Winter in Harrisburg…
8 minute read
February 2, 2025, 1:54 PM
On January 24, while Elyse was at MAGFest, I went up to Pennsylvania for some wintry fun. Most of the fun occurred in the Harrisburg area, as I had a few things in mind that I wanted to photograph, mostly with the drone. The trip was inspired by my friend Andrew Reams, who recently flew his own drone over Three Mile Island, and got some shots that I was not able to get when I flew around that site in 2021 due to DJI-imposed geofencing that was in place at the time (I have complained about this on here in the past). Now, after verifying that the geofences were indeed gone, I wanted to give it another flight and get the shots that I had wanted to get before but was locked out of getting. I couldn’t justify an entire trip just for Three Mile Island, though, so I did what I usually do, and came up with other photo targets to fill out an entire day. The final result wasn’t necessarily the most efficient trip, but I thought it turned out well, as the snow on the ground made the landscape look different than it usually does.
My first stop was fairly random: the interchange between the Pennsylvania Turnpike (I-76) and I-83 in New Cumberland.
Interchange between I-83 and Limekiln Road in New Cumberland.
Various lodging properties off of Limekiln Road in New Cumberland.
La Quinta Inn in New Cumberland.
Fairfield Inn in New Cumberland, kind of perched up on a hill.
The toll plaza at the Harrisburg West interchange for the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Despite the switch to all-automated tolling several years ago, the toll plaza structure still remains in place.
Empty sign frame in front of Beacon Hill Diner. I was surprised to see that it was lit by twelve high bay fixtures, with six pointing upward and six pointing downward.
Beacon Hill Diner.
Then I hit the road and headed over to downtown Harrisburg. I wanted to capture the Susquehanna River around the bridges while it was frozen over.
That was an enjoyable flight. I liked getting down low and photographing the ice, because the rough and uneven appearance of the ice reminded me of space probe photos of the surfaces of Mars and Titan.
While I was up in the air, I also checked up on the Fulton Bank sign, which I photographed on my August trip to Harrisburg, to see if the red cover over one of the letters had been repaired. Unfortunately, the sign was still busted, but when I contacted the company later on, they indicated that they expected that the sign would be repaired “within the next month”. So next time I go to Harrisburg, hopefully the sign will be fully intact again, and I will be able to rephotograph it in its complete form.
After my river photos, I left downtown and headed towards Three Mile Island. As soon as I got off of Eisenhower Blvd., I spotted a siren. So disregard my plans for a moment, because it’s time to send the drone up to get siren photos.
The siren in Highspire, a FS&S Model 7TT at the intersection of Eisenhower Blvd. and 2nd Street. According to the Pennsylvania siren map, this siren is inactive.
Then I hit the road again. I continued on through Middletown, where I spotted an old-style four-way traffic signal.
Traffic signal at the corner of Ann and South Wood Streets in Middletown.
And then I made it to Three Mile Island, which was the main reason that I did this trip. My original plan was to park at the Three Mile Island training center and fly from there like I did previously, but surprisingly, the parking lot was full of cars. I didn’t know what was going on there, but I suspected that it was not a good idea to park there in any event. I ended up flying in front of the entrance to a nearby electric substation. Then the boat club where I also flew from in 2021 was snowed completely over, so I passed that up because I wasn’t about to mess with that and either slide somewhere that I didn’t want to find myself in, or get stuck somewhere and need to be rescued. I ended up using a nearby neighborhood street as my other flying location, just flying from the side of the road. Over Three Mile Island, it was wide open, as I could fly anywhere that I wanted without having to worry about geofencing.
And then for those wondering what is what, the southernmost two cooling towers, which have a lot more dirt around them at the bottom, are the ones that are part of the side of the plant that was permanently decommissioned in the 1970s following the accident, i.e. unit 2. The northernmost side of the facility, unit 1, operated until 2019, and is expected to be brought back online in 2028 to generate electricity for Microsoft data centers.
Three Mile Island, viewed from the southeast. The Susquehanna River is frozen over on both sides of the island.
The cooling towers, viewed lower down from the south. The two towers closest to the camera are the unit 2 towers that were decommissioned in the 1970s.
Three Mile Island, viewed from the southwest.
Three of the four cooling towers, viewed from the north side of the facility. The fourth cooling tower is behind the camera. The plume of steam visible in the background is the Brunner Island Steam Electric Station, which is located about four miles away.
The northernmost cooling tower from unit 1, viewed from the west. This is the only one of the four that still has infrastructure installed around its bottom. The other unit 1 cooling tower had similar infrastructure around it when I photographed it in 2020, but it was gone when I came by again in 2021.
The rim of the northern unit 2 cooling tower. Definitely couldn’t have gotten this angle in 2021.
Looking down the northern unit 2 cooling tower. I don’t know quite what I expected to see, but there it is.
Three Mile Island, viewed from over the frozen Susquehanna River, southeast of the property.
Similar view of Three Mile Island from over the river, but from the northeast, on the other side of the island.
Animal tracks running across the frozen river. I don’t know what kind of animal made these tracks.
And that was Three Mile Island. My next spot was the aforementioned Brunner Island facility. However, while the two facilities are only about four miles apart as the crow flies, there is no direct route between them. Despite their closeness to each other, to drive from Three Mile Island to Brunner Island is a nearly 27-mile trek that takes 36 minutes to complete:
(Click it to see full size)
I took the shortest route, indicated in dark blue, which took local roads through Middletown, and then took the Turnpike to I-83 before taking more local roads to reach the Brunner Island facility. Either way, there is no direct way to get there, and it irked me that I passed close enough to Three Mile Island to get a really good look at it after twenty-some minutes of driving, i.e. I had to drive all that way just to be very close to where I started, but on the other side of the river. I couldn’t help but think that this could have been a ten minute drive, tops, if there was a bridge nearby, but unfortunately, there isn’t.
Arriving at Brunner Island, the first thing that I did was spot some log sections hanging from the power lines.
Clearly, the tree had grown around the power lines at some point, and then when the tree was removed, they left this so as not to disturb the power lines. I described this on my Instagram as, “When your job is to remove the tree but you don’t have the wire guy with you.”
Finishing up here, I went off in search of a place to launch my drone to see Brunner Island. The place where I flew from last time was closed, as it was a gravel road that receives no winter maintenance. Thus it was snowed completely over, plus a gate was closed across the front of it. So that took care of that. I ended up finding a spot slightly further away in a neighborhood, but it was up on a hill, which gave me better signal and line of sight to the facility, so I suppose that there are worse things.
Brunner Island Steam Electric Station, viewed from closer to where I was. Note that Three Mile Island is visible in the distance.
The steam emitting from the main stack at Brunner Island. The steam curled as it exited the stack, which was neat to watch.
As usual for Brunner Island, I had to take care not to fly directly behind the large smokestack, because whenever I found myself behind it, I would lose signal, and would have to wait for it to reconnect. It’s not that there was anything particularly notable back there, but it was quite easy to accidentally end up back there. Then I just have to wait for the drone to realize that it lost its connection with the remote and start flying back home, and as soon as it regains its connection, we’re back in business.
So that was Brunner Island, and finishing up there meant that I had met all of my photography goals for the day. I went home via York and Hanover, mostly just going grocery shopping in York, and doing a little phone photography in downtown Hanover, but those photos aren’t anything to write home about. I admit that I like these little solo adventures, because I get to go out and just have some me time while capturing something interesting. So whenever Elyse is away on days when I’m not working, I try to put the time to good use.
Categories: Harrisburg, Photography, Winter weather