In 1979 , the United States came the closest it ’s ever been to a commercial-grade atomic catastrophe .
A malfunctioning valve lead to a partial meltdown in one of the two reactor at the nuclear world power plant onThree Mile Island , a little island located in Lake Frederic , a reservoir in the Susquehanna River , just about 10 miles downriver fromPennsylvania ’s uppercase of Harrisburg . Fortunately , catastrophe was avoided .
The Three Mile Island accident has been dwarf by more dangerous atomic nuclear meltdown atChernobylin 1986 andFukushimain 2011 , but the effects of Three Mile Island have reverberate for decade since , fromchangesin U.S. zip policies topopular culture . Now , a new four - partdocuseriesabout the incident , Meltdown : Three Mile Island , willpremiere on Netflixon May 4 , 2022 .
With that in mind , here are some authoritative fact to know about the Three Mile Island accident .
1. There were two nuclear reactors on Three Mile Island.
expression began on Three Mile Island ’s first atomic nuclear reactor , TMI-1 , onMay 18 , 1968 — a full decade after America ’s first commercial-grade nuclear plant , theShippingport Atomic Power Station , spread in westerly Pennsylvania , just about 250 miles west of Three Mile Island . structure on Three Mile Island ’s 2d atomic nuclear reactor , TMI-2 , began more than a yr later on , onNovember 1 , 1969 .
TMI-1 went online in 1974 ; TMI-2began operating in 1978 . Both unit of measurement were pressurize water reactors , which rely on feedwater pump to send pressurized piss to a steam generator , which then acts as the reactor ’s elemental coolant . From the very beginning , the TMI-2 nuclear reactor , where the accident would soon occur , was tough . It was subject to unscheduled closedown due to leakage , and following the chance event it was bring out that manager haddeliberately fudge dataabout the nuclear reactor for keep the plant operational .
2. The disaster unfolded in a matter of seconds.
At roughly 4 a.m. onMarch 28 , 1979 , a relatively small malfunction occurred in the non - atomic part of the works when a feedwater pump go to send water to the steam author , which prompted both the turbine source and the TMI-2 reactor itself to automatically shut down as a built - in safety safeguard — a procedure that occurred in about one second .
To reduce the pressure and heat edifice within the reactor , a valve was opened to give vent steam , then close once the temperature within the reactor repay to a safe spirit level . Except the valve never did nigh , despite the instrumentation in the command room reporting otherwise . As a solvent , according to the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission(USNRC ) , " the plant staff was unaware that cooling piddle in the variety of steam was rain cats and dogs out of the lodge - capable valve . As alarms rang and warning lights flashed , the manipulator did not recognize that the plant was receive a personnel casualty - of - coolant accident . "
More water was pumped into the reactor , but because of the malfunctioning instrumentation , nobody fuck the valve was still open , meaning the urine was going decent back out . So the nuclear reactor go on to heat up and , with no coolant usable , the core was exposed , causing major harm .
3. Later that day, radiation was vented into the air.
Contrary to popular belief , properly officiate nuclear power plants do n’t produce a lot of radiation ( coal - base baron plants actually produce aboutthree time as much).According to the USNRC , " most of an operating atomic power plant ’s direct radiation is immobilize by the works ’s blade and concrete construction . The end dissipates in an area of controlled , uninhabited space around the plant , insure that it does not affect any member of the public . "
Potentially 2 million people were display to excess radiation as a solvent of the Three Mile Island fortuity . While children and pregnant women were encourage to evacuate , all separate , an count on 140,000 people allow the field of their own willing . An 18 - twelvemonth report of those who lived within 5 miles of the plant — about 150,000 people in entire — found no significant increase in mortalityattributable to the Three Mile Island accident , though it did find an increase in the relative danger of certain Cancer .
4. The Three Mile Island accident occurred less than two months into the term of newly elected Pennsylvania Governor Dick Thornburgh.
5.The China Syndrome, a movie that eerily foreshadowed the disaster, premiered less than two weeks before the Three Mile Island accident.
The China Syndrome — which take its title taken from the idea ( perhaps a trivial hyperbolic ) that a full nuclear meltdown would pass the nuclear core to melt through its containment and burrow through the ground all the agency to China — asterisk Jane Fonda and Michael Douglas as a television set intelligence crew who are present during a gist accident , and have Jack Lemmon as the atomic flora ’s transmutation supervisory program . The New York Timesquoted Westinghouse executive John Taylor , who call the film “ an overall character blackwash of an entire industry . ”
6. There were no human casualties.
No casualty were reported from the incident at Three Mile Island — but it effectively killed any ontogeny in the nuclear power industriousness . In the sixties and 1970s , atomic office was the lead beginning of non - carbon paper - utter free energy , and building atomic power plants was a major origin of revenue and innovation for Westinghouse . But after Three Mile Island , big businessman plants under constructionfaced raw roadblock , and orders for new ones dried up . Plans stop for 39 plants that were being develop . The world belonged to ember and gas — and all their incidental emanation .
7. The disaster had a major effect on Bruce Springsteen.
Among the artists cheer to legal action by the incident wasBruce Springsteen , who populate less than 100 miles from Three Mile Island . He wrote a song called “ Roulette”about the incidentand the on-going debate at the sentence about whether the benefits of nuclear energy outbalance the potential environmental and health risks . The call , which says that " I ’ve got a house full of things that I ca n’t touch,“opens with the lyrics :
" We left the toy out in the yardI take my wife and kids and I left my nursing home unguardedWe packed what we could into the carNo one here knows how it commence … "
Though Springsteen originallyrecorded the song in 1979 , it remained generally unreleased ( although available “ through the miracle of bootlegging , ” as the Boss himself once said ) until hisTracksbox pose in 1998 . He also joinedMusicians United for Safe Energy(MUSE ) , and performed at their famed “ No Nukes ” concert . His version of the Detroit Medley was free on the No Nukes record album , but Springsteenreleased his full concert set in 2021 .
8. The TMI-2 reactor never operated again.
The harm done in 1979 was too difficult to reclaim from . It take 12 years to full decontaminate the reactor , which became a pathological holidaymaker attractiveness , much likeChernobyl . TMI-1 proceed operate until the power flora ’s closure on September 20 , 2019 , due more toeconomic payoff than fearsover nuclear power contemporaries .
