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Newspaper: Evening Sentinel
Date: April 2, 1979
Title: Let Us Proceed with the Truth
Author: Unknown

Pennsylvania should be lauded for their calmness in the face of an incredible breakdown in the dissemination of information over the crisis at Three Mile Island.

Granted, there never has been an emergency quite like this one, but all agencies involved-including the national news media-can be cited for irresponsibility in confusing the general public over just what is going on.

Metropolitan Edison Company and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission share initial blame. As late as Saturday, four days after the problem developed, Met-Ed and the NRC still were issuing conflicting statements, this time over the gas bubble which perils getting the damaged nuclear reactor into a cold shutdown mode.

People don’t know what to believe. It’s a wonder there hasn’t been general panic. In this tense atmosphere, NBC made it even worse by announcing a general evacuation order was imminent. Local television stations had to go to great lengths to say that just wasn’t true. No general evacuation order ahs been given.

In this situation, the entire news media is at the mercy of those in control at Three Mile Island. Until Met-Ed and the NRC agreed to consolidate their announcements, general confusion reigned. The NRC should, at the very least, have moved its general information office to Middletown immediately instead of waiting until this weekend. “Experts” were making statements out of Washington and elsewhere far removed from the actual events at Three Mile Island, adding to the misinformation.

Compounding the problem is the fact that nuclear proponents and opponents are speaking out whenever possible. Everybody’s taking a shot as to what this all means. While their concerns are justified, the impact on the general public has to be a consideration. These statements could cause more anxiety and alarm than the actual events themselves.

President Carter realized the extent of the problem when he said Sunday he personally would bear the responsibility to inform the American people about the incident.

The news media is not without blame. The crush of reporters and cameramen at Middletown is getting to be unbearable. Residents who moved to Hersheypark Arena have been treated as victims in a fishbowl; everybody wants an interview or a picture.

Thus far this crisis has taken on the appearances of a three-ring circus. Dangerous days still lie ahead; it behooves everyone to present the truth about what is happening at Three Mile Island and to proceed with orderly announcements of an evacuation, should that order indeed be given.

Newspaper: The Evening Sentinel
Date: April 2, 1979
Title: Evacuation Plan is Set; Six Counties are Alerted
Author: George Lobsenz, United Press International

HARRISBURG-State civil defense authorities have put six counties on “advanced alert” to evacuate-if Gov. Dick Thornburgh so orders-more than half a million central Pennsylvanians because of the Three Mile Island nuclear plant accident

The evacuation plan on the books that county civil defense authorities are poised to put into effect could eventually remove 636,000 people from within 20 miles of the stricken nuclear facility. Included in the stages of the plan are Dauphin, York, Lancaster, Perry, Cumberland and Lebanon counties.

Authorities said an evacuation would proceed according to the atmospheric conditions and wind velocities, determining which way and how fast radioactive emissions from the plant traveled.

John Comey, spokesman for the Pennsylvania Office of Emergency Management, said a plan has long been on the books to evacuate every single person from the State of Pennsylvania-about 12 million residents-if a catastrophe loomed.

Roland Page, deputy press secretary to Thornburgh, said there is a contingency plan-and the governor has not decided whether he will follow it-for high state officials to occupy the radiation-proof state civil defense command post beneath a state office building if an evacuation was called for.

There is also an existing civil defense plan for Thornburgh to set up headquarters at the Office of Emergency Management’s central Pennsylvania station in Selinsgrove, Pa., 40 miles north of Harrisburg.
PAGE WOULD not comment when asked what Thornburgh might do if the danger zone included Selinsgrove.

Comey said the state will coordinate the effort and provide housing, specialized care and food for those forced to flee.

Comey said the procedure would go by the following steps:

-Thornburgh or state Civil Defense Director Oran Henderson would broadcast the evacuation order-which is not mandatory for citizens-over the Emergency Broadcast System. Sirens, sound trucks and door-to-door warnings may also be used.
-County authorities would advise residents to leave by car and tell those with no means of transportation how to leave. “Some counties will ask people to stand on street corners and pick them up, others have set up staging areas where there will be school buses or whatever,” Comey said. The state Transportation Department will control traffic on designated evacuation routes.
-Evacuees will either stay in shelters in unaffected areas within their county or go to designated centers further away, depending on conditions.

COMEY SAID hospitals, prisons and nursing care centers were required to have their own evacuation plans. Mike Kaufher, of the Susquehanna Valley Health Care Consortium, an association of hospitals north of the endangered area, said the consortium would provide beds and transportation to Harrisburg and Hershey hospitals.

Thousands of central Pennsylvania residents have left the area on their own accord, although state officials had no figures on how many had fled.

The civil defense evacuation plan is also set up in geographic stages.

Within the five-mile radius, it would involve 24,522 residents of Dauphin, York, and Lancaster counties. Officials said they expected to be able to evacuate all residents within the five-mile radius within three or four hours.

People living in critical areas would either be sent outside the five-mile radius or to areas within the radius but upwind from the plant. Shelters were being readied in north and northeastern Pennsylvania.

Then, if the situation warranted additional evacuations, residents within a 10-mile radius and then a 20-mile radius would be asked to leave. A 10-mile radius evacuation would involve 133,672 persons and a 20-mile radius would involve 636,000.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has said that it might be prudent to evacuation up to 200,000 persons living near the site before engineers take action to resolve a crisis at the nuclear plant caused by a hydrogen bubble in the reactor that poses the “remote” possibility of a core meltdown.

A core meltdown is the worst kind of nuclear catastrophe and could kill people and contaminate miles of land.

Newspaper: The Evening Sentinel
Date: April 2, 1979
Title: Nuclear Robot Arrives
Author: United Press International

OAK RIDGE, Tenn. (UPI)-An electronically controlled robot, used for jobs in radioactive environments, was shipped to the stricken Three Mile Island plant near Harrisburg during the weekend.

Officials here said they are not sure what use it will have at the crippled nuclear plant.

“The monitor manipulator is designed to operate at distances up to 700 feet from its control console,” said Harvey Cobart, Union Carbide’s director of public relations.

The robot, named “Herman,” is controlled by two technicians, who watch on two television monitors. Herman, designed by Carbide scientists in 1966 “walks” on tank-like treads.

Herman has been used twice recently. The robot recovered some lodged nuclear fuel pellets at a facility at the University of Rochester, Rochester, N.Y., and also carried a dropped radioactive source at the University of the South in Sewanee to safety.

Newspaper: The Evening Sentinel
Date: April 2, 1979
Title: Dickinson Open, but Most Students Gone
Author: Bill Weary, the Evening Sentinel

With 60 percent of its student population gone, Dickinson College is suspending regular classes until next week.

But college administrators consider the institution still open, with dining, dormitory, and library facilities in operation-and even the length of time classes will be suspended is subject to change.

“Based on advice from the Cumberland County Office of Emergency Preparedness, the Governor and nuclear physicists on the faculty, Dickinson College continues to believe that there is no present danger in Carlisle from the Three Mile Island situation,” Dickinson president Sam Banks said in a prepared release Sunday afternoon.

STUDENTS WHO have left campus should return by 8 a.m. Monday, April 9, “when regular classes will resume unless otherwise notified,” Banks said.

He said “Dickinson will remain open and all normal operations of the college, including the library, dining hall, dormitories, and general support functions, will continue as scheduled.”

Some professors will conduct “special learning seminars” on subjects of their choice for students remaining on campus during the time regular classes are suspended, Banks said.

Charles Seller, executive assistant to the president, said Sunday afternoon about two-thirds of the students had left. He attributed the information to Bruce Wall, associate dean of residential services.

Seller said, however, “there has been no sign of large scale panic and there never has been any sign of high emotion on any scale” on campus.

Banks’ statement attributes the departures to “misleading, conflicting and sensationalized information disseminated by the national media (which has) made it difficult for many students and staff to asses the situation properly.”

JOHN ROSS, of the Dickinson College information office, said that while he was in Philadelphia Friday, he felt he “was coming back to a panicky situation” from listening to exaggerated radio accounts of the incident.

“The quality of information deteriorates with the distance,” he said. As a result Dickinson parents have been calling the college the last few days with calls of concern, he said.

Ross said less than 10 percent of the faculty have left. Departures have “been a trickle process rather than a process of mass exodus,” he said.

Area colleges that have closed all operations are Pennsylvania State University’s Capital Campus in Middletown, until April 9, and Harrisburg Area Community College.

Shippensburg State College is remaining open, according to Gary Willhide, director of public relations. He said he did not know if many students had left because of the nuclear reactor accident but said many parents have called the college over the weekend expressing concern.

Dickinson School of Law is scheduling classes as usual.

Newspaper: The Evening Sentinel
Date: April 2, 1979
Title: ‘Beginning of End of Atomic Power’-Nader
Author: Patricia Koza, United Press International

WASHINGTON-For Ralph Nader, the accident at Three Mile Island nuclear power plant is “the beginning of the end of atomic power in this country.”

Nader made the comment Sunday in urging the government to immediately begin evacuating cities within a 30-mile radius of the plant site.

“The accident at Three Mile Island and the subsequent disclosures spell the beginning of the end for atomic power in this country,” said Nader, a longtime foe of nuclear power.

“The American people are receiving at last, in a compelling way, the truth about the dangers, the high costs and the lack of reliability of atomic energy,” he told a news conference.

THE CONSUMER advocate said he and his researchers “believe there should be stage-by-stage evacuation of the 700,000 residents living within a 30-mile radius of the disabled Three Mile Island unit” because of three factors:

-The possibility, suggested by the Nuclear Regulator Commission, of a hydrogen explosion in the reactor.
-The “significant” release of radioactivity by the plant in the last few days.
-what he called the lack of federal and state emergency preparedness plans for nuclear accidents.

Nader said in 1975 his Public Interest Research Group and 30 other citizen groups petitioned the commission to require that persons living near nuclear plants be notified of emergency evacuation plans and that all states hold drills to see if the plans work.

HE SAID the petition was rejected, but his group now plans to resubmit it.

He said he will urge Congress to repeal the Price-Anderson Act, which limits the amount of damages victims may collect in the event of a nuclear accident.

Nader said that for years he has opposed the construction of nuclear plants.

“Unless we are willing to tolerate the real risk of one or more major atomic power disasters in this country, disasters which could inflict radioactive death and disease on present and future generations on hundreds of thousands of people…we must shut down the nuclear power industry in this country,” he said.

Nader called on President Carter to make good on recommendations he made while on the campaign trail in 1976. He said Carter, a nuclear engineer while in the Navy, had called for underground nuclear reactors, location of plants in sparsely populated areas and federal inspectors on constant duty at plant sites.

Newspaper: The Evening Sentinel
Date: April 2, 1979
Title: Carter Visit has Calming Effect
Author: Jim Kershner, the Evening Sentinel

A “stable” situation at Three Mile Island and a visit by President Jimmy Carter calmed the fears of many central Pennsylvanians Sunday.

Harold Denton of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission told reporters Sunday afternoon the uranium fuel cells in the core of the reactor were cooling down to below 500 degrees and that he is convinced the size of the potentially dangerous hydrogen and oxygen bubble in the reactor is decreasing-both hopeful signs.

President Carter, after personally inspecting the crippled nuclear reactor, assured area residents “the reactor core is indeed stable.”

In a brief statement in Middletown Borough Hall, the president confirmed the possibility of an evacuation. But he added that if an evacuation is ordered, “it will not indicate that danger is high.”
He said any evacuation order would come from Gov. Dick Thornburgh and urged that any such order “be carried out calmly.”

ALTHOUGH STATE and county officials readied plans to evacuate areas within 20 miles of the plant, no evacuation has been ordered.

President Carter made it clear that Denton was in charge of the situation at the reactor and said Denton “has the confidence of the American people.”

The president did not answer questions at a Middletown press conference, but left Denton to field reporters’ inquiries.

Denton said if the size of the gas bubble in the pressurizer is successfully reduced by present methods it is possible the plant can be brought to a “cold shutdown” status without evacuating any people.

These methods include the use of hydrogen recombiners, machines that combine potentially explosive hydrogen and oxygen gases into water. He said the recombiners were to begin operation late Sunday night.

He said the scientists would decide “within the next few days” whether any new course of action would be required to end the crisis.

HE SAID they had “five or six days” before the gas in the pressurizer became capable of causing an explosion.

He made it clear the NRC was keeping a close rein on the plant’s operator, Metropolitan Edison Co.

“We have an unequivocal understanding that we will concur in advance,” before Met-Ed takes any new actions, he said.

The technical explanations from Denton indicated the situation was stable, but the crisis was far from over.

But neighbors of the nuclear power plant appeared to have been calmed considerably by the presidential visit.

“I guess if it’s safe enough for him, it’s safe enough for us,” said Steelton resident John Zales after catching a glimpse of the president entering Middletown Borough Hall.

“We were on pins and needles,” said his wife, Mary.

MIDDLETOWN MAYOR Robert Reid said after Carter left, “I’m more confident today than I was yesterday. I didn’t put too much faith in what the (Met-Ed) company said.”

While the president was talking to reporters Sunday afternoon, First Lady Rosalyn Carter stepped out of her limousine to greet residents gathered around the borough hall.

At the reactor Sunday afternoon plant workers leaving the site were pleased by the president’s visit.

One nuclear engineer from Babcock and Wilcox, the firm that manufactured the plant, said the president shook his hand and said “good luck.”

He said the president spent about 30 minutes in the plant’s control room getting briefed by Denton.
Carter, a former Navy nuclear engineer, was quite knowledgeable about the operation, he said.

A procession of trucks brought special equipment, lead bricks and loads of stone onto the island, while 12 trailers were brought to the observation center on the shore to set up a command post for the NRC.

MEANWHILE, AT Hershey about 150 evacuees spent their second night in the Hersheypark Arena.

Pregnant women and pre-school children were asked Friday to leave the area within five miles of the plant. Many were joined at the evacuation shelter by members of their families.

Gathered around television sets to watch the news Sunday evening, the evacuees seemed pleased that the president came.

“I think it’s a good thing he came,” said Richard Thomas of Lower Swatara Township, “it shows he cares.”

He said the food and care at the center have been excellent.

A Red Cross spokesman said a representative from American Nuclear Insurance Co. made immediate payment to some families Saturday, enabling them to leave the center for motels or hotels, but that they were replaced by new arrivals at the arena.

He said if a 10-mile radius evacuation were announced, the center would be evacuated although “whether or not Hershey is within 10 miles of the plant depends on where you are along the three-mile-long island you start your circle.”

Newspaper: The Evening Sentinel
Date: April 3, 1979
Title: County Planners Confident
Author: Deb Cline, Associate Editor

Cumberland County officials are gaining confidence in an emergency plan they hope doesn’t have to be implemented.

Day by day, officials are fine tuning a plan for possible evacuation of the eastern part of Cumberland County because of the Three Mile Island accident-even though each day, it looks less likely the plan will be used.

But authorities are learning much from the planning process believing they can depend on local officials to implement a plan.

County Commissioner Jacob Myers said Monday the cooperation between evacuation areas and host municipalities has been “terrific.”

John Broujos, county solicitor involved in the planning, echoes the praise.

“WE HAD 35 PP&L personnel to be housed. Within 15 minutes of the request, Rick Hoerner, of Carlisle Civil Defense, had them placed.”

Although county authorities are directing formulation of a contingency plan, they are depending on local officials to implement it.

“Great reliance has been placed on local authorities to carry out the plan,” Broujos said. “It gives confidence to officials to use their imaginations and proceed to aggressively attack the problem on the local level.”

In case of a precautionary evacuation of a 20-mile radius around the plant, residents from eastern Cumberland County would be moved to the western part of the county.

Some municipalities, such as Carlisle Borough, have already met with officials from the communities they would host to make more detailed arrangements.

Representatives from both host and evacuation areas met again Monday night with county officials to iron out details on supplies, equipment and personnel needed during any evacuation.

Col. James Dunkelberger, commander of the 1st Battalion, 108th Field Artillery of the Pennsylvania National Guard, briefed officials on the services he could provide and the kinds of things they ought to be preparing for.

Dunkelberger said he could supply about 600 men to provide support to the county and local evacuation efforts.

“WE ARE NOT coming with weapons…,” Dunkelberger said. “We’re not coming to harass citizens or people on the street. We’re coming to support your people.

“The number one mission we have is to evacuate in a safe, smooth, orderly, deliberate way.”

But Joe Dougherty, a liaison from the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency, stressed the county plan may never have to be used.

“This plan is not to infer in any way that something is going to happen at this facility,” he said. “Even after the cold shutdown, we hope every community in Pennsylvania begins this kind of contingency plan.”

One sign that the Three Mile Island status may be improving is that many schools within a 20-mile radius that closed Monday are scheduled to reopen tomorrow. Some opened today.

However, schools within a five-mile radius of the plant are still urged to remain closed.

The decision to open is based at least partially on a request from the governor and the state secretary of education, who has asked that if an evacuation were called that it be done outside school hours.

MANY SCHOOLS on the East Shore and most on the West Shore announced reopening. Among the West Shore schools to reopen will be Mechanicsburg, Cumberland Valley, Camp Hill, East Pennsboro, Northern York County, Cumberland-Perry Vocational Technical School, and the Capital Area Intermediate Unit.

Mechanicsburg and Cumberland Valley schools had closed largely because of staff having left the area and parents concerned about their children being in school if an evacuation were called.

Charles Shields, Mechanicsburg superintendent, said today he was not certain how many staff had returned, adding “We’re going to do the very best we can.”

Various county and local officials are continuing to meet today for technical discussions on the plan, for training on how to use various pieces of equipment and other aspects of the plan.

Officials of area utilities and sewage treatment plants have met and will continue to meet to work out details of their operation if evacuation were necessary.

About 30 persons met Monday “to discuss the manner in which they can support the contingency plans in the event of an evacuation,” according to Broujos.

“They discussed how they would maintain the utilities, housing for service personnel, instructions to persons for preparing homes for vacancy and how to avoid crank calls to utilities,” he said.

Robert Matalonis, PP&L official, said no utility plans a cut-off of service to an evacuated area.

“WE DON’T want to damage any equipment,” he said. “If we were to cut off energy, for instance, a lot of food in the people’s freezer would spoil. Motors could burn up.”

United Telephone officials said they expect a lot of long distance calls in case of an evacuation but plan to put extra operators on its PBX system.

West Shore municipal water and sewer officials indicated they would curtail operations somewhat during an evacuation but nothing would be completely cut off.

All utility officials indicated they could supply adequate services to a crowded host area.

“All the utilities seem optimistic,” Matalonis said. “They don’t anticipate any problems.”

Newspaper: The Evening Sentinel
Date: April 3, 1979
Title: Confused? The Crisis Explained…
Author: Dennis O’Brien

Here is what happened, and what’s now happening, at the Three Mile Island nuclear generating station:

Last Wednesday, at 4 a.m., a leak sprung in the cooling system of the nuclear reactor.

The cooling system, a series of pipes that circulate water near the reactor, is necessary to keep the reactor from getting too hot during the process of nuclear fission. (Nuclear fission is simply the splitting of uranium atoms in the reactor, which produces heat.)

Under normal conditions, a small amount of water is continually broken down into hydrogen and oxygen. The gases rise to the top of the steel reactor capsule and are pumped out, ignited and combined back into water in a device known as a “hydrogen recombiner.”

WHEN THE LEAK sprung, however, the temperature inside the reactor grew hotter than its normal 240 degrees and an emergency cooling system automatically began to circulate water near the reactor, which is a tubular structure 15 feet wide and 40 feet high.

The reactor, encased in a steel and concrete vessel that’s 138 feet wide and 202 feet high, is currently at 280 degrees, according to officials of Metropolitan Edison, which owns a major share of the plant.

For a reason that’s still unknown-either through human error or mechanical failure-this secondary cooling system apparently shut down.

This lead to an explosion from hydrogen gas collecting inside the nuclear reactor.

THE EXPLOSION, which meant that an undetermined amount of radioactive gases escaped into the air, occurred at 2 p.m. Thursday, 34 hours after the initial leak was discovered.

Harold Denton, a top ranking official with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said that it was not until 9 a.m. Friday that the NRC was informed of the hydrogen blast, which is what led to last week’s order to prepare for an evacuation.

So for those two days hydrogen gas was forming at dangerously high levels inside the reactor.

The hydrogen explosion led to the formation Saturday of a potentially lethal bubble of hydrogen gas-which is now the major cause for concern among NRC and Met Ed officials.

What has the NRC and utility officials worried is how to get rid of the hydrogen bubble and keep the temperature in the reactor down at the same time.

To get rid of it they have to reduce pressure inside the reactor, but they are not sure of the safest way to do that.

If the temperature inside the reactor is not kept down, the uranium could get so hot that it would melt through the floor of the reactor and containment level.

Scientists differ on what a meltdown at Three Mile Island would mean.

Some say the molten mass would disperse through the ground just below the reactor with the radioactive gases floating right back up into the reactor, where it would be safely shielded.

But another possibility is that the mass would hold together and melt down through the earth below the reactor creating a “China syndrome” effect (this catchphrase was coined in the belief such a molten core would, hypothetically, continue melting through the earth eventually reaching the other side of the world, or China). Radioactive gases would be sent through the earth’s surface at various, unpredictable points and would be disseminated through underground water supplies.

BUT RIGHT NOW NRC and utility officials agree that a meltdown is not the immediate danger. For a meltdown the temperature of the uranium inside the reactor must reach 5,000 degrees, according to MetEd officials.

THE BUBBLE is trapped near the top of the reactor. To reduce its size some of the hydrogen, which is in solution in the water around the uranium, is being pumped through a one-inch line into a nearby pressurizer.

The pressurizer is normally used to check levels of water and gaseous materials in the reactor.
As the hydrogen in solution and other materials are removed from the reactor, pressure is being reduced, shrinking the size of the bubble, officials say.

From the pressurizer, the hydrogen in solution is being vented into a pipe to another storage tank in the containment vessel.

The hydrogen in solution in that storage tank, which is highly radioactive, will be transported off-site in the near future, according to Thomas Elasser, a nuclear physicist for the NRC.

Officials are currently optimistic, claiming a reduction in the risk of danger from the bubble.
Uranium is currently 500 degrees.

The main concern is still the bubble, which officials say is slowly diminishing in size.

If the bubble, which is now estimated at roughly 50 cubic feet, were pure hydrogen it would be harmless. But there are also minimal amounts of oxygen present.

If the mixture of gases reaches the right combination-five percent oxygen and four to six percent hydrogen, the hydrogen will burn.

If the hydrogen reaches seven percent, it may explode.

Scientists are not sure how much hydrogen is inside the bubble, but one NRC official estimated it could be as high as six percent.

Denton said Sunday that if the bubble were left untouched, the oxygen and hydrogen levels will reach the explosive stage in five or six days.

After that the bubble may explode at any time.

NRC and Met Ed officials agree, therefore, that it’s vital that the bubble be dissipated.

Newspaper: The Evening Sentinel
Date: April 3, 1979
Title: 3 Mile Island Optimism Grows
Author: United Press International

HARRISBURG (UPI)-Federal officials today cautiously expressed hope that the worst is over in the Three Mile Island nuclear crisis but said the reactor’s fuel core appeared so badly damaged it may have to be scrapped.

Evacuation plans remained ready if necessary.

Civil defense officials said there were indications that some of the 200,000 people who left the four county area around the plant are beginning to return home. Area schools remained closed but many planned to open Wednesday.

Pregnant women and young children were still advised to stay out of an area within five miles of the reactor.

“I FEEL PRETTY good right now,” said Robert Reid, the mayor of Middletown, three miles from the Susquehanna River power plant. “I feel confident things are shaping up but I don’t think we’re out of the woods yet.

“The people in town are still a little jumpy. They feel as though they’re almost over the hump going down the other side but they know there’s still a problem.”

The town’s entire 18-man police force, which had been on double shifts of 16-hour days, went back to normal eight-hour shifts today and police chief George Miller said the town was “a lot calmer now than it was.”

A Nuclear Regulatory Commission official said preliminary indications suggest most-and probably all-of the 3,600 metal-covered uranium fuel rods that make up the core were irreparably damaged in the accident that launched the nation’s worst nuclear power emergency last week.

NORMALLY, ONE official said, only one-third of a reactor’s core would have to be replaced each year to add new fuel. But he said at Three Mile Island, the intense heat from the accident appears to have knocked out the entire core.

“The core appears to be damaged to the point it would not be re-useable,” the official said.

Still ahead were efforts to bring the crippled reactor to a safe, cold shutdown condition. Because risks remained, state civil defense officials said evacuation plans were ready if necessary.

“We’re still in a holding position ready to implement evacuation plans if necessary,” a spokesman said.

Les Jackson, of the York County civil defense office, said about 35 percent of 38,000 people within 10 miles of the plant in his county had left.

“From some of the calls we are getting, it seems some of the people are coming back. We have advised those in a five mile area to stay away.”

Officials in Lancaster and Dauphin counties also reported inquiries about returning home. About 150 people remained in the only official evacuation center still open, Hershey Park.

NRC teams have gradually raised their estimate of core damage as the full dimensions of the Three Mile Island incident unfolded.

The first estimates said only 1 percent of the core was badly damaged, while estimates Friday said 25 to 50 percent of the core had been knocked out.

AT first officials said some of the fuel rods might have melted. But new analysis led officials to believe the rods might only have split and twisted.

After more than five days on the defensive, engineers said they finally have taken the offensive in subduing the reactor.

Newspaper: The Evening Sentinel
Date: April 3, 1979
Title: If Nuclear Power is Here to Stay, It Must be Made Safer
Author: Max Lerner

NEW YORK CITY-We fear the dangers we must face. But we must also face the dangers we fear. In a world of growing dangers and fears that is the ultimate maturity.

Within this frame I can give only a mixed review of the drama of the leaking nuclear reactor at Harrisburg, Pa. It has been a double testing, not only of the operations of a nuclear power plant in a crisis but also of the public perception of that crisis.

FIRST, ABOUT the actual experience with nuclear power systems. The Union of Concerned Scientists says there have been more than a hundred instances of safety failures and violations in nuclear plants across the nation. To which a spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission responds with a question: “Did anyone die?”

The fact is that no one did, but their response is not an answer. Not only may someone die, but many may die before the safety problems get ironed out. We know there is no fail-safe, error-proof mechanism in the operation of nuclear plants. We also know that thus far there have been no deaths either of plant workers or of the public anywhere. But the question is only in part about what did happen. It is also about what might happen.

Here the problem is one of prudence and responsibility. At Harrisburg the Metropolitan Edison managers of the plant seem to have fallen short on both counts. There was no adequate back-up system to take account of human error as well as mechanical malfunction. And there was a failure to notify the public immediately.

THESE ARE PROBLEMS of operation and control that can be solved. That is the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s job. Earlier this year the commission shut down five East coast nuclear plants because of faulty design which exposed their cooling system to the hazard of earthquakes. The nuclear industry protested but the shutdown was clearly prudent. The commission will have to be no less rigorous in cracking down on the design and operation of power plants in the light of the Harrisburg mess.

What can be done beyond that? No knowledgeable critics call for a total ban on nuclear power. If they did they would have to provide an alternative, especially since solar energy is too far off on any effective scale. The alternative would be for the West to throw itself on the mercy of the OPEC nations, including Iraq, Libya, Algeria and Iran, whose potential oil boycott presents far greater hazards than the Harrisburg leaks.

The Michael Douglas film, “The China Syndrome,” played a role in polarizing the wave of Harrisburg fear, even while it stands to reap windfall profits as a result. It is an instance of media luck and power in the workings of American capitalist democracy. Along with the more reasoned TV coverage of Harrisburg such a film can have a healthy effect in prodding the regulatory agencies and scaring the nuclear power industry into more stringent safety measures.

THAT IS BASICALLY what needs doing. Those who want all nuclear plants shut down until an error-proof way of running them is discovered fly in the face of reality. The best to hope for is to narrow the chances of accident to near zero, but that can be done by a tight regulation of the plants in action.

We live and have our being in a hazardous world. The dangers to health of chemical dumps, toxic sprays and polluted foods are probably greater than the chances of nuclear plant failure. We are doomed to live with extreme vigilance in a universe of danger and chance. An emotionally mature people will demand tighter safety standards but will react to the dangers without panic.