Four legged daddy-long-legger spider photographed on Sunday, July 27, 1996, about 6 ½ miles north-northwest direction. These spiders in a normal, healthy state have 8 legs. Following the accident at TMI, many insects disappeared for many years. In this location, there were no bumble bees, certain type caterpillars, or daddy-long-leg spiders for 10 to 15 years. Pheasant have disappeared as well as hop toads. Carpenter bees disappeared from the location where the 31"dandelion leaves were found, and many dead birds were found there shortly after the accident.
(taken from http://www.tmia.com)
Twenty-eight years ago on 28 March 1979, Three Mile Island Unit 2 nuclear reactor underwent a partial meltdown, risking the lives of hundreds of thousands of people.
All 3 emergency feedwater pumps had been undergoing maintenance for 2 weeks
prior to the accident - a serious violation of regulations.
The reactor was not equipped with a supplementary safety system. Temperatures
inside the reactor vessel climbed above 752°F (400°C). A hydrogen gas bubble
(with oxygen, xenon, argon, etc) reached 30 cubic meters, which, at about 2,000
psi, had the equivalent explosive potential of 3 tons of TNT. On March 30,
52,000 cubic meters of radioactive water were discharged into the Susquehanna
River without permission from the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). --
The Truth About Chernobyl, by Grigori Medvedev.
"The 237,013 bottles of saturated Potassium Iodide (KI) (to protect the
public's thyroids from radioactive Iodine 131) solution that were delivered to
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania mostly too late to have been effective if the Three
Mile Island accident had become an uncontained meltdown were stored in secret
in a warehouse, and were never used."
It was not until the third day of the TMI disaster that Pennsylvania's Governor
Thornburgh decided to recommend that pregnant women and preschool children
leave the region within a 5-mile radius of Three Mile Island and to close all
schools within that area.
http://www.ki4u.com/three_mile_island.htm
Background:
http://www.tmia.com
"The sequence of certain events - equipment malfunctions, design related
problems and worker errors - led to a partial meltdown of the TMI-2 reactor
core..." (US Nuclear Regulatory Commission 'The Accident At Three Mile
Island').
Approx. 66 million curies of Iodine 131 was in the reactor at the time of
accident.
"More than half the unit's core melted". - National Geographic, April, 1989.
"It flowed like hot olive oil," - Vice President of the company operating Three
Mile Island, in reference to TMI's uranium fuel. - Edward Kintner, executive
vice president of General Public Utilities (GPU) Nuclear.
GPU denies that TMI releases could have harmed anyone, but the company has
quietly paid at least $15 million in out of court settlements.
Although the nuclear industry repeatedly told the public that Three Mile Island
didn't have a meltdown, about 48 tons of fuel (32%) melted, of which 30 tons
reached the bottom of the containment, having melted a 2x5 ft. hole in the
inner wall of the containment. - New York Times.
"Jack Herbein [MetEd's plant manager] confidently predicted that the amount of
failed fuel was 'considerably under one percent.' [the NRC will allow a
commercial nuclear reactor to operate with 'up to one percent failed fuel.']
...As the fuel-damage debate continued, at least 80 percent of the reactor fuel
had failed." - Mark Stephens, Three Mile Island.
"[the information exchange between the licensee and the NRC included] A 12:15
p.m. suggestion [by the NRC on March 28] that the primary cooling system be
'blown-down' or de-pressurized - a maneuver followed by the utility and
resulting in the reactor core's being uncovered for a second time."- "Three
Mile Island" by Mark Stephens (Random House).
"...a year after it all began, Unit 2 was still not in cold shutdown. In the
reactor 1,500 gallons of water had to be added each day to replace the 1,500
gallons that continued to leak daily into the containment sump. With the
control rods gone - 69 silver and boron rods melted by the intense heat of
March 28, 1979 - only the boron-laden cooling water kept the reactor from
coming back to life. After a year, Unit 2 still relied on a single safety
system in each area of plant operation. And these systems had been running for
a year without maintenance in radiation fields far stronger than they were ever
designed to withstand. If the last cooling pump or the last steam generator
failed, then the accident at Three Mile Island would pick up right where it had
left off in April 1979. Only, this time, there would be no safety systems at
all to save the plant."
Statistics indicate that there was a tripling of Harrisburg's infant death rate
in the three months after the tmi accident. - Harvey Wasserman, Killing our
Own: The Disaster of America's Experience with Atomic Radiation, Dell
Publishing, 1982.
The following journalists, who spent long periods of time in the area covering
the accident, developed cancer and died: Pete Stoler (Time magazine), Bob
(CBS), Paul Cowan (Village Voice), Cathy Machen (ABC), and Jack Pollard (New
Era, Lancaster, PA).
"From the three months of 1979 prior to the accident at Three Mile Island to
the four subsequent months, the infant mortality rate rose in Pennsylvania by
almost sixteen percent, in Maryland by 41 percent. The... official 1979-1980
infant mortality rate for Dauphin County [site of tmi] was 37 percent higher
than the rate for the previous two years; during the same period, the U.S.
infant mortality rate dropped by eight percent. The probability... by chance is
less than one in one thousand." - Deadly Deceit.
2,500 lawsuits have been filed against Metropolitan Edison, alleging that the
accident at TMI has caused a host of radiation induced illnesses (March '91).
The environmental consultants retained by Metropolitan Edison (owner of TMI)
reported: "Based on techniques used in this analysis, dose estimates are
consistent with the release of seven million curies of noble gases in the first
one and one half days and one million in the next three days, and a relatively
small amount thereafter." - Kemeny Commission.
- compiled by Nuclear Liabilities http://www.ki4u.com/three_mile_island.htm
