Today is the 25th anniversary of the Three Mile Island nuclear disaster. The damaged Unit 2 remains sealed, but Unit 1 still churns out megawatts of electricity.
On a related note, I found this account called Ghost Town, where the daughter of a nuclear scientist takes her camera along for a motorcycle ride through the Chernobyl area. It’s eerie seeing this city stopped dead in its tracks, with thousands of roengens per hour blasting out of the cripped reactor one morning in 1986. It makes you wonder how those people felt to have been left cooking in deadly radiation for over a week before officials announced the accident.
A recent news story mentioned that the local Shearon Harris Nuclear Plant had four unplanned shutdowns last year, while most nuke plants typically have none. I don’t know if there are more serious problems here, or if they’re just being extra careful. I don’t think another TMI-scope accident is likely, but there is always the possibility of trouble, however small that possibility may be. I hope we’ve learned our lesson.