The eyes of the world were on an obscure island in the Susquehanna River 45 years ago Thursday as the worst nuclear accident in American history was unfolding at Three Mile Island.
The reactors no longer produce energy and the place is mostly quiet, but nearly a half century later there is still fallout.
At the time the meltdown was partial, but the panic was much more than that.
“All of a sudden all of these parents start to rush to the front of the school, and they look so scared and frightened and frantic,” said Maria Frisby, who lived near Three Mile Island and was in class at Middletown High School.
“I had a strong metallic taste in my mouth. I never tasted anything like that before,” she recounted.
American journalist and TV news broadcaster Walter Cronkite, anchor for the ‘CBS Evening News,’ reports on the meltdown of a reactor at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant, 1979. Behind the news desk a map shows the scene of the accident with an atomic energy symbol. (Photo by CBS Photo Archive/Getty Images) 
The huge towers of Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Londonderry Township, Pennsylvania, near the Susquehanna River. | Location: Londonderry Township, Pennsylvania, USA. 
Left to right: A plant official, President Jimmy Carter, First Lady Rosalynn Carter, Pennsylvania Governor Richard L. Thornburgh and NCR’s Harold Denton in a control room at the crippled Three Mile Island nuclear plant near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, April 1979. (Photo by Dirck Halstead/Getty Images) 
This photo dated 01 November 2001 shows Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station site in Middletown, PA. The facility is on an island in the Susquehanna River, south of Harrisburg, the state capital. Only two of the four cooling towers are seen in this view. Tightened security measure are in place at all of the nation’s nuclear generating stations following the 11 September terrorist attacks in the US. AFP PHOTO/TOM MIHALEK (Photo by TOM MIHALEK / AFP) (Photo by TOM MIHALEK/AFP via Getty Images) 
(Original Caption) 5/17/1979-Middletown, PA: John G. Kemeny, Chairman of the President’s Commissionon the Accident at tbhree Mile Island, inspects a long panel of switches as he toursthe control roomat the crippled nuclear power here 5/17. He and his commission made an extended tour of the plant as they begin their investigation in to the accident which closed the plant down 3/28 and released radiation in to the air causing the evacuation of children. 
(Original Caption) The sun sets behind the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant. The crippled reactor, the round building on the left of the cooling towers, is cooling down. 
Nuclear accident, nuclear powerplant “Three Mile Island” in Harrisburg, USA 1979 (Photo by Blick/RDB/ullstein bild via Getty Images) 
Power lines come off of the nuclear plant on Three Mile Island, with the operational plant run by Exelon Generation on the right, in Middletown, Pennsylvania on March 26, 2019. (Photo by ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS / AFP) (Photo credit should read ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP via Getty Images)
Now 45 years later there’s a new exhibit remembering the disaster.
“This has been our most popular exhibit yet,” said Taylor Mason, an archivist for the Pennsylvania House.
The exhibit includes a timeline, documents from a special investigating committee, t-shirts, vintage photos, and video from the incident.
“I learned the biggest thing was how passionate people were about it and how nervous they were,” said Mason. “This never happened before, really. So it was a really big time in Pennsylvania’s history.”
Maria Frisby says there are still people who are feeling the effects of TMI, insisting neighbors, friends, and classmates were exposed to radiation that day and are still suffering.
“They’re dying,” she said. “It’s just too many. It’s a big, big cancer cluster.”
The medical studies are mixed; the science is spotty at best.
“The reason we don’t have the data is that the industry wasn’t prepared,” said Eric Epstein with TMI Alert. “The company, whether they did it intentionally or unintentionally, are simply not prepared to gauge the amount of radiation that was released.”
Epstein has run the nuclear watchdog TMI Alert for 42 years and says while the reactors are closed there’s still much to keep an eye on.
“It would be foolish to think that you look at the plants and there’s no danger. That’s absolutely not the case. TMI two is still highly radioactive, and TMI one has tons of spent fuel onsite on an island in a river. You know, not a great formula for security.”
Things are quiet on the island right now with a lengthy decommissioning underway. We’re still decades away from completion at Three Mile Island.
