8/23/2023 0 Comments Nuclear power plant meltdown paWhen investigators could safely enter the reactor building in July 1980, they discovered that nearly one-third to one-half of the core had melted. President Carter and First Lady Rosalyn Carter visited Unit 2’s control room with Governor Dick Thornburgh to reassure the public that there was no need to panic. Denton, director of the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation, to TMI to gather facts and quell rumors. President Jimmy Carter dispatched Harold R. Experts feared the bubble might explode, releasing massive amounts of radiation, and officials made plans to evacuate nearby residents. Operators were able to return cooling water back to the core area by Friday, March 30, but a hydrogen bubble had formed inside the dome of the pressure vessel in an auxiliary building. They shut off emergency backup cooling water, resulting in an increased temperature that boiled off any remaining cooling water. Unaware of the problem, operators misinterpreted instrument readings as too much water in the core. ![]() A pressure relief valve then opened, but when pressure returned to normal, the valve remained opened, causing water to pour out of the reactor core. Without water from the pump to cool the core, a meltdown became likely. On Wednesday, March 28, at 4:00 a.m., a water pump failed in a non-nuclear part of the plant. Such a scenario, some reporters speculated, could result in deaths from radiation exposure and render a wide geographical area uninhabitable for at least one hundred thousand years. ![]() As the drama unfolded, the media reported that the reactor was out of control and that a total meltdown of the nuclear core was possible. ![]() The scope of the physical accident was relatively small, but the impact on the country’s nuclear power industry was enormous.įor several days, people around the world anxiously followed the emergency through the eyes of hundreds of reporters who thronged the scene. On March 28, 1979, the worst nuclear accident in the history of the United States occurred at the Three Mile Island (TMI) Nuclear Power Station near Middletown, Dauphin County.
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