's central business district. Officials said the spillway at the Ross Barnett Reservoir, which impounds the Pearl River north of Jackson, was releasing about 50,000 cubic feet of water per second downstream.

However, the inflow rate from the basin above the reservoir was placed at 52,598 cubic feet per second. Flooding also was reported along the Leaf River in the Hattiesburg area of South Mississippi, and an estimated 75 families were evacuated in the Columbia area, where the Pearl River had reached 25.5 feet early today and was expected to climb between 26 and 27 feet before cresting later this week. The Leaf River at Hattiesburg had climbed 28 feet early today, forcing the closing of several highways, including U.S. 11 between Hattiesburg and Petal. Flood stage on the Leaf River is 22 feet at Hattiesburg and officials said the river could reach 30 feet on Tuesday.

Officials said as many as 3,500 people may have to be evacuated in the Hattiesburg area. A number of persons, many of whom left their homes during high water two weeks ago, had unseasonably cool temperatures and rains are likely to persist throughout the end of next week. Many farmers in the Delta who remember the below average cotton yield last fall which was attributed largely to late planting, do not welcome this year's above-average spring rainfall. William Oneal, Coahoma County Agent, said this morning that the rains and cool weather would delay planting considerably in the Delta, but said that there is still sufficient time to plant and receive a bountiful yield if the rains dissipate during the remainder of April and the first part of May. "Cotton is usually planted between April 10 and May 10.

You need to plant cotton when the ground temperature reaches 68 degrees or above and stays there a while," Oneal said. He said that some planting in the high sandy-land areas which will dry easily can be done late this week, but chances cotton planted this week producing a significant yield are "only about 50-50." "We ought to be able to get some good planting time around the end of the month if we can get warmer and dryer weather and still produce a good crop this year," Oneal said. Weather delays planting but plenty time remains ar 1 I Jl A -i GULFPORT (AP) Civil Defense officials are estimating the cost of destruction caused by a Sunday tornado at $10 million. The twister that slammed into the coastal city ripped off roofs, shattered windows, wrecked airplanes and demolished at least one building. "That's an educated guess, but the damage is very widespread," said Wade Guice, director of Civil Defense for Harrison County.

Guice said the business area of Gulfport was hard hit by the rampaging winds and torrential rain. "The rain was so heavy you could hardly breathe," Guice said. About 200 houses were damaged, either by flooding or wind damage, State Street rapids irtw hi ii rif 1 r- Many filing taxes before deadline WASHINGTON (AP) Taxpayers, probably inspired by the prospect of higher refunds, have filed their 1979 federal returns in advance of Tuesday's deadline at a faster rate than last year, the Treasury Department reports. As of April 4, the Internal Revenue Service had received 58.1 million returns of an expected 93 million. The return rate is 3.3 percent higher than a year ago, and higher refunds may be the prime motivator, IRS spokesman Larry Batdorf said last week.

At the same time last year, the IRS had made 38.74 million refunds totaling $19 billion, or an average of $490 per return. This year, refunds totaling $23.6 billion, or an average of more than $590, have been sent are up to 39.9 million filers. "Obviously, this is the result of inflation," Batdorf said of the 20.5 percent increase in the average refund. The speedy filing has, however, resulted in an increase in errors that will delay refund checks for some taxpayers. As of April 4, Batdorf said, 6.3 percent of those who filed the 1040 long form made mistakes of one sort or another, compared with 6 percent last year.

The error rate on the 1040a short form was 5.6 percent, up from 5 percent a year ago. The most common error among long-form filers has occurred when "people looked at the wrong tax table to calculate their total liability," the spokesman said. For those taxpayers who cannot meet Tuesday's midnight filing deadline, the IRS has a safety net known as Form 4868, "Application for Automatic Extension of Time to File U.S. Individual Tax Returns." By BOB LEWIS Staff Writer The planting prospects for local farmers are beginning to resemble the conditions which existed last spring which forced late planting and one of the worst cotton crops in many years. Nearly four inches of rain have fallen over Clarksdale and the northern half of the Delta as a result of an intense low pressure system which stationed itself in south Mississippi after inflicting heavy water and wind damage along the state's Gulf Coast Saturday.

The Sunflower River here which had receded into its banks after cresting three weeks ago at roughly 15 feet above normal stages, has again swollen from its banks. Joe Mooney of the Yazoo-Mississippi Delta Levee Board said that the river crested this morning at 9 a.m. after rising some eight feet during the weekend from the torrential rains. Forecasts presently call for clearing skies sometime Tuesday before another front enters the Mid-South Thursday or Friday packing more rains and unusually cool temperatures. An agricultural meteorologist for the Mississippi Cooperative Agriculture Experiment Station in Stoneville said that the These New Orleans residents had fun running the rapids In front of their homes on State Street after more than eight inches of rain flooded the area Sunday.

-AP Laserphoto.