[3] The most severe occurring in March 2002, when maintenance workers discovered corrosion had eaten a football-sized hole into the reactor vessel head.

The company paid an additional $28 million in fines under a settlement with the United States Department of Justice (DOJ).

[8][9][10] The bill was alleged to be part of the Ohio nuclear bribery scandal revealed by the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) in July 2020.

The entrance to the Magee Marsh Wildlife Area[12] is approximately 5 miles east of the power station.

It is the 57th commercial power reactor to commence building in the United States of America (construction began on September 1, 1970) and the 50th to come on-line July 31, 1978.

[17] This incident later became a precursor to the Three Mile Island accident, in which a pilot-operated relief valve also became stuck open, leaking thousands of gallons of coolant water into the basement of the reactor building.

[4] In January 2006, First Energy, the owner of Davis–Besse, acknowledged a series of safety violations by former workers, and entered into a deferred prosecution agreement with the United States Department of Justice (DOJ).

The deferment granted by the NRC were based on letters from Davis–Besse engineers stating that previous inspections were adequate.

Fish and Wildlife Service, Habitat for Humanity, and the University of Toledo as well as to pay some costs related to the federal investigation.

[27] Two former employees and one former contractor were indicted for statements made in multiple documents and one videotape, over several years, for hiding evidence that the reactor pressure vessel was being corroded by boric acid.

[35] An October 2011 shutdown of the plant for maintenance revealed a 30 foot long hairline crack in the concrete shield building around the containment vessel.

[37] On May 9, 2015, a steam leak in the turbine building caused FirstEnergy operators to declare an 'Unusual Event' and shut the reactor down until repairs could be made.

In August 2006, FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company (FENOC) submitted a letter of intent to renew.

[8] It was later learned that the bill itself was a part of a public corruption scheme revealed by the Justice Department in July 2020.

[45] The Nuclear Regulatory Commission's estimate of the risk each year of an earthquake intense enough to cause core damage to the reactor at Davis–Besse was 1 in 149,254, according to an NRC study published in August 2010.

The cooling tower for Davis–Besse stands at 493 feet above the surrounding area, making it a major landmark around the western end of Lake Erie.

The tower is visible from the Michigan and Ontario shores and on clear days the condensing steam plume can be seen from Bowling Green, Ohio, over 40 miles away[citation needed].