The China Syndrome
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The China Syndrome
''The China Syndrome'' is a 1979 American disaster thriller film directed by James Bridges and written by Bridges, Mike Gray, and T. S. Cook. The film stars Jane Fonda, Jack Lemmon, Michael Douglas (who also produced), Scott Brady, James Hampton, Peter Donat, Richard Herd, and Wilford Brimley. It follows a television reporter and her cameraman who discover safety coverups at a nuclear power plant. " China syndrome" is a fanciful term that describes a fictional result of a nuclear meltdown, where reactor components melt through their containment structures and into the underlying earth, "all the way to China". ''The China Syndrome'' premiered at the 1979 Cannes Film Festival, where it competed for the Palme d'Or while Lemmon received the Best Actor Prize. It was theatrically released on March 16, 1979, twelve days before the Three Mile Island nuclear accident in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, which gave the film's subject matter an unexpected prescience. It became a critical ...
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James Bridges
James Bridges (February 3, 1936June 6, 1993) was an American screenwriter, film director, producer, and actor. He is a two-time Oscar nominee: once for Best Original Screenplay for ''The China Syndrome'' and once for Best Adapted Screenplay for '' The Paper Chase''. Life and career Bridges was born February 3, 1936, in Little Rock, Arkansas and grew up in Paris, Arkansas. His mother was Celestine Wiggins, his sister was Mary Ann Wiggins, and his life partner from 1958 until his death was actor, librettist, screenwriter, and producer Jack Larson. Bridges got his start as a writer for ''Alfred Hitchcock Presents'' after catching the attention of Norman Lloyd, a producer for the series. One of his episodes, "An Unlocked Window", earned him a 1966 Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America for Best Episode in a TV Series. Bridges went on to write and direct a number of notable films, including ''The Baby Maker''; '' The Paper Chase''; ''September 30, 1955''; ''The China Synd ...
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Nuclear Meltdown
A nuclear meltdown (core meltdown, core melt accident, meltdown or partial core melt) is a severe nuclear reactor accident that results in core damage from overheating. The term ''nuclear meltdown'' is not officially defined by the International Atomic Energy Agency or by the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission. It has been defined to mean the accidental melting of the core of a nuclear reactor, however, and is in common usage a reference to the core's either complete or partial collapse. A core meltdown accident occurs when the heat generated by a nuclear reactor exceeds the heat removed by the cooling systems to the point where at least one nuclear fuel element exceeds its melting point. This differs from a fuel element failure, which is not caused by high temperatures. A meltdown may be caused by a loss of coolant, loss of coolant pressure, or low coolant flow rate or be the result of a criticality excursion in which the reactor is operated at a power level that exc ...
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Turbine Trip
A turbine trip is the emergency shutdown of a power-generation turbine due to unexpected events. Due to the number of issues that may cause a trip, they are relatively common events. Although it can occur on any such turbine, the term is most often seen in the field of nuclear power Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions to produce electricity. Nuclear power can be obtained from nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion reactions. Presently, the vast majority of electricity from nuclear power is produced b .... Many events can cause a turbine trip, including: * turbine overspeed condition where the turbine accelerates over its design speed, typically by 10% * low vacuum in the secondary cooling loop, or condenser * lubrication failure for any number of reasons * vibrations due to any number of issues In order to trip the turbine, inlet steam has to be removed from the feed. This is normally accomplished with dump valves that re-route the feed stream from the ...
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Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world's most populous megacities. Los Angeles is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Southern California. With a population of roughly 3.9 million residents within the city limits , Los Angeles is known for its Mediterranean climate, ethnic and cultural diversity, being the home of the Hollywood film industry, and its sprawling metropolitan area. The city of Los Angeles lies in a basin in Southern California adjacent to the Pacific Ocean in the west and extending through the Santa Monica Mountains and north into the San Fernando Valley, with the city bordering the San Gabriel Valley to it's east. It covers about , and is the county seat of Los Angeles County, which is the most populous county in the United States with an estim ...
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The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid digital subscribers. It also is a producer of popular podcasts such as '' The Daily''. Founded in 1851 by Henry Jarvis Raymond and George Jones, it was initially published by Raymond, Jones & Company. The ''Times'' has won 132 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any newspaper, and has long been regarded as a national " newspaper of record". For print it is ranked 18th in the world by circulation and 3rd in the U.S. The paper is owned by the New York Times Company, which is publicly traded. It has been governed by the Sulzberger family since 1896, through a dual-class share structure after its shares became publicly traded. A. G. Sulzberger, the paper's publisher and the company's chairman, is the fifth generation of the family to head the pa ...
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Academy Award For Best Production Design
The Academy Award for Best Production Design recognizes achievement for art direction in film. The category's original name was Best Art Direction, but was changed to its current name in 2012 for the 85th Academy Awards. This change resulted from the Art Directors' branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) being renamed the Designers' branch. Since 1947, the award is shared with the set decorator(s). It is awarded to the best interior design in a film. The films below are listed with their production year (for example, the 2000 Academy Award for Best Art Direction is given to a film from 1999). In the lists below, the winner of the award for each year is shown first, followed by the other nominees in alphabetical order. Superlatives Winners and nominees 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s 2020s See also * BAFTA Award for Best Production Design * Critics' Choice Movie Award for Best Production Design T ...
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Academy Award For Writing Original Screenplay
The Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay is the Academy Award for the best screenplay not based upon previously published material. It was created in 1940 as a separate writing award from the Academy Award for Best Story. Beginning with the Oscars for 1957, the two categories were combined to honor only the screenplay. See also the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, a similar award for screenplays that are adaptations of pre-existing material. Superlatives Woody Allen has the most nominations in this category with 16, and the most awards with 3 (for ''Annie Hall'', ''Hannah and Her Sisters'', and ''Midnight in Paris''). Paddy Chayefsky and Billy Wilder have also won three screenwriting Oscars: Chayefsky won two for Original Screenplay (''The Hospital'' and ''Network'') and one for Adapted Screenplay ('' Marty''), while Wilder won one for Adapted Screenplay ('' The Lost Weekend'', shared with Charles Brackett), and two for Original Screenplay (''Sunset Boulevard'', ...
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Academy Award For Best Actress
The Academy Award for Best Actress is an award presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS). It is given to an actress who has delivered an outstanding performance in a leading role in a film released that year. The award is traditionally presented by the previous year's Best Actor winner. The 1st Academy Awards ceremony was held in 1929 with Janet Gaynor receiving the award for her roles in '' 7th Heaven'', '' Street Angel'', and ''Sunrise''. Currently, nominees are determined by single transferable vote within the actors branch of AMPAS; winners are selected by a plurality vote from the entire eligible voting members of the Academy. In the first three years of the awards, actresses were nominated as the best in their categories. At that time, all of their work during the qualifying period (as many as three films, in some cases) was listed after the award. However, during the 3rd ceremony held in 1930, only one of those films was cited in ea ...
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Academy Award For Best Actor
The Academy Award for Best Actor is an award presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS). It is given to an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance in a leading role in a film released that year. The award is traditionally presented by the previous year's Best Actress winner. The 1st Academy Awards were held in 1929 with Emil Jannings receiving the award for his roles in '' The Last Command'' (1928) and ''The Way of All Flesh'' (1927). Currently, nominees are determined by single transferable vote within the actors branch of AMPAS; winners are selected by a plurality vote from the entire eligible voting members of the Academy. In the first three years of the awards, actors were nominated as the best in their categories. At that time, all of their work during the qualifying period (as many as three films, in some cases) was listed after the award. During the third ceremony in 1930, only one of those films was cited in each winner' ...
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52nd Academy Awards
The 52nd Academy Awards ceremony, organized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), honored films released in 1979 and took place on April 14, 1980, at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles beginning at 6:00 p.m. PST / 9:00 p.m. EST. During the ceremony, AMPAS presented Academy Awards (commonly referred to as Oscars) in 22 categories. The ceremony, televised in the United States by ABC, was produced by Howard W. Koch and directed by Marty Pasetta. Comedian and talk show host Johnny Carson hosted the show for the second consecutive year. Three days earlier, in a ceremony held at The Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, California, on April 11, the Academy Scientific and Technical Awards were presented by hosts Cloris Leachman and William Shatner. ''Kramer vs. Kramer'' won five awards, including Best Picture, Best Director for Robert Benton, Best Actor for Dustin Hoffman, and Best Supporting Actress for Meryl Streep. Sally Field received ...
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Dauphin County, Pennsylvania
Dauphin County (; Pennsylvania Dutch: Daffin Kaundi) is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population was 286,401. The county seat and the largest city is Harrisburg, Pennsylvania's state capital and ninth largest city. The county was created ("erected") on March 4, 1785, from part of Lancaster County and was named after Louis Joseph, Dauphin of France, the first son of King Louis XVI. Dauphin County is included in the Harrisburg–Carlisle Metropolitan Statistical Area. Located within the county is Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station, site of the 1979 nuclear core meltdown. The nuclear power plant closed in 2019. Geography According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of , of which is land and (5.9%) is water. The county is bound to its western border by the Susquehanna River (with the exception of a small peninsula next to Duncannon). The area code is 717 with an overlay of 223. Adjacent counties * N ...
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Three Mile Island Accident
The Three Mile Island accident was a partial meltdown of the Three Mile Island, Unit 2 (TMI-2) reactor in Pennsylvania, United States. It began at 4 a.m. on March 28, 1979. It is the most significant accident in U.S. commercial nuclear power plant history. On the seven-point International Nuclear Event Scale, it is rated Level 5 – Accident with Wider Consequences. The accident began with failures in the non-nuclear secondary system followed by a stuck-open pilot-operated relief valve (PORV) in the primary system that allowed large amounts of nuclear reactor coolant to escape. The mechanical failures were compounded by the initial failure of plant operators to recognize the situation as a loss-of-coolant accident (LOCA). The failure of operators is attributed to the out-of-the-loop performance problem. TMI training and procedures left operators and management ill-prepared for the deteriorating situation. During the event these inadequacies were compounded by design ...
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