A Narrative by Scott Johnson
A Narrative by Scott Johnson
(More to come soon!)
The PBS series "The American Experience" produced a program in 1999 which chronicled the accident and its causes and effects. Featuring interviews with Roger Mattson, Mike Gray, and Dick Thornburgh, among others, it was the most complete and in-depth television documentary ever done on the subject. The web site contains most of the content, a complete script of the show and transcripts of all of the interviews. There's also a link to a PBS web site where you can order the tape, and a link to a program where educators can get free copies for classroom use. A very well-done site.
This link leads to the home page of the original owner of Three Mile Island. The company has gone through several name changes and mergers. Previous names include Metropolitan Edison and GPU Nuclear. The company is now called First Energy.
This link leads to a site report page maintained by the new owners of Three Mile Island. AmerGen, a unit of British Energy, bought the plant in 1998.
Here you'll find the home page of Three Mile Island Alert, a group of anti-nuclear activists based in Harrisburg, PA. Despite the site's strong anti-nuclear bias, there is much useful information to be found among their content, including verbatim excerpts from the NRC's Rogovin Commission report.
This is a nuclear-industry association's site, so it is obviously strongly pro-nuclear in its treatment of the accident. Some of the information presented is largely accurate, however, and gives the nuclear industry's view of several of the more controversial issues. It is also provided for balance.
The PBS series "Frontline", a few years ago, featured a very interesting piece called "Nuclear Reaction", which explores the causes of Americans' fear of nuclear power. Three Mile Island, as one of the galvanizing events in the trend away from nuclear power in the US, is featured prominently.
Penn State University maintains a huge collection of photographs, documents, videotapes, and other media related to the decontamination and cleanup of Three Mile Island Unit 2. Very little of this information is available online, but the inventory is amazingly large. Included here for completeness.
About a month before the 20th anniversary of the Three Mile Island accident, Sara Kelly of PhiladelphiaWEEKLY visited Three Mile Island and the surrounding area and produced this well-crafted piece. It paints a very vivid picture of what life was like in the days following the nation's worst nuclear accident. I had carried a link to this story several years ago, but the story was eventually taken off the web and we lost it -- until now. The author was kind enough to grant me permission to carry the story here, and even took the time to dig up a copy for me. My sincere thanks go to Sara Kelly, now Executive Editor at PhiladelphiaWEEKLY.
Mark Stencel of the Washington Post compiled this special report in recognition of the 20th anniversary of the TMI-2 accident. In striking contrast to most mainstream media coverage, this is a very responsible, well-written and well-researched piece. It's presented as several pages and provides some very interesting reading.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission maintains a web site which has information on all currently operating nuclear power plants in the United States. This link will take you to the plant information page for Three Mile Island, Unit 1, which remains operational.
NOTE: This site has been deactivated by the NRC. I am told by some officials that it will be reinstated in the future, and by other officials that it will not. If I find out the latter, I'll remove the link entirely.)
As with most of the internet's resources, these links are subject to change. If you find a link to be outdated or dead, please notify the author. We make every effort to keep up. Thanks.
Links last checked and updated 1 April 2005