‘I remember TMI’: An oral history of the 1979 Three Mile Island accident as told by people who lived nearby

• Scott Blanchard/WITF
  BioRecent Stories

  

  As director of journalism, I work on things like newsroom strategy, culture, ethics, and training; I work with reporters (mainly climate reporter Rachel McDevitt) on stories; and I'm deeply involved with our community engagement efforts and collaborations with other news organizations.
  
  My roots in journalism go back to growing up outside Washington, D.C., reading Woodward and Bernstein in my hometown paper, and being drawn to the ideals of freedom of the press and holding the powerful to account. I also idolized the Post’s sports columnists, and in fact was a sports reporter/editor before I moved to news.
  
  I followed journalism’s call to the University of Missouri, then to jobs in Virginia and Maryland before landing in Pennsylvania, and I’ve lived near Gettysburg for more than two decades. Living in rural Pa. helps inform my work as a journalist and my belief that listening is one of the most important things we can do.
  
  If I’m not doing journalism stuff, I may be traveling, bird-watching, or both.

Jack Kanthal / The Associated Press

FILE PHOTO: Newsmen and spectators stand in front of the main gate of the Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station in Middletown, Penn., April 2, 1979.

Pretty much everyone who lived near Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in 1979 has a story about what happened there that spring.

It turned out to be the nation’s worst commercial nuclear accident.

In this special StateImpact Pennsylvania oral history, listen as seven residents bring you inside their stories of uncertainty, confusion, fear and the decision they faced: Stay home amid risk of radiation, or flee.

Did you live in central Pennsylvania in the spring of 1979? Share your story. Tell us about your experience.

View the I REMEMBER TMI story wall

Editor's Picks

---

About StateImpact Pennsylvania

StateImpact Pennsylvania is a collaboration among WITF, WHYY, and the Allegheny Front. Reporters Reid Frazier, Rachel McDevitt and Susan Phillips cover the commonwealth’s energy economy. Read their reports on this site, and hear them on public radio stations across Pennsylvania.

PARTNERS

FUNDERS

Climate Solutions partners

---

Terms of Use | Privacy Policy