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1979: Meltdown fearsThe accident at the Three Mile Island reactor tapped into American people's deepest insecurities about nuclear power.
Residents woke up on 28 March 1979 to hear their local radio station announcing a "general emergency" had been declared at the plant and that radioactive steam was leaking into the atmosphere.
The accident was caused by technical malfunctions in the power station's water coolant pipes and then compounded by errors made by engineers in the control room.
Despite official reassurance there was no danger of a core meltdown and that fallout was limited, many locals decided not to take the risk and 14,000 people fled the area in the days after the emergency.
Three days before TMI blew, my wife delivered our second child in Harrisburg Hospital. I worked several blocks away and, of course, visited at least twice daily.
Granny took off work to care for our two-year-old son. We lived near Duncannon, about eight miles NNW of Harrisburg, upwind of TMI.
The baby recovered after extensive, expensive, experimental treatments, but the doctors casually dismissed any TMI causality. I still have doubts.
I was 13 years old and I clearly recall the first hint of a problem at Three Mile Island was on a Wednesday. While at school, we were not allowed to go out of doors and all windows were ordered shut.
Our town had no evacuation plans. We were advised if a meltdown occurred, we would never be able to return to our homes again. We didn't even know what a meltdown was! And the movie The China Syndrome [a film about the cover-up of safety hazards at a nuclear power plant] opened at theaters the very same week.
I was in high school when this happened. It was a huge event. I don't recall me fearing for my safety.
But I do recall, when we were sent home from school, the school administrators would not allow bus windows to be open. It was a warm afternoon, and I remember thinking, "This is really stupid. The bus is not airtight, and I have to get off the bus to walk home!" They closed school for three days.
Officials advised staying in your house with windows closed. Then US President, Jimmy Carter, came to Central Pennsylvania. The Governor of Pennsylvania and experts looked very sober during press conferences.
No one really sure how much radioactivity was released. There was concern about a meltdown.
People who lived next to the plant were evacuated to a local arena.
Looking back, if it ever happened again, I wouldn't be so blasť about it. I would get as far away as possible!
I was a high school senior and remember it vividly. Panicked parents coming to school and demanding that they be able to take their children and fleeing hundreds of miles. And men posing as nuclear employees telling people near the plant to evacuate their houses. Once the home owners were gone the men would break in and rob the homes.
That event definitely marked the beginning of the end of nuclear power in the United States. The industry was already under scrutiny because they were not able to deliver electricity as cheaply as they had promised. And this event proved that the industry could not be trusted to run the nuclear program safely.
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