NATIONAL PARK SERVICE
                           MORNING REPORT

To:        All National Park Service Areas and Offices

From:      Division of Ranger Activities, Washington Office

Day/Date:  Wednesday, December 11, 1996

Broadcast: By 1000 ET

INCIDENTS

96-671 - NRPC (Colorado) - Follow-up on Employee Death

Donations in memory of John Christiano, chief of the Service's Air Resources
Division, may be made to Rocky Mountain National Park Associates, Inc., Rocky
Mountain National Park, Estes Park, CO 80517, or to University of Illinois
Foundation, General Scholarship Fund, 1305 West Green Street, Hark Hall, Room
400, Urbana, IL 61801.  [John Bunyak, AQD/WASO]

96-684 - Lincoln Home NHS (Illinois) - Suspected Bomb

The Postal Service delivered the daily mail and a package to the park's
administrative office around 12:30 p.m. on December 5th.  The package, which
was mailed from Germany, was the size of a shoe box and was addressed to
"Mrs. A. Lincoln, Springfield, Illinois."  It was wrapped in aluminum foil
and clear plastic, held together with wire, and was leaking a thick, greenish
substance.  Rangers responded, investigated the package, then implemented the
park's emergency operation plan for suspicious packages.  Agents from ATF and
the state police bomb squad were summoned; they determined that the package
could contain some type of explosive device.  ATF agents spent several hours
analyzing the package, including on-site x-rays to determine its contents. 
The package was finally opened and was found to contain several household
items, including a candle, a light bulb, tightly wound brass wire on a stick,
a steel wool pad, cake mixes, a photograph of a child, liquid car wax, and
other unrelated miscellaneous items, some wrapped in aluminum foil.  There
were no explosives.  Investigators believe the package was designed to look
like it contained an explosive device.  The box also contained a letter typed
in German, which is being translated by the FBI's language services division. 
Under ATF's bomb plan, a state bomb disposal truck, two fire trucks, two
ambulances and city police were dispatched to the scene.  Operations chief
Kathy DeHart was IC for the incident.  [Kathy DeHart,CR, LIHO]

96-685 - Joshua Tree NP (California) - Rescue

On the afternoon of December 5th, K.M., 25, was descending from a
climb of the Banana Cracks Formation in the Lost Horse Valley area when she
misjudged the distance between steps and fell about 15 feet to the base of
the formation.  K.M. landed on her back and hands, causing a possible
fracture and other injuries.  Rangers and paramedics treated her and lowered
her 50 feet to a waiting ambulance for transport to a hospital in Palm
Springs.  [Keith Kelly, Acting CR, JOTR]

96-686 - Baltimore-Washington MP (Maryland) - Shooting Incident

On December 3rd, a man driving on the parkway near Route 495 had a vehicle
approach from behind him and flash its headlights to pass.  The man pulled to
the right and yielded, but flashed his headlights back at the vehicle as it
went by.  The passing vehicle then slowed down and pulled abreast of the man,
and a person within fired a single round at him.  The shot missed him, and
the vehicle headed off on the parkway toward the District of Columbia.  Park
Police are investigating.  [Bill Lynch, LES, NCFAO]

96-687 - Baltimore-Washington MP (Maryland) - MVA with Fatality

R.H. of Washington, D.C., was killed in a single-vehicle accident
on the parkway on December 1st.  R.H. was exiting from the parkway when
he apparently lost control of his vehicle, struck a guardrail, then hit a
tree.  [Bill Lynch, LES, NCFAO]

RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

Yellowstone NP (Wyoming) - Update on Wolf Reintroduction

As of last month, there were 40 wolves roaming wild within the park and
another dozen in temporary captivity.  During the late summer and autumn,
park staff radio-located 34 of the wolves, mostly inside the park.  Most of
these were in the park's northern quarter.  The wolves are in several packs:

  o Rose Creek Pack - The largest of the packs, consisting of the adult
    pair, six wolves (four females and two males) born in 1995, and three
    pups born this year.

  o Crystal Creek Pack - The pack was reduced to just a pair of wolves when
    the former alpha male was killed in an interaction with the Druid Peak
    pack in May.

  o Druid Peak Pack - The pack is comprised of five wolves - an alpha male,
    a subordinate male, and three females.  As of mid-November, four of the
    wolves remained together, while an adult male ranged widely into
    Montana.

  o Leopold Pack - There are a pair of two-year-old alphas and three pups
    in the pack, which lives on Blacktail Plateau.

  o Chief Joseph Pack - The pack this fall consisted of only the alpha male
    and a female; younger members of the pack have dispersed and, along
    with other previous loners, formed two new pairs.

o Nez Perce Pack - This pack has an adult female and three pups.

o Soda Butte Pack - The six wolves (an alpha pair, a female born last
year, and two males and a female born this year) were penned from June
to October due to concerns about potential livestock predation on
private lands where they had denned this spring.

Other wolves are wandering alone or in pairs.  The following summarizes the
status of all wolves: The 14 released in 1995 bore two litters with a total
of nine pups.  Another 17 were released this year, and had four litters with
14 pups.  Eleven wolves have died - three were illegally shot, three were
killed by vehicles, two were killed by other wolves, one was removed due to
livestock depredation, one was fatally burned in a hot spring, and one pup
died of unknown causes.  Another pup was accidentally injured and
subsequently sent to live in a captive facility.  Ten pups were brought to
the park in the summer of 1996 from the Rocky Mountain front and have yet to
be released.  The goals of restoring wolves to Yellowstone and beginning to
delist them by about 2002 appear to be within reach, perhaps even ahead of
schedule and under budget.  [Excerpted from "Yellowstone Wolf Tracker," July-
December, 1996]

OPERATIONAL NOTES

No notes.

MEMORANDA

"Natural and Cultural Resources Professional Development Program," signed on
December 4th by Deputy Director Denis Galvin and sent to all associate
directors, field directors and superintendents with a reply due by January
17th.  Please note that the instructions alluded to in the following will be
posted on the natural resources bulletin board and several cultural resource
bulletin boards:

"As you are aware, one of our primary objectives is to improve
professionalism within the National Park Service (NPS).  To do so, it is
essential that resource management decisions be made on a scientific and
scholarly basis.  By doing so we will strengthen park protection; achieve
sustainability in park operations and development; help people forge
emotional, intellectual, and recreational ties with their natural and
cultural heritage; and, become a more responsive, efficient, and accountable
organization.

"With this in mind, the Service undertook an initiative to review natural and
cultural resources work within the organization.  A committee was established
to look at our workforce and the manner in which work is being assigned and
performed.  Results of the committee's work are contained in the attached [on
the original memo] Natural and Cultural Resources Professional Development
Program (PDP), 21 benchmark position descriptions, and other materials in the
draft implementation package.

"Funding for this initiative is being explored and will be discussed at the
next National Leadership Council meeting in January.  For this reason, it is
imperative that you review the attachments and complete and return one
worksheet for each resource management position in your organization that may
be affected by this initiative, by January 17, 1996.  Negative responses are
required. 

"In addition to the worksheets, we offer you the opportunity to provide
comment on the PDP, position descriptions, and draft implementation
information.  In particular, please indicate whether or not the benchmark
position descriptions adequately reflect the resource management duties in
your organization.  Suggestions of changes to the benchmarks will be helpful.

"Responses should be sent to Ms. Kathy Davis at SOAR (the address is
contained in the instructions).  If you have any questions about the
material, or how to compile the information, please call or cc:mail either
Ms. Kathy Davis at (602) 640-5258 or Mr. Bob Krumenaker at (540) 999-3491."

EXCHANGE

No submissions.

                                *  *  *  *  *

Distribution of the Morning Report is through a mailing list managed by park,
office and/or field area cc:Mail hub coordinators.  Please address requests
for the Morning Report to your servicing hub coordinator.

Prepared by the Division of Ranger Activities, WASO, with the cooperation and
support of Delaware Water Gap NRA.

                                  --- ### ---