Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Plant
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State and federal officials were readying evacuation plans, in case the situation at Three Mile Island took a turn for the worse. Carter ordered the creation of a White House task force to coordinate all federal assistance. The group's first move was to send the NRC'S chief operations officer, Harold Denton, to Three Mile Island. He carried with him legal authority to take complete charge, overruling plant officials if he thought it necessary. Carter also called Governor Thornburgh and asked how the state could be helped. Citing overloaded telephone circuits, Thornburgh asked for a clear line. Carter dispatched an entire communications team to tie the Governor's office in to the plant, NRC headquarters in Washington, and the White House.
Although the Defense Department was preparing plans to feed and house evacuees, any decision on evacuation remained with the Pennsylvania Governor.
On Sunday, the President helicoptered from Washington to visit the ailing plant. The former navy nuclear engineer toured the control room, was briefed by the experts in charge of solving the reactor problems and afterward issued a reassuring statement. Even if an evacuation is ordered of the Three Mile Island area, Carter said, "This will not indicate that danger is high. It will be strictly a precautionary measure."
When the emergency is over, the President promised, "I will be personally responsible for informing the American people" about the results of the investigation, which he said will be "conducted thoroughly."
While there was no panic, thousands of residents left the endangered area of their own volition. In the countryside near the disabled plant, once complacent families were now both worried and angry. "You hear one thing from the utility," protested Suzanne Machita, as she began packing a suitcase. "Then one thing from the Government, another thing from Harrisburg and something else from civil defense. I don't know what to believe, what to do, so I guess the best thing is to go It's better than doing nothing." She said she had often argued with her husband Harry when he raised questions about living so close to the plant. "I just believed the company when they said it was safe Now I don't believe it."
Next door, Karl Krodel, a computer technician, his wife and three children had piled travel clothes on chairs in their living room. But Krodel was reluctant to evacuate. "We're ready to go if they tell us to," he said. "But we're not going before that. If it is dangerous, we already got it Wednesday. We just built this home two years ago and we're not about to desert it."
Some refugees went to Hershey Park, twelve miles from Three Mile Island, where an evacuation center was set up in a sports arena built by the chocolate company. As children played ring-around-a-rosy on the arena floor, Charles Noon said angrily about the nuclear plant: "They ought to shut that damn thing down." He had fled his home in Middletown with his wife and two children. "We came here as soon as we heard the warning on the radio," he said. "We didn't want to take any chances."