The "There It Was...Bigger Than Life...And Still Scary!" Story

It was an ordinary day.  My wife and I decided to explore Lancaster County by car, seeing if we could find a few places we had never been before so we headed west on SR283.  Before long we saw a sign for Elizabethtown and decided it was time to see parts of the county we had never visited.  Before long we were on Main Street and when we approached the square headed south toward the sign that said Falmouth.  We had read for years about the town that has held annual goat races since 1978, but had never been there.  Town is located in Conoy Township that is famous for lowering a stuffed goat on New Year's Eve.  

Cooling towers from Three Mile Island were to our right.

The last census told the tale about the town which had 420 residents.  As we approached the western end of the town we looked off to the right and there it was.  Two large circular cement towers spewing steam into the noontime sky.  There it was...bigger than life...and still scary.  Wow!  It was back on March 28, 1979 that reactor #2 of Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station released radiation into the air right down the road from Falmouth, PA.  

Along the road in front of TMI stands this plague.

Not only was radiation released but the nuclear core was damaged and thousands of residents evacuated the area.  It was in the news for days in our area.  We were within the limits of evacuation, but most people near the city of Lancaster did not evacuate.   Carol and I drove down the final incline with the Susquehanna River in front of us.  Should we bear right and head toward the island?  

View as we approached the cooling towers.

For as much as we have heard about Three Mile Island, we had never in our lives explored and found the island.  I guess it was time even though it was still a bit scary.  Two of the four towers were spitting steam into the air as we drove about 200 yards away from them as we passed the island.  To our right was the Exelon Generation Training Site as well as a small grove of cherry trees.  We stopped to read the plaque that sat amongst the trees and found that the Yoshino Cherry Trees were presented to the GPU Nuclear Corporation by the Japanese Engineers who were assigned to the TMI-2 research and development program in May of 1988.  We sat in the car for quite some time looking at the massive cooling towers right in front of us and wondering what we would have done had we lived in the houses that lined the road across from the river and power plant.  

The Yoshino Cherry Trees presented by the Japanese.

Would he have grabbed the kids and driven as fast as we could away from the disaster.  Did most of the people who live there do just that?  After a few more photos we turned around and headed back to the sign telling us we were in Falmouth and decided it was time to head back towards Elizabethtown.  I doubt very much if we will ever duplicate our drive exploring this area of Lancaster County again.  Ever!  It might be close to 40 years ago that the catastrophe happened, but getting this close to those scary memories is more than we could take.  As we drove east through Falmouth we vowed never to return again.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.

Sitting in our car directly across the road from the cooling tower #2.

Training center for Exelon Generation Training Site.