Disaster Three Mile Island

American Energy Secretary Steven Chu said that the situation at Fukushima could be worse than the 1979 Three Mile Island disaster, which took more than 12 years and 1 trillion to clean up. 

Although not written up as a recommendation, the Commission s report discusses the Nuclear Model at some length. This model has provided the basis for the organizational structure of the Centre for Offshore Safety, part of the American Petroleum Institute (API). The role of this new organization, and how it compares to what occurred in the nuclear power industry following the Three Mile Island disaster is discussed in the next chapter. 

When the US Air Force lost four hydrogen bombs over the Atlantic Ocean near Palomares, Spain, he sketched a bewildered officer asking a peasant in broken Spanish if he had seen a missing hydrogen bomb. (As it turned out, a scene like this actually occurred.) The disagreeable Mr. Atom reappeared periodically over the issue of nuclear proliferation and the proposed missile defense systems. After the Three Mile Island disaster of 1979, Herblock drew a family wandering in the dark with the caption "Unknown Effects of All Radiation." ... 

Nearly all major disasters provide ample evidence of the failures of organizations to learn from their own or other organizations experience. In the case of Three Mile Island for example, a similar accident had occurred some months before at the similarly designed Davis Besse plant, but correct worker intervention had averted an accident. 

The Three Mile Island accident, rated as one of the top media events of the century, was a crowning blow in the battle. The media consistently portrayed the accident as a close call on a public health disaster, and continue to do so to this day, although none of the studies done after the accident gives any reason to believe that to be the case. As demonstrated in those studies, the containment building would have prevented release of large amounts of the radioactivity regardless of what might have hap-... 

The results of sleep deprivation have been linked to motor vehicle accidents, major industrial accidents such as the Exxon Valdez, and Three Mile Island, and the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster (2). The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) in 1999 estimated that 56,000 police-reported crashes and 4% of all traffic crash fatalities (1550 cases) involved drowsiness and fatigue as principal causes (3). Sleepiness was a probable cause in about one third of all fatal-to-driver motor vehicle accidents involving commercial truck drivers (4). 

By the 1970s, nuclear power was in widespread use, in the U S. and abroad, as a source of electricity. As of 2007, nuclear power provided about 19.3% of the electricity generated in the U.S., created by 104 licensed nuclear reactors. Nonetheless, the potential for accidents, meltdowns and other disasters has never been far from the minds of many consumers (after all, for many of us the first image that comes to mind upon hearing the word nuclear is a nuclear bomb). The 1979 Three Mile Island nuclear power plant accident in the U.S. led to the cancellation of scores of nuclear projects across the nation. This trend was later reinforced by the disaster at... 

Some of the most tragic and well-remembered accidents also had a start with a mini-modification made with a hose connection. The Bhopal Tragedy, the Three-Mile Island Incident, and the Flixborough Disaster were initiated by the improper use of hoses. 

Melatonin (= Ar-Acetyl-5-methoxytryptamine Regulin) (indole) circadian rhythm control - Chernobyl, Three Mile Island Bhopal all night work-related disasters... 

Although the Three Mile Island incident of the 1970s and the Chernobyl disaster increased the awareness of radioactive gases in the atmosphere somewhat, radioactive xenon does not pose a significant health risk compared to other radioisotopes since it does not react with the environment and has a short half-life, hence it does not give the public much dose compared to other reactive radioisotopes such as Cs and Sr even though it is present in the air. 

It should also be remembered that most evolving technologies, whether boilers during the 19th century, airplanes in this century, or nuclear plants, entail some accidents from which lessons are learned. Both the Three Mile Island accident, from which only limited radioactivity escaped to the environment, and the Chernobyl disaster, have led to the introduction of new safety features in nuclear reactors, in plant operating procedures, and in regulations. 

The risks associated with the operation of nuclear reactors are small but not negligible, as the failnre of the Three Mile Island reactor in the United States in 1979 and the disaster at Chernobyl in the former Soviet Union in 1987 demonstrated. If a reactor has to be shnt down quickly, there is danger of a meltdown, in which the heat from the continning fission processes melts the uranium fuel. Coolant mnst be circulated until heat from the decay of short-lived isotopes has... 

Worldwide, the introduction of a wide variety of anthropogenic chemicals into waters and soils has caused a growing concern about the consequences of such practices. Public awareness concerning the vulnerability of the environment to pollution has only been heightened by major incidents such as the Union Carbide (DOW) Bhopal and the Seveso disasters, the Three Mile Island and the Chernobyl accidents, and the Amoco Cadiz and the Exxon Valdez oil spills. 

Certain chemical disasters have prominent places in medical history. In 1976, a chemical reactor explosion in Seveso, Italy, released 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin, which contaminated thousands of acres, killed 100,000 animals, and caused the evacuation of hundreds of people (Melius and Binder 1989). In 1984 in Bhopal, India, a carbamate pesticide plant released 30 tons of methyl isocyanate, causing more than 3,000 deaths and 50,000-300,000 injuries (Melius and Binder 1989). The Three Mile Island and Chernobyl nuclear accidents during the 1980s were the culmination of a string of eight nuclear accidents since 1952 (Melius and Binder 1989). Other chemical disasters severely affected local communities but did not generate widespread attention (De La Paz 1997 Withers 1988). 

This industry has most of the corrosion problems of other industries and some that are all of its own. Right from the start, the potential for disaster was recognized and tackled by using high-grade materials in many parts of the systems. Zirconium alloys were needed, which had their own corrosion problems and solutions. Growing worldwide demands for acceptable environmental performance have alienated others to the cause of nuclear power, in particular, after events at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. 

A few of the worst nuclear disasters in history are those which took place at Three Mile Island in the USA in 1979, at Chernobyl in the Ukraine in 1986, and more recently following an earthquake in Fukushima, Japan, in 2011. Nuclear disasters are very dangerous if they do occur, and the possibility of a nuclear disaster represents a primary reason that some people oppose the construction of new nuclear power plants. 

Investigations of industrial accidents reveal that most are caused by human error. The twentieth century s worst industrial disasters—Bhopal, Three Mile Island, and Chernobyl—helped clarify the complex chain of system problems that lead to human error. System problems are problems caused by a process system with built in design and operating deficiencies. The accidents provided numerous checklists and case studies for control room and equipment design. A partial list of some of the problems found at the industrial sites mentioned above are ... 

SANDS, R, The Chernobyl accident and public international law, paper presented at a conference on International Disaster Management with Special Reference to Chernobyl and Three Mile Island, sponsored by the Annenberg School of Communication, University of Pennsylvania and the University of Southern California, Washington, DC, October 1986. 

Hampton, W. (2001) Meltdown, A Race Against Nuclear Disaster at Three Mile Island, A Reporter s Story. Cambridge, MA Candlewick Press. 

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