Three Mile Island: Crisis Management - Term Paper Example

Three Mile Island: Crisis Management BY YOU YOUR SCHOOL HERE YOUR HERE HERE Three Mile Island: Crisis Management Introduction In 1979, anuclear power facility in the United States experienced a large-scale radiation leak which caused a great deal of local panic from citizens and businesses. This facility is referred to today as Three Mile Island and it is one of the most terrible nuclear-related accidents to date. This nuclear facility was powered by two pressurized water reactors, one of which experienced a near meltdown, a situation in which radioactive material is unable to remain at an appropriate temperature to avoid radioactive materials to be released. Three Mile Island was a major crisis, involving a variety of stakeholders who each contributed differently to the efforts to contain a catastrophe. Three Mile Island There was no warning that the pressurized reactor was going to experience a meltdown, making Three Mile Island a rapid onset crisis. Believing that the radioactive materials were being housed properly and that containment measures were in place, the workers and managers of that day were quite surprised when alarms began ringing that there was a problem with one of the reactors. Workers believed that the warnings were just the product of a system glitch and went about their daily business of providing power to the local region (Time.com, 1979). As time went by, the plant workers began to realise that there was risk of the core dropping into the cooling tanks where radioactive materials are housed. This would have created a tremendous radioactive explosion or caused the core material to burn through the concrete barriers which protected it and drop radioactive material directly into the soil (Time.com). In any event, what appeared to be a minor glitch was turning into a potential ecological disaster of monumental proportions. Only four hours after discovering the problem, a general state of emergency was issued by Metropolitan Edison, the utility operating Three Mile Island. This was important as it was the first time such an emergency state had ever been declared in relation to nuclear power plants (Library of Congress, 1999). The main trigger event which sparked all of this trouble was a stuck steam relief valve designed to ensure the careful flow of radioactive steam. At first, Metropolitan Edison contacted the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to discuss the problem and notify them of a potential radiation leak. A few hours after the initial press release about a potential release of radiation, after denying the existence of any, John Herbein, vice-president and chief spokesman, finally admitted to the public that radiation was being leaked (Library of Congress). By this point, the Lieutenant governor, a step below the state governor in the United States, had been contacted as was working with the press. Finally, word of the situation reached the governor’s ears, Richard Thornburgh, who began to handle the executive handling of the crisis and handling of the media. The major stakeholders in the Three Mile Island accident would include the general public, the workers at the facility who had been exposed to the radiation, all of the politicians and bureaucrats who used authority to drive crisis responses, and the media itself. The general public was the most important stakeholder because many women were pregnant in that area and had been told to evacuate only after they had already been exposed to unknown levels of radiation for almost two days. Also, the low income resident and the Native Americans were affected by Three Mile Island (Brugge, deLemos and Bui, 2007). This is due to the long-term damage that radiation can leave in the environment for those who are in touch with nature and who cannot afford to leave the potentially-radiated area. The crisis appears to have escalated once the media became heavily involved in the situation, leading to the public seeing a wide variety of different discussions about what was actually going on. In one hour, denial of radiation would be replaced with the admission of its presence in the atmosphere. This began to cause a local panic where the local citizens began to wonder whether they would be seriously harmed by the radiation release. When the governor of the state decided to have everyone evacuated, this was occurring which helicopters were flying above the plant to measure the levels of radiation in the atmosphere. In a local community which was not used to these types of activities in their own background, simply the act of crisis management created chaos due to the growing uncertainty about the plant’s condition. Even though these efforts were designed to calm an anxious public (Johnson, 2005), the decision to bring in helicopters lead to the crisis escalating. Blend the media into this situation, with presentations of differing perspectives on the health of the plant, and there is the element of community panic and concern. The management response to the Three Mile Island crisis was swift and deliberate. Metropolitan Edison’s president, at a press conference during the crisis, suggests that he should not have to account for everything his organisation does when he was questioned about toxic waste dumpage into local waters (Library of Congress). This makes this individual lose his credibility instantly for the stakeholders involved in this crisis, showing both lack of concern for others in the community and a sense of aristocrat philosophy. Management also seemed to recognise the importance of dealing with the public in such a manner that there would not be local panic during the suggested evacuations. They had a responsibility to let people know of the danger but to phrase it in a way which avoided a total breakdown of the social order in the area. Even the President and his wife visited the site just days after the situation occurred, likely as a means to offer public relations support to the White House and to calm the nervous public about not only Three Mile Island, but other nuclear power facilities across the United States. Outside of the management steps taken to combat the crisis, various investigators and specialists in nuclear technology were invited to assess the situation. They examined various coils, valves, cooling tanks and pressure tanks to determine where the system had received its failure. This was likely a risk control situation to prevent this from happening again. However, while specialists and spokespersons were dealing with the social crisis, investigative experts and technological experts were scrutinizing the plant to determine whether the situation could have been avoided and to search for accountability for the error. Additionally, there was increasing concern about the existence of a hydrogen bubble in the pressure tanks which held the core with concerns that the bubble might catch fire or explode, causing more problems with radiation leakage (USNRC, 2005). However, one of the largest problems to attempting to combat the crisis was the lack of technological expertise about physics in this period of time. It was soon discovered that the hydrogen bubble would not cause the damage suggested due to the lack of oxygen in the pressure tank, as it is commonly known that fire can only exist in the presence of oxygen. If the scientists of 1979 were even speculating about hydrogen bubbles and simple physics, they may have overlooked the obvious in their own technological failures. Limiting the crisis on the region was simply an outcome of trying to prevent the meltdown from occurring. It was clear that the radiation posed some form of risk to those who were exposed to it and there was a significant risk of the plant causing widespread damage across the region. As previously identified, the existence of helicopters to measure atmospheric particles of radiation was one method which management used to calm social anxieties about their health and safety near Three Mile Island. Dealing with damage involved assessing the long-term impact on various stakeholders, such as with checking them for cancer or other diseases. In fact, some people who were impacted by the Three Mile Island disaster have actually sued, without solid evidence, to receive money for claims that their diseases were caused by exposure to the event (Wall Street Journal, 1996). Even though many judges simply throw out those cases, it does show that dealing with the long-term impact of such a situation is a big commitment from many stakeholders and leaders. The governmental also had to deal with the lack of community belief in the validity of nuclear energy as a power source, especially if it caused the potential to harm society. This created the motivation for many leaders to begin assessing new forms of nuclear regulation and to create safety protocols to make sure such an error did not happen again. As part of dealing with the after-effects of a crisis, it is important to create new health and safety campaigns which promote the vitality of nuclear energy so that people are not afraid to set up residence near those familiar, steaming towers. Potential damage from the incident also occurred with various politicians who had their reputations discredited or had their good names reduced for telling the public conflicting stories. People want crisis leadership, or any leadership for that matter, which is honest and trustworthy and willing to communicate openly when their needs are at stake. A crisis management team would recognise that people are going to be skeptical about any information they receive in the future about nuclear energy, therefore it is important to send the right message quickly and stay consistent in its delivery. This is often an under-valued and under-looked portion of crisis management: Social and community function. Conclusion The Three Mile Island incident involved many different stakeholders and required the efforts of a large body of management professionals in order to handle the crisis effectively. Using the media as a tool, governmental and business leaders attempted to calm the public and assess whether the damage could be measured and predicted. Regardless of the specific activities which occurred as a means to ensure the safety of the community, Three Mile Island was a lesson to the future to ensure that nuclear radiation is well-regulated and handled safely. It was also, it would seem, a lesson in telling the public the truth about what is occurring in order to avoid long-term reputational damage and lack of public support. Bibliography Brugge, D., deLemos, J. and Bui, C. (2007). “The Sequoyah Corporation Fuels Release and the Church Rock Spill: Unpublicized Nuclear Releases in American Indian Communities”, American Journal of Public Health, Washington, 97(9). Accessed 30 Nov 2008 from ProQuest Database. Johnson, Linda B. (2005). “Three Mile Island: A Nuclear Crisis in Historical Perspective”. Library Journal, 130(9). Accessed 30 Nov 2008 from ProQuest Database. Library of Congress. (1999). “Media Interaction with the Public in Emergency Situations: Four Case Studies”, U.S. Federal Library of Congress, United States. Accessed 30 Nov 2008 http://www.loc.gov/rr/frd/pdf-files/Media_Interaction.pdf Time.com. (1979). “A Nuclear Nightmare”, Time Magazine Online. 9 Apr 1979. Accessed 30 Nov 2008 http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,920196,00.html USNRC. (2005). “Three Mile Island Accident”. United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Accessed 30 Nov 2008 http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/3mile-isle.pdf Wall Street Journal. (1996). “Three Mile Island Suits Dismissed by Judge”. New York, NY. 10 Jun 1996: A5A. Read More