The meltdown at Three Mile Island occurred on March 28th, 1979 nearby Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. It was America’s worst accident at a civilian nuclear power plant. Half of the fuel in one of the two reactors melted causing large quantities of radioactive materials to leak from the reactor. Thankfully, most of the material was contained (1). It was caused by a combination of stuck valves, misread gauges, and poor decisions (2). Some radioactive gasses did escape into the atmosphere. The same day, the EPA arrived and immediately stationed experts with radiation monitoring equipment. This accident was an eye opener for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and many government agencies (3). The meltdown at Three Mile Island was a catalyst for …show more content…
After the meltdown on Three Mile Island, the NRC worked on equipment to detect problem before they arise to fix the problem before it becomes a threat. After eight years of study, researchers at Ohio State University have designed a system that combines different software programs to detect slow-forming malfunctions called faults in nuclear plants. By catching these problems early, researchers believe plant operators can minimize plant shutdowns and prevent accidents from occurring. The research team successfully tested the integrated software approach in a training simulator at the Perry Nuclear Plant. The Ohio State team was one of the first in the country to test fault-detecting software at a nuclear plant simulator. Integrated computer systems will improve the reliability of a nuclear plant by allowing the operators to fix a problem before it causes an accident that would trigger the plant's safety systems and automatically shutting the plant down in case of an emergency. Nuclear plants are made of up to 80 mechanical and nuclear systems and all of them are monitored by human operators. These safety systems alert workers about problems in the plant. However, because a plant has up to 80 systems that work independently and interactively, the operators sometimes incorrectly diagnose problems in systems that interact, or fail to detect small faults as they begin development. If a fault reaches a critical stage, it will trigger a safety system that will shut down the plant
How would a person react if he wakes up one day and realizes every aspect of his life is a lie? In Michael Bay’s film, The Island, Lincoln Six Echo awaits to win The Lottery and go to The Island. In the beginning, he believes The Island is the only place left to live a normal life because the rest of the world is contaminated. As Lincoln Six Echo and his friend, Jordan Two Delta, live in a sterile facility waiting to win, Lincoln Six Echo considers the idea that The Contamination may not be real. Putting her trust in Lincoln Six Echo, Jordan Two Delta grabs Lincoln Six Echo’s hand as they attempt to escape the not-so-truthful facility. As they step into the real world, the two partake in an adventure trying to find Lincoln Six Echo’s clone. In
Hurricane Katrina left a devastating scar on the citizens of the southern coast of the U.S., especially New Orleans, Louisiana. The category 5 hurricane was the costliest natural disaster, as well as one of the most deadly. Katrina hit New Orleans on August 29th, 2005 and after that day, 66,000 people were displaced from their homes. Of those who decided to ride out the storm with hopes of success and survival as they had experienced with other storms, they were found on their rooftops, in their attics, hoping for boat or helicopter rescue, relying on others for help to survive. The storm had reached 28,000 square feet inward to Louisiana, which was 60 percent of the state. 1,100 Louisianans lost their lives, and 200,000 were displaced and/or lost their homes (Davis 8). It was a devastating time of despair and suffering. People were put through experiences that would scar them for a long time. While preparing for evacuation, people left most of their belongings at home to flee to a safer city or to find shelter in the Superdome and Convention Center. Some even decided to remain in their boarded up homes. After the hurricane had past, a few hours went by and a levee located near the Mississippi River canal broke leaving New Orleans flooded (Delisi). After the disaster, the state and federal governments were pointing fingers at each other as to who was to blame for the poorly planned evacuation and rescue efforts for the victims. The state government promised to help evacuate those who could not transport themselves. Citizens were told to go to the Superdome and convention center for evacuation, but the supplies needed for survi...
I. (Gain Attention and Interest): March 11, 2011. 2:45 pm. Operations at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant continued as usual. At 2:46 pm a massive 9.0 earthquake strikes the island of Japan. All nuclear reactors on the island shut down automatically as a response to the earthquake. At Fukushima, emergency procedures are automatically enabled to shut down reactors and cool spent nuclear fuel before it melts-down in a catastrophic explosion. The situation seems under control, emergency diesel generators located in the basement of the plant activate and workers breathe a sigh of relief that the reactors are stabilizing. Then 41 minutes later at 3:27 pm the unthinkable occurs. As workers monitored the situation from within the plant, citizens from the adjacent town ran from the coastline as a 49 foot tsunami approached. The tsunami came swiftly and flooded the coastline situated Fukushima plant. Emergency generators were destroyed and cooling systems failed. Within hours, a chain of events led to an explosion of reactor 1 of the plant. One by one in the subsequent days reactors 2, and 3 suffered similar fates as explosions destroyed containment cases and the structures surrounding the reactors (Fukushima Accident). Intense amount...
...ial approaches which are Normal Accident and HROs, although it seems certain that both of them tends to limit the progression that can contribute toward achieving to highly protective systems. This is because the scope of the problems is too narrow and the potential of the solutions is too limited as well. Hence, Laporte and Consolini et.al., (1991) as cited in Marais, et.al., (2004) conclude that the most interesting feature of the high reliability organization is to prioritize both performance and security by the managerial oversight. In addition, the goal agreement must be an official announcement. In essence, it is recommended that there is a continuing need in the high risk organizations for more awareness of developing security system and high reliability environment in order to gain highly successful method to lower risk in an advance technology system.
Hurricane Sandy, also commonly referred to as Superstorm Sandy, is known as the most devastating, destructive, and deadliest hurricane that hit the Atlantic in 2012. The storm emerged in late October of that year. In terms of fatalities, over 286 people were killed in seven different countries. 117 were killed in the US and an additional 69 were killed in other countries throughout the world. [2] In terms of costly damage, this natural disaster was the second most expensive hurricane in US History. [3] Hurricane Sandy was a Category 3 storm at its peak when it had first hit Cuba. Eventually, Sandy had turned into a Category 2 storm once it had moved up and hit off the coast of the Northeastern US. The storm was named the largest Atlantic hurricane that was ever recorded, with measurements that included winds reaching an upwards of 1,100 miles per hour. [3]
The month of August in 2005 was an extremely shocking and devastating time for the United States more particularly for the people of New Orleans, Louisiana. For a city that was already crumbling for many years something tragic was about to happen. On the 29th of August a rated Category 3 hurricane made landfall. The name of the tragic disastrous storm is Hurricane Katrina. Hurricane Katrina, will forever be known as one of the worst storms in United States history. Tearing apart the lives of so many people in just a short period of time(Hurricane Katrina, par. 1).
Hurricane Katrina, a category 5 hurricane at its highest, made impact between August 23-30th 2005, and has since gone down as the most devastating and costliest natural disaster in the history of the United States. In preparation for the impact of the storm, on August 27th 2005, two days before the hurricane made landfall, President George W. Bush declared a state of emergency in the states of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. The Waterford nuclear plant was shut down for precautionary reasons in the wake of the oncoming storm and mandatory evacuations were issued for large parts of the southeast. Mayor Ray Nagin of New Orleans stated that about 80% of the 480,000 people asked to evacuate heeded warnings. Evacuation orders were also made for areas along the Mississippi coast, low-lying coastal areas in Alabama, as well as the barrier islands in western Florida Panhandle.
The film “When the Levees Broke” of spike lee is a four part series covering the events that took place before and after the devastation of Katrina on New Orleans and its residents. In August 2005, New Orleans was struck by Hurricane Katrina. People were unprepared for the disaster. As the city was flooding, levees safeguard failed the city, which caused the city to go underwater. In the film, part 1 shows hurricane Katrina and it’s impact. The flooding, rescue efforts and people trying to survive the disaster. Part 2 shows the aftermath with people that were evacuated waiting for help to come to the city. It was a very slow response to help and everyone was just waiting. Part 3 shows how people started to recover. Many hoped to return to their
Chernobyl was the greatest nuclear disaster of the 20th century. On April 26th, 1986, one of four nuclear reactors located in the Soviet Union melted down and contaminated a vast area of Eastern Europe. The meltdown, a result of human error, lapsed safety precautions, and lack of a containment vessel, was barely contained by dropping sand and releasing huge amounts of deadly radioactive isotopes into the atmosphere. The resulting contamination killed or injured hundreds of thousands of people and devastated the environment. The affects of this accident are still being felt today and will be felt for generations to come.
As a result a huge number of organisations have become software dependent. Some of these systems are used to safeguard the lives of many people. This means that if these systems were to fail they could lead to devastating consequences. Here are some examples of where software systems are used heavily and could be very dangerous if they were to fail - aviation, hospitals, space exploration, nuclear power stations and communications. I will be looking at some examples of actual software failure in these fields to explain the reasons why systems fail.2.0 Reasons for Systems FailureIf software systems failure can be so dangerous why can they not be completely eliminated? According to Parnas, "The main reason is that software can never be guaranteed to be 100% reliable.
After the nuclear accident in Fukushima in 2011, I have been communicating with victims and received countless of irate calls from victims, but almost all of them repeat critics and anger to the central government. An enormous number local residents criticized our reconstruction policy to return to the evacuation areas. “You government must be willing to sacrifice us to evaluate the effect of exposure to low-level radioactive doses.” Or “Government does not have the right to think about the reconstruction because you know almost nothing about the local situation.” These were some typical words I have received.
The Texas City Disaster of 1947 was a disaster that really left a impact to the world. The Texas City Disaster of 1947 was one of the world's worst industrial disasters.
The energy industry is beginning to change. In today’s modern world, governments across the globe are shifting their focuses from traditional sources of power, like the burning coal and oil, to the more complex and scientific nuclear power supply. This relatively new system uses powerful fuel sources and produces little to no emissions while outputting enough energy to fulfill the world’s power needs (Community Science, n.d.). But while nuclear power seems to be a perfect energy source, no power production system is without faults, and nuclear reactors are no exception, with their flaws manifesting in the form of safety. Nuclear reactors employ complex systems involving pressure and heat. If any of these systems dysfunctions, the reactor can leak or even explode releasing tons of highly radioactive elements into the environment. Anyone who works at or near a nuclear reactor is constantly in danger of being exposed to a nuclear incident similar to the ones that occurred at the Chernobyl and Fukushima Daiichi plants. These major accidents along with the unresolved problems with the design and function of nuclear reactors, as well as the economic and health issues that nuclear reactors present serve to show that nuclear energy sources are not worth the service that they provide and are too dangerous to routinely use.
Technological and accidental hazards can be occur without warning and can be both hazardous material incidents and failures at nuclear power plant. In some cases, victims that have been exposed to harmful chemicals or radiation show little to no symptoms until several years later. There are an increasing number of new substances and chemicals being manufactured which has increased the likelihood of a hazardous material spill or release. This also increases the risk to the environment and to the health and safety of a community.
On April26, 1986, the nuclear power plant was exploded in Chernobyl, Ukraine. At 1:23 AM, while everyone were sleeping, Reactor #4 exploded, and 40 hours later, all the city residence were forcefully moved to other cities, and they never return to their home. The Chernobyl disaster is ranked the worst nuclear accident. The Chernobyl nuclear power plant was ran by the Soviet Union central nuclear energy corporation. (International Atomic Energy Agency-IAEA, 2005)