The old nuclear ghosts are still alive, 40 years after the worst accident in the history of the United States – 03/28/2019

"It's time to close it": 40 years after worst nuclear accident in the history of the United States, many in the vicinity of the Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania, are anxiously awaiting the announced shutdown of the still operating reactor, despite the hundreds of jobs at risk.

John Garver was 40 when, on March 28, 1979, the failure of a cooling mechanism at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Plant (TMI) caused the partial meltdown of Reactor # 2.

Today, at 80, the old merchant still remembers the "metallic taste" in the mouth and the unusual "smell" that floated tonight in the air of this mountainous region of the East Coast. the United States.

"They evacuated us for two days and when we came back, they asked us to stay at home and close the windows and the door, as if it could stop the radiation," he says with a smile as yellow as the protective boots used by President Jimmy Carter. He moved there to rebadure the population.

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From the booth of the yacht club that he occupies in Middletown, on the banks of the Susquehanna River, this old man with his head covered with a worn sailor cap looks grudgingly at the cooling towers that, at a few hundred meters, throw his steam in the clear sky. tireless.

"I have opposed this plant since the beginning, I still oppose it today and hope to see it closed in life," he sighs. "This desire can be granted."

Exelon Generation, owner of the plant, has announced its closure for September 30, 2019 due to a lack of profitability. But Pennsylvania lawmakers, whose 40% of electricity comes from nuclear power, are considering approving a comprehensive bailout plan in the name of fighting CO2 emissions and hundreds of thousands of dollars. 39 jobs in play

At the age of 58, Frank Waple, chief operating officer of the control room, has never worked anywhere other than in the TMI factory. In his opinion, its closure would have a "consequent impact on the economy" nearby small towns like Middletown, where you see posters everywhere saying "Nuclear power feeds Pennsylvania".

"The municipality is endowed with a large amount of taxes from the central, which distributes the money to the centers for the elderly, youth badociations, libraries, fire …", says this man worried to see Middletown become again the "ghost" people "was once.

The final closure of reactor # 1 would equate to the end of his career: "With nearly 60 years old, it is not easy to recover in this activity," he laments.

For his youngest colleague Nathan Grove, retirement is not an option. "I am a single father, so it would be difficult for me to go to work elsewhere, I can not get away from my daughter, she is all for me," says the 37-year-old electrician retaining his emotions .

That is why he decided to "fight" to "make people understand" the benefits of nuclear energy, "one of the best ways to preserve the purity of the air ". A reasoning that people "begin to hear," he says, despite the "bad image" of the nuclear industry in the country, especially since the TMI accident.

A few kilometers downstream, in Harrisburg, the capital of Pennsylvania, Eric Epstein demystifies the social argument, a "fable", for the chairman of the TMI Alert monitoring group, which ensures that "the majority of employees" of the "factory" will be transferred "to other sites administered by Exelon.

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Faced with the imposing Pennsylvania Capitol, which will decide in the coming weeks of the future of the TMI factory, the activist believes that "there is no point in wanting to continue to defend a declining industry ".

"The world is changing, life goes on," he says. "It's an old factory that can not compete (economically), it's time to shut it down and move on."

At the Middletown Yacht Club, John Garver would also like to turn the page on the accident, which he suspects the origin of cancer that took his aunt. "Who knows," he said with resignation between two puffs of cigarette.

But between the power lines and the huge concrete chimneys, this dark night of March 28, 1979 seems to drive him away.

When he returned home earlier this week, the television aired "The China Syndrome", a film about a nuclear accident that occurred at an American factory, which happened a few weeks before TMI in fiction.

Source: AFP