DATE: Saturday, August 9, 1997              TAG: 9708090311
SECTION: FRONT                   PAGE: A4   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS 

DATELINE: WASHINGTON                        LENGTH:   32 lines

PENTAGON STUDY WILL LOOK AT MILITARY DEATHS DURING PEACE

Pentagon investigators will look into the military's safety procedures after two senators questioned whether enough was being done to prevent noncombat deaths in the services.

``Obviously, one accident is one accident too many,'' spokesman Kenneth Bacon told reporters. ``The secretary felt it was appropriate to look into this.''

Defense Secretary William Cohen asked the Pentagon's inspector general for the inquiry at the request of Sens. Edward Kennedy and John Kerry, Massachusetts Democrats. Their query followed reports in The Boston Globe about death in the peacetime military.

Bacon argued the Pentagon ``has had considerable success in recent years in bringing down the noncombat accident rate.''

He said accidental deaths per 100,000 people declined from 117 in 1980 to 68 in 1996.

``That's been a fairly steady decline with a blip or two up. But generally, the trend has been downwards,'' Bacon said.

He also noted the major aircraft accident rate dropped from 2.04 per 100,000 flying hours in 1990 to 1.50 in 1996, what he called a ``rather dramatic improvement.''

The Boston Globe reported Thursday that it will look at mechanical and human factors responsible for accidental deaths, steps taken to prevent accidents and ways to investigate them.

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