ML20212H614

Forwards Constituent J Seertsen Ltr Re Continuing Health Effects of TMI-2 Accident,For Response

ML20212H614
Person / Time
Site:	Three Mile Island
Issue date:	01/15/1987
From:	Hatch O SENATE
To:	Zech L NRC COMMISSION (OCM)
Shared Package
ML20212H611	List: ML20212H607 ML20212H614
References
NUDOCS 8701270365
Download: ML20212H614 (8)

Text

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9,!0nifeb States Senafe Respectfully referred to:

The Honorable Lando W. Zech, Chairman U. S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D. C. 20555 Because of the desire of this office to be responsive to all inquirios and communications, your consideration of the attached is requested. Your findings and views, in duplicate form, along with return of the enclosure, will be appreciated by

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9W QQ the Tall accident roughly amounts to that of a chest X-ray. Their studies 4

.ep concluded that such radiation was too

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nold 31uller, "This was probably the best kind of accident a nuclear power

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leases is missing. and infant-mortahty figures for the summer following the bMpeMN - Wm p ,35@0@

? ~*e accident remain under dispute. j hggBjg Q@g% v*4 Two thousand lawsuits overinjuries and dcaths are pending. Nearly a hun-gN"gglyf@g$ty%p$.

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e {"^~piQ6; -[ 4g.;[3% p ylsA ppd @g.w%g .dp p dred more were settled out ofcourt.

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dents have noted severe abnormalities in plant and animal life - for exam- [

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I ple, dandelion leaves five times the usual size. Trees bore no fruit. Clover wouldn't erow.and humblebees disap- examined independently. A Columbia peared.

their cattieSome farmers couldn't get Universty team began o study - but, two sisters. Eva and Af arie. The llo-to conceive, so far, authorities won't release data. lowka farm lies at the end of a long dirt 13ut most alarming are patterns Could the acknowledged radiation road, surrounded by rolling fields along that have shown up among humans. dose 3 hase cau-ed more damage than the edge of the Sumuchanna lhver- a Last year, former 13 ell Labs engineer was believed likely? Or did more radi- spot so beautif ul that all a visitorcan do Norman Aamodt, and hm wife,31arjo- ation e-cape during the attident than fhr a moment is sigh. Huge trees shade rie. surveyed three neighborhoods the front yard. The Pennsylvama hille that fell in paths of radiation plumes. the Nuclear Regulatory Commi ion are vishle m all direttmn . And off in has made know n? Crucial dutumenta-Thc3 found a six times more than nor- tion of the first hours of the atrident is the distante rise the twin towers of the mal incidence of cancer. miwing Becau edot tor-seldom know Three Ahle Island plant one spewing This $1ay, the Supreme Court de-w hat cau es tanter. iti hard to say il white doud The llolowka place is clined to hear the Aamodts' petition to the auident produced it. "All you < an pretty run-dow n now: the lawni over-stop operation of Talli Unit 1 untd do is biok at the numbers " savs Dr. grown and mostly gone to scrub. the perth is in need of shormn Someone health data from theaccident has been Slaureen llatch. of the ha- Columbia planted p t ic-uma- m the 3 ard, and a i

-earch team. "I'es tamts some ut t hose couple of spmdl3 m.nigold . At least a numbers u arrant a < t ond look ' dozen kitten-lull m the -un, along with BY JOYCE na a ea o oo-a. ,ov, e.oi a iouple of dog lint it N ca-y Io ec that ihe i.u m is not w hai a on<e w a-ARD llolou ka lic'- -tamhop out-ole t he ohl hi o A iaimboo - w h-,- he h s-- u iih hi- The llolow La came he e with their p.ueni- iait se.n- aco.iorarm ena 24 t,$ OCTO8tB 6,1986 W$ hf5(& - ,h ' W ~ '

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\ l WHAT REALLY HAPPENED TO I; k THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE THERE raise cattle. " Water in the crick, water getting good conception And with the Paul liolowka had attended lectures on in the well." Paul savs. " Cattle grew ones that did bem calves, there were nuclear pnysics, taught by Albert Ein-like weeds. You could go out in the problems. Birth defects. tumors."

field 6. and ten cove) of quail would fly stein. "1 always remembered Einstein Not .iust at the llolowka farm, ei. saying. 'If you're around where there's up. Pheasants thick as pigeons. If you had a calf horn, you knew nothing t her. " People were bla ming hired men, radiation, you could end up like an blaming each other. I myself was get. Egyptian mummy? We chuckled about would kill him except indigestion 7 ting after my sisters, for not doing a All of that changed, the llolow kas goodjob with stock. it. But then, with all the troubles say, with the start up of the TMI "This one farmer," Paul adds, "he around the farm, we got to wondering."

llolow ka bought an electrometer to plant. Even before the 1979 accident. walked into his barn one morning, measure radiation. Out by the barn there one made was troub!e. But a connection to the forplant.

a while, no found his cattle dead. Went right over one day. the meterjumped. lie called "The quail were the first to ro,"says to the farmer who sold him his hay the Pennsylvania State Department and shot the man deadf of Environmental Radiation. Dr. Mar-Paul. "That was back around 1975. I'm But the llolowkas began noticing a garet Heilly came out to pay him a ,

not a man with money, but I'm not pattern. A hciferwould dropdead,and visit. "I told her about the time I afraid to offer you a thousand dollars t wo days tater they'd hear a brief news walked into our barn and found four- l rightyourself find now, to one goquail out in that Ikid and item: " Minor radiation leak at Three teen heifer cows keeled over dead,' i I

Mde Island." A dog would keel over sa3 s Marie. "She told us we were poor with"Then my dogs tumors. We had started thirty showingfive tu- up and vomit, and the next day they'd farm manager. . I went right into the mors in fif ts dogs. The cattle weren't hear about another " minor accident ! house and brought out all our blue Years before, at Temple Univer-ity, riblun* Ihr rai me champion heifer.

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i InVOStigatiOn wm d on t he bical new >J Marn. wa- sick that day, and the fit showed up to hold the auction.'

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and cha m In 19s2. Marie llolow ka, sutterini the barn, pion dogs We took bei over to Hy Friday. no evacuation had yet from pains in her chest went to th.

< and she turned on her own meter. The needle went up When she been ordered. hut people werc learmg. doctor again. This time it was breas-lett, she took a sample ofour mdk with The llolowkas, who had livestock to cancer. She had a rodical mastectomy cane for and nowhere to go, stayed. but the doctor < couldn't get all of thc her. Hut w e nes cr hea r d bac k from her!'

- On.)une 29th.1977, the corn m the The grou ndbog> disappeared. Walk- cancer. She undernent chemotherap3 Holouka% field turned white, ing tbrough his fields, Paul llolow ka and radiation.1" Funny. isn't it?" sht leaves started 1.dlmg off the trees and kept conung upon dead hirds. And say>J But the tumor has spread to her

• hke it was OctoberJ health problems with the livestock heart now. "fm dying." she says. "No "Then came the morning of Alarch increa ed. "Our ibree-year-old heders doubt about it.'

1'.hj. 2Mh.19m Four a m . I was out m used to weigh in around 1500 poundsf It's not just Marie who has cancer.

the barn. milkmg the cows with says Paul. "Now we're lucky if we can "The farmer over thereJ says Paul. <

Paul. Same as alu ap." savs Slarie. s et one 900 pounds." The lioloukas pointing toward the next hillside. " lie 1 "There was this rumble. The whole .~ent a baby heifer and theirold Britta- died last year. That farm there, man '

harn shook. hke somet hing boihng in nv spaniel. Str. Luke to a hical veter. and his brother-in-law both got cancer.

.narian for autopsies. Paul keeps the Those people to the south. the husband. I

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• the wife and the daughter, theyie all got cancer "llis li<t goes on.

g * "This farm used to be hke a piece of z, g,.4 g heaven,"says Eva. "It was never what I

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you could caH a big raoney thing.but it

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%,g.; g- y 14fJti "After the accident," savs Paul. "the W F' k ' * *N[g' h >..--m . E"yr. N '$, .. - ,

man who picks up dead lifestock didn't eing j T" "+Y L

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even bother to wait for our calls any

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b 6@%~4.g he,d I e 4/ a more. liejust came by every week. and q we always had something for himJ c y.w 7* ( '

" Starch 28th was the first really

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..  %* d, L. . warm dav of the spring,"says Barbara

( p M ;b, Pettey. S'he's sitting at the table in her

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', ' ?> immaculate kitchen, looking out over 4 the yard where her husband Ed. was

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', working on the day of the accident.

4' ,.~ , . . Barbara calls in her seventeen-year-S w_- _,

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? old daughter and asks iishe'll ta ke her younger brother to 51cDonald's. " lie MM4L N.W

• doesn t need to hear this all over again." says Barbara. "We've been rers.m. . ?/M trying to forget about things." lier 1

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tone is flat, a httle weary.

e Bill Peters' skin turned as red " Late that afternoon." the contin-os a poinsettia plant -and it specimens of those autopsies in jars ues."we heard on the radio about some still does from time to time, out in the shed. "Looks more like a kind of accident at Three Alile Island.

bunch of grapes than a kidney, But Ed was determined to get his yard a pot. 'That's an earthquake,' says doesn't it?" he asks, pointing to one. work donc, so be stayed outside. lie Paul. "Now this cow, when they opened her said,'Ifsomething's going to happen to

l thought I'd head back to the up, they said her bone marrow was me, iti probably already happened.'

house. First thing I noticed was the hke cherry jello." lie didn't feel that good when he came l

I at mosphert it wa3 so blae Two months after the accident in, but I didn't think much more ofit.

l dewribeit. And there was som.

ething i Irie llolov ta woke up one morn, Sla.

can't ing, Some of our neighbors evacuated that could almost feel, rolling along the unable to swallow. lier sore throat w etkend, but Ed couldn't leave hisjob, ground. I walked about twenty feet, lingered, and late that year, she was so we stayed."

Barbara Pettey doesn't recall her and I fell down Ihdn't thmk so much diagnosed as sutiering from an infect-of that, so I got up. Walked a few feet, ed thyroid gland. Iler thyroid prob. husband having any particular symp-fell again. That was strange. I wasn't lems persisted for a couple of3 cars. toms after the accident.except that he Meann bile, neighbors were mov- was always tired. "Hejust wanted to one to st umble hke that. But I got up Took two steps. and I fell a ihird ing. "Anyone who could leave, did." sleep a lot. That wasn't hke him."

time. 'Oh. m3 ' I said. 'Now I really says Eva "A couple of peoplejust left Then one morning, five years after know so met h ing's happening ' 1 t heir house > cmpty and drove away." the accident. Ed Pettey fell so violent-couldn't get up I tried to ycH. but I " Man in the next farm. he ca me nver ly ill that his wife had to rush him to couldn't even 3 ell. When i finally one mormng to talk about all the live- the doctor. White celh. had taken over made et to the house, I turned on the >tock problems."says Paul. "1 showed Edi blood count. The doetor told Bar-radio, but allI got was Dolly Parton. lum my meter readmg( lie put his hara he might not hse twelve hours.

We hstened all morning - not a tarm on the mar ket. People who ButEd Pettey pulled through that time.

umd. That mght, we got a Phdadel- bought it. for $lti5.im down. thought he was diagnosed as suHering phia statom and they said theie'd thc3'd keep cattle. Couldn't get them from an incurable form ofleukemia.

been a had amdent at Three Mde to conceive. though. Then the father Esen then. Ed and Barbara didn't Idand And stdl there wa-n't ans got cancer Nn couldn't keep up the immediately confront the powihility pay men t s Thr Memor ial Dav,an out- that Ed's cancerimeht have some con-as nection to Three Shle I land it was us oc70 san e, asse I

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hVeSti b 8. tion ple think we've after the money.">he mays. But it s not that so much as son used to run a luuly > hop. The g ; wanting to see the whole thing set- w mdows were open. ,I went out to Ix later, m the ho pital. wheie Ed spent mo t of his remaimne year. that he tied. It would actually be a relief. if Wyne that morning to get some parts," he recalls "and before I lef t, !

and hi- wife beg.m to wonder. "Ed someone could stand here and tell told my son to replace a panel on a car.

i me, 'We can prove the leaks didn't

• spent .Go dap m St .lo-eph's." say , cause your husband's cancer / But When I got back. I had this funnv II.nbara "lic not te know the other metallic taste in my mouth. I figureil cancer patient > there and they all there're telling metoo they many did."things out there mayhe my son welded that panel wit talked about T511 Some of the nur>es In Barbara Pettey's neighborhood. galvanized steel by mistake I even

• dul.toa Ed' doctor sud it seemed to there's a family whose son has cancer, tore that panel off, to see. But there N.m f. him t hese w a- a lot of (amer m Edi. and another neighbor next door suf. was nothing wrong with the welding age gn,up. It all made 9,u wonder!' job.

a 1:d Petter died in 31 arch 19E fered hvingaaheart coupleattack.

of blocksA friend's away died wife. "That night we both took a shower 1 Smre Ed's death. ILn bara ha-jomed last year at the age of thirty-seven. of after work, same as alway.*. When y' the l'tilitielau withsuit re>ponsihihty chargme forGeneral her husband Pubhc died ofthyroid leukemia.problems.

got out, we were all red everywhere One fam- Another neighbor's our clo husbanW death. "I guess some peu-ily's child has cancer. " People don't " Imagine that/ I said. *We got sun- l

"_ burned. right there in the garage?

,,#. 3g want to talk about all the And still, neither one of u> said a word sickness." she says. "But you about Three Mile Island.

1. j can't help seeing it/

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f.. "We were usiting that night with

. *)J One whole wallin the Pet- my daughter and snn in. law. Nobod tey's hving room is coven d b, 9*$.. g 9 . wa> saymg much. Fmally my son-in-3 y% with needlepoint done by law comes out with it. 'l don't want to

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/ "M Barbara. Pictures of Gowers. sound dumb. but doe > any body else birds, a sampler that read 3,

'4 - .j " Count your hfe by smiles. Andbase youaknow,metallic taste in thur moutt.?' '

I ~ N ,P+ @ T6 .' *T' we all did!

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hl. t-- *- [7 . " not tears? "Idid those in Edi.

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hospital room," she ex When Bill Peters woke up the next

"! had all thosc hour >. plains. morning with diarrhea, and bhsters e h- [*j( h .- C. +,,.1 i * ~~ by his bed." sitting on his hp< he and his wife. Darla, P *

L.. .Es .& ' -% On another wall, old photo- figured it was time to get out. "Our dog r 'I s'

N.U.;..;M t *. * , [f' 4C graphs from before Ed got sick ymiq show a big, nice-looking man, was used to us leaving him for a few days, so we put a big bag of chow out j F! -- CUP /^^

l for him in the garage, and food for the b = 1 cradling his daughter by a m +f f+--* 't* - + +-

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cats, too." he remembers. "We headed Christmas tree playing with out to this campground in Wrginia,

• C . J.O I his infant son.and a real beau- figuring - this bemg March - it

! ty - Barbar a - beside him.

woula be pretty near empty. But when s "I was always a quiet type we pulled m. the man said. 'You're t ,

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-* of person," she says softly. from Three Ahle taland? You'll proba-P ..

1 A "I'm not the type that makes hly see quite a few of your neighbors s waves. I can't see myself go- here? And sure enough, the place was w ing to stand in front of the packed."

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e s gates at the plant and get

myself arrested. But when When Bill and his wife came home A ,v g  ?- '

they reopened Unit 1, I just five days later, their dog was lying stiff and cold on the garage th>or. Only

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couldn't believe it. I don't one drive by there anymore. cat survived. lier kittens born '

.b ^ ', _ "I've accepted that Ed's Soon after y ve born dead. hairless and with white eyeballs. Bi!! had lost gone," Barbara says. "But his body hair also. "The corners of my 6 Paul Eva Holowho (above), whose and sisters forrn felt Marie "likeand a ing knowingon business they'reasstill usualcarry-overmouth were all cracked, like l'd been riding a snowmobile on a cold night."

piece of Marie got heaven" conceruntil - while cows the died gov. and there, and no one s admitting And his skin, he says, was as r anybody got hurt, and it poinsettia plant.

ernenent ignored thern. Their spaniel could all happen again - Plowing the field behind his house a (below), eyes burned by fallout. that's what's hard. Some- month later. Bul kept findmg d r ~r times l'Il be mowing the hirds. That summer, all the buds on t

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lawn, and the sun will be his walnut trees dried up. The next i

g shining. and one mmute ev. summer, though. "the leaves on the

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i' crything seems okay. And trees were three times normal site /~

then ljust start bawhng and

, t can't stop " Smce the accident, the Peterses (t , f have experienced many health prob.

'4( i Q I. When Ihll Petern heard lem* lbll's wife sufTers f rom a thyroid l T~

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about the accident at TMI on condition. Ibil. forty.nme, has suf-

' the night elesen of March o' clock 28th,new3 the fered from recurring sore- on his leg.

he told his wife. "Probably Just the And every once m a while, for no

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apparent rea-on. hinkm st di changes

$ p'd f # media proportion blowmg" things out of to the same red color it turned on the 44

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.( lle spent all the nes t day m day after the ateident St dl. he counts himselfluc kier tha n the garage, where he and hh a lot of hn neighbors Walking up the so t us ocrosen e,ivae

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k .4 i IDVOStigatiOn - cancer Across the ro.id. the woman mme over theie. >he had a tubula got bon..anin.r. sh. was thirty t hice.

pn gnanc3 a w hile bac k. Over thers i

block w heie he lived when the acci- The woman next door was pregnant that one has tumor on the appenda

! when the accident happened. lier Out of t w ent3.t u o hou es. youie go dent 19sl e.ornirred Hill points she outsold all thethathouehome in hahv was lorn dead. Next lady. cancer eleven people d of' the back. The next lady. I don't scen about mty.fh e l'rien<!- and neigh j

wherv thetr base been medical trou-bles smce 193 know wallhere it started. butnext ehe has hors <>l mine die rince the u "That Iamily m er ihere." he begins.

cancer through her. That "I've heard them say this happen:

house. the fellow had cancer in his all m er America." says lhll, who nov "The taken .ut daughter when she was hadeighteen.

to haveAn.her m aries back. Went mio hi3 lung >. Next place. lives about I other d.iughter ha leukenina. Man in hi< dogs died af ter the accident. hke old house. "1 don't know about that.1:

$~t that house had a ten pound tumor. Next mine. Then two families moved away. --it like this in your neighborhood?"CD e

place. another Itukemia. The That York Next one place.

the l' the llowuman moved diedtoof'New house after that. t hey lost four horses. ,lere Miymin!rs a ntin Across t he road. euton cancer. I'riend of nu,/corproMems m Amenca.

] OUR elo t- near co s t d rson ar o, pose the major threat. Only a favorable had its meltdoAt iedion reint. the

[ Ta occident is still waiting to hoppen."

wind blowing oway from population cen.

y wr4 Forty miles north of Chicago sit two ters may protect t6em ogainst forge-scale reactors of the Zion nuclear plant (which

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NUCLEAR radiation iejuries. Sofety improvements - were otso designed by Westinghouse indeed. the ciosino of some lP ants-need to be considered.

Thus. Chico 2o. to the south, or miiwou-4 4 R EA CTO R S .c'" '"'r 'h'.""

wmd of the maior nuc # Pea'r" trouble spots kee, to the north, could be fatally vulnero-

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The safety logs at Zion show a disturb-F BY DANIEL FORD " '"'"d

' '" * 'h* 'iSkS Ih* P ants l ing monogement pottern: fundamental

,$i & STEVEN NADIS reviewed here shore neo,8y populat;ons in the miilions. one feature: they are safety lapses occur repeatedly, d By for the most dangerously situatedNobody demands for change by Edison of Commonwealth reguiotor Twenty years ago, a nuclear power plant construction boom begon. For safe- nuclear plantin the Point, just twenty-seven miles north of United States is Indian (Zion's owner) seems to have lea ty reasons, some of the earlier military Manhattan in Buchonon, New York. lesson of TMI. One equipment malfunc.

, reactors had been built in remote deserts. tion at TMI involved the emergency feed.

But by the mid 1960s, the nation's utilities The Soviets had to relocate 135,000 water system. The system failed because wanted to make nuclear power economi- people living within nineteen miles of somebody mistakenly closed a set of Chernobyl, in a comparable zone around volves during a routine maintenance in-colly competitive. They begon to build Indian Point, almost a million people commerciol nuclear plants close to the big would abandon homes and businesses. spection. At Zion, os recently as January, cities they serviced, thus avoid.ng expen. The " misaligned" volves, resulting from poor sive, long-distance transmission lines, consequences would be much maintenance, disabled this critical safety The United States Atomic Energy Com- worse if the prevailing winds happened to system.

mission readily permitted this on the be blowing toward metropolitan New The NRC imposed a minor fine grounds that the chance of a serious occi- the York - os they do thirty fou,r percent of (525,000) on Commonwealth Edison. The time, dent was negligible. When challenged, Consolidated Edison ho; tsuilt three re- agency was " concerned" that plant oper-otors had not " realized the full signifi-the to be AECkilled bysaid Americans were more likely octors of Indian Point. T'fe earhest and conce of this meteorites.

Nowadays, cher Chernobyl and Three smallest of the units ws shut down in the plant's license.

1974, of the insistence of regulators -it At Davis-Besse, o nuclear plant near Mileisland, James Asselstine,omemberof locked the essential emergency cooling Toledo, the Nuclear the opposite: Regulatory there Commission, says systems required of current reactors. The cy feedwate is o roughly forty.i.ve- other two reactors still operating at Indi- plant, which the NRC regards os one of the percent chance of a meltdown at any of the natior.'s 100 plants. "No one would an Point (which were built by Westing- worst managed, has a reactor designe question whether there will be another house) have emergency cooling systems, the some company that designed T although their safety remains in doubt.

occident. It's o matter of when," says scant few months offer the plant received its Port of the controversy about Indian operating license, in April 1977, it beg Mitchell Rogovin, the head of the Nuclear Point's cooting systems involves design having ma Regulatory Commission's independent questions. Other problems are monoge-board of inquiry, which studied TMI. (The ment and maintenance practices - criti. feedwater and emergency feedwater sys-tems. That September there was on occi-NRC is the Commission.) successor to the Atomic Energy col opporatus hos periodically follen into dent disrepair. In December 1984, all three the plant was running of only nine per However, the industry cites prohibitive emergency cooling pumps were inopero- of full power. (TMl's occident occurred at

< costs as the reason it hasn't token strong measures to prevent such occidents. ble at Indian Point Unit 2, as a result of nearly fullpower.)

clogged pipes.

Federal officials rely on improved evoc- The presidential commission that inves-votion as the rationale for letting nuclear rejected To date, bothimprovements maior Con Ed and recom- the NRC have tigated TMI noted the NRC and in plants operate. For plants in remote or- failure to oppreciate the significance of mended by govemment safety advisers.

the Dovis Besse cccident. Yet not even the eos, this may andsovefor accidents lives. thatmeo-However, such unfold slowly, "There are technical dMerences between score at TMI-sures won't prevent long term land con- Russio," Indian Point and that nuclear plant in come frightfully close to o meltdown -

maintains Robert Pollard, a for-tomination - which con turn large areas promptad the NRC or Davis Besse's own-into o radioactive no mon's land. mer NRC official. "The teolly importont ers to fix the problems.

difference is that Chemobyl hos olreody Their continuing neglect become evi-34 us ocTosas e,196e

dent as recently as June 9th,1985, when yet another accident at Davis-Besse near- ligence. The NRC attributed the 1985 ly developed into o replay of TMI. "Siace uccident to "the licensee's lack of atten. containment structure based on the some tion to detailin the core of plant equip. design principles as G.E.'s buildings.

April 1985, there had been control prcb- By the time Indian Point, Zion, Davis-lems with both main feedwater pumps." ment." Davis-Besse has been shut down noted on NRC report on this occident. since the occident. Besse and Limerick were under cesnstruc-At 1:35 a.m. on June 9th, when the No. I Another type of reactor made by Gen- tion,ledercl officials hod begun to believe main feedwater pump failed, the entire erol Electric " boilint, water"-is used that plants near moior cities m emergency feedwater system at Davis- in 36 of the 100 US. pfants. The Limerick unocceptable risks. In a confidential 1974 Besse also lailed. Within minutes, o set of Nuclear Power Station, twenty miles study, the AEC proposed new siting crite-r:o in remote arcos. But they were never operator errors and twelve safety system northwest of Philadelphia, uses this reac-

' malfunctinns caused the pressure and tor. in the 1960s, cost cuts were adopted odopted, because top officials feared ternperature inside the reactor to climb by G.E. to try to capture o shore of the they couldn't explain them dangerously,iust as it did at TMI. nuclear plant market. For instance, at ple living near current nucleor plants.

The situation in the centrol room was Limerick and other plants, G.E. built less Tropped by their own post decisions, later described by plant officiols os " hec- expensive containmen* structures than its federal oHicials decided to push on with the licensing of new plants on previously tic," and reminiscent of The China Syn- comperitors. G.E. olso introduced plumbing approved sites. Indian Point, as one offi-drome. One of the most notable aspects that it hoped would do away with the ciotneedloter conceded, was on " insane" of the emergency was what httle control for o super-strong containment building. In place to build a plant, the operators had over the plant, and how the early 1970s, govemment safety analysts often the small crew of assistent opero- worried that G.E.'s plumbing Today,system was so NRC officiols talkbeen classified as less about fors had to leave the control room to complex that it might not w ork. In 1972, the ottempt to restart systems that would not AEC's top safety adviser recommended a siting mistakes than abo respond to outomatic commands. "They bon on this containment design. Such o step which con - in principle - be improv violated the company's 'no running' policy was rejected, however, put pressurebecause it would on the " worst" of them, They such have ra os they raced down the stairs," on NRC raise too many embarrassing safety ques-os D avis.Besse, to mend their ways.

team observed, although it found good ing tions about the G.E. plants ofready operot-or under construction. la the final onolysis, the only foolproof reoson for the operators' hoste.

in the end, operators did correct earlier Thus, the Limerick plant was designed way to figure out the most dangerous with known safety weaknesses. The nuclear plantis to wait and see which one errors and were able to get one emergen-cy feedwater pump running. Noting how plumbing problems that could result in the hos the nex close the reactor come to overheating, the rupture of Limerick's contoinment have i

NRC praised the operators for are their pluck, not been fixed, and,in light of Chernobyl, Daniel Ford is glaring safety defects. The Soviet The Secret Papers of the Atomic Energy but lined Toledo Edison 5900,000 for neg- plant, contrary to early reports, did have a Commission.' Steven Nadis is co-author o

' Energy Strategies.'

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