47 1973 Loss of Fluid Test Facility The LOFT reactor was a critical resource in the safety testing program for commercial power reactors. A scale model of a commercial pressurized water power plant, it was built chiefly to explore the effects of loss-of-coolant accidents (LOCAs). Between 1978 and 1985, 38 nuclear plant accident scenarios were conducted, including a simulation of the 1979 accident at Three Mile Island.The program investigated the capability of emergency cooling systems to prevent core damage. In July 1985, the nuclear tests concluded with a deliberate melting of the reactor’s test-fuel bundle, somewhat fulfilling LOFT’s original destiny as a “meltdown”reactor and representing the most comprehensive severe-fuel-damage test ever conducted in a nuclear reactor.