THE NUCLEAR CRISIS
(Three Mile Island (1979), Chernobyl (1986), Santa Susana (1957)

Normally the nucleus of an atom is stable and will remain indefinitely in its
present state. Take, for example, the element iron. No matter how much we would
like it to be otherwise, iron is never going to change into anything like gold. However, the atoms of some elements are unstable and can change into another form spontaneously. The disintegration of these elements and the radiation they release is known as nuclear energy. Vast amounts of nuclear energy can be derived through the decay of an unstable element (such as Uranium235), in what is called a chain reaction. 300 kilograms of material, for example, fully converted, will supply the entire energy demands of the United States for a year. Unfortunately, in a typical reactor only about 1% of the mass is converted. Ancient Greek philosophers first developed the theory of atoms. Through the centuries the concept was improved. And by 1942, German and American scientists working in Chicago had designed and built the worlds' first nuclear reactor.

And it wasn't long after that we began to experience the Nuclear Crisis.

Three Mile Island, 1979
The Three Mile Island nuclear power plant is located in the middle of the Susquehanna river near Middletown, Pennsylvania, run by Metropolitan Edison, (MetEd). The accident of Wednesday, March 28, 1979, led to no deaths or injuries to plant workers or members of the nearby community, but it effectively spelled the end of nuclear power generation in America. It resulted from four-or-five seemingly trivial little occurrences, which by themselves were routine and expected and safeguards were in place to take care of them - It's just that they all happened at once. And in just the right sequence (the wrong sequence). Nothing at Three Mile Island would ever be the same again. The accident began about 3:58am, March 28, 1979, in the Number-2 reactor. Of the several books I read on the TMI disaster, everyone sites a different chain of events as to how it began, but what they finally all agree on is that the computers monitoring the reactor detected a problem in the coolant system, and shut everything down. First the turbine, then the reactor, automatically shut down. As the residual heat and pressure in the primary system increased, the relief valve at the top of the reactor also automatically opened.

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