Many people were victims of this terrible accident, the consequences of which are still felt today.
The catastrophe at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the Chernobyl accident (in the media the terms “Chernobyl disaster” or simply “Chernobyl” are most often used) is one of the saddest pages in the history of modern civilization.
We bring to your attention a brief description of the Chernobyl accident. As they say, briefly about the main thing. Let us recall those fatal events, the causes and consequences of the tragedy.
What year did Chernobyl happen?
The Chernobyl accident
On April 26, 1986, a reactor exploded at the 4th power unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant (ChNPP), as a result of which a huge amount of radioactive substances was released into the atmosphere.
The Chernobyl nuclear power plant was built on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR (now -) on the Pripyat River, near the city of Chernobyl, Kyiv region. The fourth power unit was put into operation at the end of 1983 and successfully operated for 3 years.
On April 25, 1986, at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, it was planned to carry out preventive maintenance of one of the systems responsible for safety at the 4th power unit. After that, in accordance with the schedule, they wanted to completely shut down the reactor and perform some repairs.
However, the shutdown of the reactor was repeatedly postponed due to technical problems in the control rooms. This led to difficulties regarding the control of the reactor.
The disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant
On April 26, an uncontrolled increase in power began, which led to explosions in the main part of the reactor. Soon a fire started, and a huge amount of radioactive substances was released into the atmosphere.
After that, thousands of people were sent to eliminate the accident using a variety of equipment. Local residents began to urgently evacuate, forbidding them to take any things with them.
As a result, people were forced to leave their homes and run away in what they were wearing at the time the evacuation began. Before leaving the disaster area, each person was doused with water from hoses to wash contaminated particles from the surface of the skin and clothing.
For several days, the reactor was filled with inert materials to extinguish the power of the radioactive release.
Helicopters are decontaminating the buildings of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant after the accident In the early days, everything was relatively good, but soon the temperature inside the reactor plant began to rise, as a result of which even more radioactive substances began to be released into the atmosphere.
It was possible to achieve a decrease in radionuclides only after 8 months. Naturally, during this time a huge amount was thrown into the atmosphere.
The Chernobyl accident at the nuclear power plant shook the whole world. All the world's media constantly reported on the state of affairs at a particular point in time.
Less than a month later, the Soviet leadership decided to mothball the 4th power unit. After that, construction work began on the construction of a structure that could completely close the reactor.
About 90,000 people were involved in the construction. This project was called "Shelter", and was completed in 5 months.
On November 30, 1986, the 4th reactor of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant was accepted for maintenance. It is worth noting that radioactive substances, primarily radionuclides of cesium and iodine, were distributed almost throughout Europe.
The largest number of them fell on Ukraine (42 thousand km²), (47 thousand km²) and (57 thousand km²).
Chernobyl radiation
As a result of the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, 2 forms of Chernobyl fallout were released: gas condensate and radioactive substances in the form of aerosols.
The latter fell along with precipitation. The greatest damage was caused to the territory within a radius of 30 km around the site of the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.
Helicopters put out the fire Interestingly, cesium-137 deserves special attention in the list of radioactive substances. The half-life of this chemical element occurs within 30 years.
After the accident, cesium-137 settled on the territories of 17 European countries. In total, it covered an area exceeding 200 thousand km². And again, Ukraine, Belarus and Russia were in the top three "leading" states.
In them, the level of cesium-137 exceeded the permissible norm by almost 40 times. More than 50 thousand km² of fields sown with various crops and gourds were destroyed.
Chernobyl disaster
In the first days after the disaster, 31 people died, and another 600,000 (!) liquidators received high doses of radiation. More than 8 million Ukrainians, Belarusians and were exposed to moderate radiation, as a result of which their health was irreparably harmed.
After the accident, the Chernobyl nuclear power plant was suspended due to a high radioactive background.
However, in October 1986, after decontamination work and the construction of the sarcophagus, the 1st and 2nd reactors were put into operation. A year later, the 3rd power unit was also launched.
In the premises of the block control panel of the power unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in the city of Pripyat In 1995, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed between Ukraine, the Commission of the European Union and the G7 countries.
The document spoke about the launch of a program aimed at the complete closure of nuclear power plants by 2000, which was later implemented.
On April 29, 2001, the NPP was reorganized into the State Specialized Enterprise "Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant". From that moment, work began on the disposal of radioactive waste.
In addition, a powerful project was launched to build a new sarcophagus, instead of the outdated Shelter. The tender for its construction was won by French enterprises.
According to the existing project, the sarcophagus will be an arched structure with a length of 257 m, a width of 164 m and a height of 110 m. According to experts, the construction will last about 10 years and will be completed in 2018.
When the sarcophagus is completely rebuilt, work will begin related to the elimination of the remnants of radioactive substances, as well as reactor installations. This work is planned to be completed by 2028.
After the dismantling of the equipment, cleaning of the area will begin using appropriate chemicals and modern technology. Specialists plan to complete all types of work to eliminate the consequences of the Chernobyl disaster in 2065.
Causes of the Chernobyl accident
The accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant was the largest in the history of nuclear energy. Interestingly, there are still heated debates about the true causes of the accident.
Some blame the dispatchers for everything, while others suggest that the accident was caused by a local one. However, there are versions that it was a well-planned terrorist act.
Since 2003, April 26 has been considered the International Day of Remembrance for Victims of Radiation Accidents and Catastrophes. On this day, the whole world remembers the terrible tragedy that claimed the lives of many people.
Workers of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant walk past the control panel of the destroyed 4th power unit of the station In contrast, the explosion at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant resembled a very powerful "dirty bomb" - radioactive contamination became the main damaging factor.
Over the years, people have been dying from various types of cancer, radiation burns, malignant tumors, immunity decline, etc.
In addition, in the affected areas, children were often born with some kind of pathology. So, for example, in 1987 an unusually large number of cases of Down syndrome were recorded.
After the Chernobyl accident, serious inspections began to be carried out at many similar nuclear power plants in the world. In some states, nuclear power plants have decided to close altogether.
Frightened people went to rallies, demanding that the government find alternative ways to produce energy in order to avoid another environmental disaster.
I would like to believe that in the future humanity will never repeat such mistakes, but will draw conclusions from the sad experience of the past.
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For almost eight centuries, Chernobyl was just a small Ukrainian town, but after April 26, 1986, this name began to denote the worst man-made disaster in the history of mankind. The very word "Chernobyl" bears the sign of radioactivity, the imprint of human tragedy and mystery. Chernobyl scares and attracts, and for many decades it will remain in the center of attention of the whole world.
Accident at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant
The accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant on April 26, 1986 is the beginning of a new period in the relationship between man and the atomic nucleus. A period full of fear, caution and distrust.
An object: Power unit No. 4 of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the city of Pripyat, Ukraine.
Victims: 2 people died during the disaster, 31 people died in the following months, about 80 in the next 15 years. 134 people developed radiation sickness, resulting in death in 28 cases. About 60,000 people (mostly liquidators) received high doses of radiation.
Causes of the disaster
An unusual situation has developed around the Chernobyl disaster: the course of events of that fateful night on April 26, 1986 is known literally to seconds, all possible causes of the emergency have been studied, but it is still unknown what exactly led to the explosion of the reactor. There are several versions of the causes of the accident, and over the past three decades, the disaster has acquired a lot of speculation, fantastic and frankly delusional versions.
The first months after the accident, the main blame for it was placed on the operators, who made a lot of mistakes that led to the explosion. But since 1991, the situation has changed, and almost all charges against nuclear power plant personnel have been dropped. Yes, people made several mistakes, but they all corresponded to the reactor operation regulations in force at that time, and none of them were fatal. So, the low quality of regulations and safety requirements was recognized as one of the causes of the accident.
The main causes of the disaster lay in the technical plane. Many volumes of investigations into the causes of the disaster boil down to one thing: the exploded RBMK-1000 reactor had a number of design flaws, which under certain (rather rare!) conditions turn out to be dangerous. In addition, the reactor simply did not comply with many nuclear safety rules, although it is believed that this did not play a special role.
The two main causes of the disaster are considered to be a positive vapor reactivity coefficient and the so-called "end effect". The first effect boils down to the fact that when water boils in the reactor, its power increases sharply, that is, nuclear reactions begin to take place in it more actively. This is due to the fact that steam absorbs neutrons worse than water, and the more neutrons, the more active the uranium fission reactions are.
And the "end effect" is caused by the design features of the control and protection rods used in the RBMK-1000 reactors. These rods consist of two halves: the upper one (7 meters long) is made of neutron-absorbing material, the lower one (5 meters long) is made of graphite. The graphite part is necessary so that when the rod is pulled out, its channel in the reactor is not occupied by water, which absorbs neutrons well, and therefore can worsen the course of nuclear reactions. However, the graphite rod did not displace water from the entire canal - approximately 2 meters of the lower part of the canal were left without a displacing rod, and therefore filled with water.
It is known that graphite absorbs neutrons much worse than water, and therefore, when completely pulled out rods are lowered in the lower part of the channels, nuclear reactions do not slow down due to the sharp displacement of water by graphite, but, on the contrary, sharply accelerate. That is, due to the "end effect" in the first moments of lowering the rods, the reactor is not shut down, as it should be, but on the contrary, its power increases abruptly.
How could all this lead to disaster? It is believed that the positive steam reactivity coefficient played a fatal role at the moment when the reactor power was reduced, and at the same time the circulation pumps were also reduced - because of this, the water inside the reactor began to flow more slowly and began to evaporate rapidly, which caused an acceleration of the flow of nuclear reactions. In the first seconds, the increase in power was controlled, but then it acquired an avalanche-like character, and the operator was forced to press the button for the emergency lowering of the rods. At that moment, the “end effect” worked, in a fraction of a second the power of the reactor increased abruptly, and ... And an explosion thundered, almost putting an end to not all nuclear energy, and leaving an indelible mark on the face of the Earth and in the hearts of people.
Chronicle of events
The accident at the fourth power unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant occurred so rapidly that until the last seconds all control devices remained operational, thanks to which the entire course of the disaster is known literally to fractions of seconds.
On April 24-26, the shutdown of the reactor was scheduled for scheduled preventive maintenance - this is, in general, a common practice for nuclear power plants. However, very often during such shutdowns, various experiments are carried out that cannot be carried out with the reactor running. Just one of these experiments was scheduled for April 25 - testing the “turbine generator rotor run-down” mode, which in principle could become one of the reactor protection systems during emergencies.
This experiment is very simple. Turbogenerators of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant are units consisting of a steam turbine and a generator that generates electricity. The rotors of these units are combined, and their total mass reaches 200 tons - such a colossus, accelerated to a speed of 3000 rpm, after the steam supply is stopped, can rotate for a long time by inertia, only due to the acquired kinetic inertia. This is the “run-out” mode, and theoretically, it can be used to generate electricity and power circulation pumps when regular power sources are turned off.
The experiment was to show whether the turbogenerator in the “runaway” mode was able to provide power to the pumps until the emergency diesel generators returned to normal operation.
From April 24, the reactor power gradually began to decrease, and by 0.28 on April 26, it was possible to bring it to the required level. But at that moment, the reactor power dropped to almost zero, which required the immediate lifting of the control rods. Finally, by 1:00 a.m., the power of the reactor reached the required value, and at 1:23:04, with a delay of several hours, the experiment was officially launched. This is where the problems started.
The turbogenerator in the “runaway” mode stopped faster than expected, which is why the speed of the circulation pumps connected to it also dropped. This led to the fact that the water began to pass more slowly through the reactor, boil faster, and a positive vapor coefficient of reactivity intervened. So the power of the reactor began to gradually increase.
After some time - at 1:23:39 - the instrument readings reached critical values, and the operator pressed the emergency protection button AZ-5. The completely withdrawn rods began to sink into the reactor, and at that moment the “end effect” worked - the reactor power increased many times, and after a few seconds an explosion occurred (more precisely, at least two powerful explosions).
The explosion completely destroyed the reactor and damaged the building of the power unit, a fire started. Firefighters quickly arrived at the scene of the accident, who by 6 o'clock in the morning completely coped with the fire. And in the first two hours, no one imagined the scale of the catastrophe and the degree of radiation contamination. Already an hour after the start of the extinguishing, many firefighters began to show symptoms of radiation damage. People received large doses of radiation, and 28 of the firefighters died of radiation sickness in the following weeks.
Only at 3.30 am on April 26, the radiation background at the crash site was measured (because at the time of the accident, the standard control devices were out of order, and compact individual dosimeters simply went off scale), and an understanding came of what actually happened.
From the first days after the explosion, measures began to eliminate the consequences of the disaster, the active phase of which lasted several months, and in fact lasted until 1994. During this time, over 600,000 people took part in the liquidation work.
Despite the powerful explosion, the bulk of the contents of the nuclear reactor remained at the site of the destroyed fourth power unit, so it was decided to build a protective structure around it, which later became known as the Sarcophagus. The construction of the shelter was completed by November 1986. The construction of the "sarcophagus" took over 400 thousand cubic meters of concrete, several thousand tons of a mixture attenuating radioactive radiation and 7,000 tons of metal structures.
Explosion
Until now, disputes have not stopped about the nature of the explosion of the reactor at the fourth power unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.
Many experts agree that the explosion was similar to a nuclear one. That is, an uncontrolled chain reaction began in the reactor, similar to what happens when a nuclear bomb is detonated. These reactions lasted a fraction of a second, and did not turn into a full-fledged nuclear explosion, since the entire contents of the reactor were ejected from the mine, and the nuclear fuel dissipated.
However, the main explosion of the reactor was facilitated by an explosion of a different nature - steam. It is believed that due to the avalanche-like growth of steam generation inside the reactor, the pressure increased many times (in fact, by 70 times), which ripped off the multi-ton plate covering the reactor from above, like a lid on a pan. As a result, the reactor was completely dehydrated, uncontrolled nuclear reactions began in it, and an explosion.
A different version of what happened was proposed by Konstantin Pavlovich Checherov, a man who devoted more than 10 years to analyzing the causes of the Chernobyl disaster, during which he personally examined virtually every meter of the reactor shaft and the reactor hall of the fourth power unit. In his opinion, due to an emergency shutdown of the pumps, the temperature in the lower part of the reactor rose sharply, the pipelines (the water pressure in them reached 70 atmospheres) broke, and as a result, the entire reactor, like a colossal jet engine, was thrown out of the shaft up into the reactor hall . And already there, under the roof of the hall, there was an explosion that had a nuclear nature, but a relatively small power - about 0.01 kilotons. This explosion destroyed the roof and walls of the reactor hall. That is why virtually all the fuel (90-95%) was ejected from the reactor shaft. Checherov's version for a long time contradicted the official position and therefore remained (and remains) practically unknown to a wide circle.
To imagine the scale of the disaster, you need to understand what the RBMK-1000 reactor is. The basis of the reactor is a concrete shaft with dimensions of 21.6 × 21.6 × 25.5 m, at the bottom of which lies a steel sheet 2 m thick and 14.5 m in diameter. On this slab rests a graphite stack of cylindrical shape, pierced by channels for fuel elements, coolant and rods - in fact, this is the reactor. The diameter of the masonry reaches 11.8 m, the height is 7 m, it is surrounded by a shell with water, which serves as additional biological protection. From above, the reactor is covered with a metal plate with a diameter of 17.5 m and a thickness of 3 m.
The total mass of the reactor reaches 5000 tons, and all this mass was simply thrown out of the mine by the explosion.
Consequences of the Chernobyl accident
The Chernobyl disaster is in the forefront of the most serious man-made accidents in the history of mankind. It had such disastrous consequences that even now - almost 30 years later - the situation remains very difficult.
The explosion of the reactor led to monstrous radiation contamination of the area. At the time of the accident, there were about 180 tons of nuclear fuel in the reactor, of which from 9 to 60 tons were released into the atmosphere in the form of aerosols - a huge radioactive cloud rose above the nuclear power plant and settled over a large area. As a result, significant territories of Ukraine, Belarus and some regions of Russia were subjected to pollution.
It should be noted that the main danger is not uranium itself, but highly active isotopes of its fission - cesium, iodine, strontium, as well as plutonium and other transuranium elements.
In the first hours after the accident, its scale remained unknown, but already on the afternoon of April 27, the entire population of the city of Pripyat was hastily evacuated, in the following days people were taken out first from the 10-kilometer zone around the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, and then from the 30-kilometer one. To this day, the exact number of people evacuated is unknown, but according to rough estimates, about 115,000 people were evacuated from more than a hundred settlements in the whole of 1986, and in subsequent years more than 220,000 people were resettled.
Subsequently, around the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, in the 30-kilometer zone, the so-called “exclusion zone” was created, in which a ban on all economic activity was introduced, and in order to prevent the return of people, almost all settlements were literally destroyed.
Interestingly, even now in some contaminated areas, there are over-permissible levels of radioactive isotopes in the soil, plants and, as a result, in cow's milk. This situation will be observed for several more decades, since the half-life of cesium-137 is 30 years, and that of strontium-90 is 29 years.
Over time, the radioactive background in the contaminated areas generally decreases, but this effect has unexpected manifestations. It is known that during the decay of radioactive elements, others are formed, and they can be either less or more active. So, during the decay of plutonium, ameretium is formed, which has a higher radioactivity, therefore, over time, the radioactive background in some areas only grows! It is believed that in the contaminated territories of Belarus, due to the increase in the amount of ameretium, by 2086 the background will be 2.5 times greater than immediately after the accident! The only reassurance is that the bulk of this background is alpha radiation, from which it is relatively easy to protect yourself.
The terrible consequences of the accident caused mass dissatisfaction with nuclear energy, people simply became afraid of nuclear power plants! This led to the fact that in the period from 1986 to 2002 not a single new nuclear power plant was built, and the construction of new power units at existing plants was either frozen or completely stopped. And only the last ten years there has been an increase in nuclear energy, but this applies more to Russia - the accident at the Japanese nuclear power plant Fukushima-1 dealt a new blow, and a number of countries have already announced the abandonment of nuclear energy (for example, Germany wants to completely abandon nuclear power plants by the 2030s).
The Chernobyl disaster also had some very surprising consequences. The exclusion zone has long been the subject of dark jokes about mutations and other scary things caused by radiation. But in fact, the situation in those areas is quite different. Almost 30 years ago, people left the 30-kilometer zone, and since then no one has lived there (with the exception of several hundred "self-settlers" - people who returned here, despite all the prohibitions), did not plow and did not sow, did not pollute the environment and did not dump waste. As a result, the radioactive forests and fields have almost completely recovered, the populations of animals, including rare ones, have multiplied in them, and the ecological situation has generally improved. Paradoxical as it may seem, but the radiation catastrophe was not an evil, but rather a boon for nature!
And, finally, Chernobyl brought to life a new socio-cultural phenomenon - stalking. The exclusion zone perfectly embodies the Zone created by the Strugatsky brothers in the novel Roadside Picnic. Since the beginning of the 90s, hundreds of “stalkers” have been drawn to the closure of the territory, dragging everything that is bad, visiting abandoned cities and striving for the stalker “Mecca” - the post-apocalyptic city of Pripyat, forever frozen in the Soviet past. And no one knows what doses of radiation these unfortunate stalkers received, and what dangerous things they brought home.
Stalkerism acquired such proportions that the government of Ukraine was forced to adopt special legislative acts restricting people's access to the Exclusion Zone. But despite the increased control of the zone's borders and all the prohibitions, the newly-minted stalkers do not give up trying to get into the most mysterious region of the planet, covered with myths and legends.
The current situation at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant
Despite the disaster, the Chernobyl nuclear power plant resumed its work in the autumn of 1986: already on October 1, power unit No. 1 was launched, and on November 5, power unit No. 2. The launch of the third power unit was difficult because it was in close proximity to the emergency fourth, so he began work only November 24, 1987.
On the evening of October 11, 1991, a serious fire occurred at the second power unit, which actually put an end to the work of the station. On this day, the reactor of power unit No. 2 was shut down, later work began on its restoration, but they were never completed, and since 1997 the reactor has been officially shut down. The reactor of power unit No. 1 was shut down on November 30, 1996. The shutdown of the reactor of power unit No. 3 was carried out by the President of Ukraine on December 15, 2000 - this event was staged like a show and broadcast live.
So today, the Chernobyl nuclear power plant is not functioning, but work is being done on it to replace the “sarcophagus” (which is starting to collapse) with a new protective structure. In this regard, about 750 people continue to work on the territory of the station. The progress of work is broadcast around the clock on the official website of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant http://www.chnpp.gov.ua/.
On November 14, 2016, the process of moving the assembled new shelter began - in 4 days it should take its place above the destroyed power unit.
What has been done to prevent a disaster from happening again?
It is believed that the main causes of the Chernobyl disaster were the design flaws of the RBMK-1000 nuclear reactor. But these reactors were not only at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, but also at several other stations - Leningrad, Smolensk and Kursk. Millions of people are in potential danger!
After the disaster, the question arose of modernizing all these reactors, which was done in subsequent years. Now 11 more RBMK-1000 reactors remain in operation, which no longer pose a danger, however, due to physical wear and tear and moral obsolescence, most of them will be decommissioned in 5-10 years.
Also, the Chernobyl disaster made it necessary to revise the regulations for the operation of reactors and tighten nuclear safety requirements. So, really serious safety measures at nuclear power plants were introduced only after 1986 - before that, it was believed that many accident scenarios were simply unthinkable, and fears were far-fetched.
To date, the global nuclear power industry has become one of the most high-tech industries in which special attention is paid to safety, equipment reliability and personnel training. And this was largely due to the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, which showed that the fission of the atomic nucleus is much more complicated and dangerous than the simple burning of coal.
April 26, 1986... This date will be remembered by several generations of Ukrainians, Belarusians and Russians as the day and year when a terrible thing happened. When all this happened, perhaps even the most experienced experts did not fully and completely realize what awaited us all later.
The catastrophe of April 26, 1986 resulted in thousands of deaths and diseases, infected forests, poisoned water and soil, mutations of plants and animals. Among other things, a thirty-kilometer exclusion zone appeared on the map of Ukraine, access to which is possible only with a special permit.
This article is aimed not only at reminding readers once again what happened on April 26, 1986, but also at looking at what happened, as they say, from different angles. Now it seems to be no secret to anyone that in the modern world there are more and more often those who are ready to pay a lot of money to go on an excursion to these places, and some former residents, who have not settled down in other regions, often return to their ghostly and abandoned cities.
Brief summary of events
Almost 30 years ago, namely on April 26, 1986, the largest nuclear accident in the world occurred on the territory of present-day Ukraine, the consequences of which are felt by the planet to this day.
At the power plant in the city of Chernobyl, the nuclear reactor of the fourth power unit exploded. At the same time, a huge amount of deadly radioactive substances was thrown into the air.
It has now been calculated that only in the first three months, starting from April 26, 1986, 31 people died literally on the spot from radiation. Later, 134 people were sent to specialized clinics for intensive treatment for radiation sickness, and another 80 died in agony from infection of the skin, blood and respiratory tract.
The Chernobyl nuclear power plant (1986, April 26 and the following days) needed workers more than ever. More than 600 thousand people took part in the liquidation of the accident, most of whom were military personnel.
Perhaps the most dangerous consequence of the incident was a huge release into the environment of deadly radioactive substances, namely isotopes of plutonium, uranium, iodine and cesium, strontium and radioactive dust itself. The plume of radiation covered not only a huge part of the USSR, but also Eastern Europe and the Scandinavian countries, but most of all on April 26, 1986, it affected the Byelorussian and Ukrainian SSR.
A lot of international experts have been investigating the causes of the accident, but even so far no one knows for sure the true causes of what happened.
Distribution area
After the accident around the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, it was necessary to designate the so-called "dead" zone of 30 km. Hundreds of settlements were destroyed almost to the ground or buried under tons of earth with the help of heavy equipment. If we consider the sphere with confidence, we can say that Ukraine at that time lost five million hectares of fertile soil.
Before the accident, the reactor of the fourth power unit contained almost 190 tons of fuel, 30% of which was released into the environment during the explosion. In addition, at that time, various radioactive isotopes accumulated during operation were in the active phase. It was they who, according to experts, represented the greatest danger.
Over 200,000 sq. km of surrounding land was contaminated with radiation. The deadly radiation spread like an aerosol, gradually settling on the surface of the earth. Pollution of the territories then mainly depended only on those regions, in which it rained on April 26, 1986 and the next few weeks.
Who is to blame for what happened?
In April 1987, a court session was held in Chernobyl. One of the main culprits at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant was recognized as the director of the station, a certain V. Bryukhanov, who initially neglected the elementary safety rules. Subsequently, this person deliberately underestimated the data on the level of radiation, did not put into effect an evacuation plan for workers and the local population.
Also, along the way, facts of gross neglect of their official duties were discovered on April 26, 1986 by the chief engineer of the Chernobyl N. Fomin and his deputy A. Dyatlov. All of them were sentenced to 10 years in prison.
The head of the same shift at which the accident happened (B. Rogozhkin) was sentenced to another five years, A. Kovalenko, his deputy, to three, and Yu. Laushkin, state inspector of Gosatomenergonadzor, to two.
At first glance, this may seem cruel enough, but if all these people had shown great caution in working at such a dangerous enterprise as the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the catastrophe on April 26, 1986 would hardly have happened.
Alert and evacuate the population
The expert commission claims that after the accident, the first thing to do was to immediately evacuate the population, but no one took the responsibility to make the necessary decisions. Had the opposite happened then, human casualties could have been tens or even hundreds of times less.
In practice, it turned out that people did not know anything about what had happened all day. On April 26, 1986, someone was working on a personal plot, someone was preparing the city for the upcoming kindergarten kids walking on the street, and schoolchildren, as if nothing had happened, were doing physical education in the fresh, as it seemed to them, air.
Work on the removal of the population began only at night, when an official order was issued to prepare for evacuation. On April 27, a directive was announced on the complete evacuation of the city, scheduled for 14.00.
So the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the disaster on April 26, 1986, which deprived many thousands of Ukrainians of their homes, turned the modest satellite town of Pripyat into a terrible ghost with devastated parks and squares and dead, deserted streets.
Panic and provocation
When the first rumors about the accident passed, part of the population decided to leave the city on their own. Already on April 26, 1986, closer to the second half of the day, many women in panic and despair, picking up babies in their arms, literally ran along the road away from the city.
Everything would be fine, but it was done through the forest, the dose of pollution of which actually many times exceeded all permissible indicators. And the road... According to eyewitnesses, the asphalt pavement shone with some strange neon tint, although they tried to fill it with plenty of water mixed with some white solution unknown to a simple layman.
It is very unfortunate that serious decisions on the rescue and evacuation of the population were not made in time.
And, finally, only a few years later it turned out that the secret services of the Soviet Union were aware of the procurement of three tons of meat and fifteen tons of butter in the territories that were directly affected by the Chernobyl tragedy on April 26, 1986. Despite this, they decided to recycle radioactive products, adding relatively pure components to them. In accordance with the decision taken, this radioactive meat and butter was transported to many large plants in the country.
The KGB also knew for sure that during the construction of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, defective equipment from Yugoslavia was used, it was also familiar with various kinds of miscalculations in the design of the station, the delamination of the foundation and the presence of cracks in the walls ...
What was done anyway? Attempts to prevent more grief
At about half past one in the night in the city of Chernobyl (1986, April 26), the local fire department received a signal about a fire. The guard on duty went to the call and almost immediately transmitted a high-complexity fire signal.
Upon arrival, the special team saw that the roof of the engine room and the huge reactor room were on fire. By the way, today it has been established that when extinguishing that terrible fire, the guys who were engaged in the reactor hall suffered the most.
Only at 6 o'clock in the morning the fire was completely extinguished.
In total, 14 vehicles and 69 employees were involved. Of the overalls, people who carried out such an important mission had only canvas overalls, a helmet and mittens. The men put out the fire without gas masks, since it was simply impossible to work in them at high temperatures.
Already at two o'clock in the morning the first victims of radiation appeared. People began to experience severe vomiting and general weakness, as well as the so-called "nuclear sunburn". It is said that some of the skin of the hands was removed along with the mittens.
Desperate firefighters did their best to prevent the fire from reaching the third block and beyond. The station staff, however, began extinguishing local fires in various areas of the station and took all necessary measures to prevent a hydrogen explosion. These actions helped prevent an even greater man-made disaster.
Biological consequences for all mankind
Ionizing radiation, when it hits all living organisms, has a detrimental biological effect.
Radiation radiation leads to the destruction of biological matter, mutations, changes in the structure of organ tissues. Such irradiation contributes to the development of various types of oncological disorders of the vital functions of the body, changes and decay of DNA, and as a result leads to death.
A ghost town called Pripyat
For several years following the man-made disaster, this settlement aroused the interest of various kinds of specialists. They came here en masse, trying to measure and analyze the level of the contaminated territory.
However, in the 90s. Pripyat began to attract more and more attention from scientists interested in environmental changes in the environment, as well as the transformation of the natural zone of the city, which was completely left without anthropogenic influence.
Many Ukrainian research centers have been assessing the changes in flora and fauna in the city.
Stalkers of the Chernobyl zone
First of all, it is worth noting that stalkers are people who, by hook or by crook, penetrate the exclusion zone. Chernobyl fans of extreme sports are conditionally divided into two categories, distinguished by their appearance, slang used, photographs and prepared reports. The first - curious, the second - ideological.
Agree, now you can really find a lot of information in the media
The Chernobyl tragedy is a sad lesson for mankind. The most grandiose man-made disaster occurred on April 26, 1986, at the 4th block of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in a small satellite town called Pripyat. An unthinkable amount of deadly radioactive substances was in the air. In some places, the level of radiation pollution is thousands of times higher than the standard background radiation. it became clear that after the explosion there would be a different world here - land where you can’t sow, rivers where you can’t swim and fish, and houses ... where you can’t live
Already an hour after the explosion, the radiation situation in Pripyat was obvious. No measures were taken because of the emergency: people had no idea what to do. According to the instructions and orders that have been in place for 25 years, the decision to evacuate the population from the affected area was to be taken by the local authorities. By the time the Government Commission arrived, it was already possible to evacuate all the inhabitants of Pripyat, even on foot. But no one dared to take on such responsibility (for example, the Swedes first of all took all the people out of the zone of their power plant, and only then they undertook to find out that the release did not occur at their plant). In the morning, April 26, all the roads of Chernobyl were flooded with water and an incomprehensible white solution, everything was white, all the roadsides. Many policemen were drawn into the city. But they did nothing - they just settled down at the objects: the post office, the palace of culture. Everywhere people were walking, small children, there was a strong heat, people went to the beach, to summer cottages, to go fishing, to rest on the river near the cooling pond - an artificial reservoir near the nuclear power plant.
The first talk about the evacuation of Pripyat appeared on Saturday evening. And at one o'clock in the morning an instruction was issued - to prepare documents for evacuation in 2 hours. On April 27, a directive was published: "Comrades, due to the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the evacuation of the city is announced. Have documents, necessary things and, if possible, food for 3 days with you. The evacuation begins at 14:00." Imagine a convoy of several thousand buses with burning headlights, moving along the highway in 2 rows and taking out the entire population of Pripyat from the radiation zone - women, the elderly, adults and newborn babies. Columns of buses drove west, towards the village of Polessky, Ivanovo districts, neighboring Chernobyl. So Pripyat turned into a ghost town
View of the ruined Chernobyl
The evacuation of Pripyat was carried out in an organized and precise manner, almost all the evacuees showed restraint. But how can one describe the irresponsibility shown in relation to the population, when during the day before the evacuation they did not say anything, did not forbid children to walk along the streets. And the schoolchildren, not suspecting anything, ran around on Saturday at breaks? Was it really impossible to save them, to forbid them to be on the street? Would anyone condemn politicians for such reinsurance?
Is it surprising that in such a situation of hiding information, some people, succumbing to rumors, decided to leave along the road leading through the "Red Forest" near Chernobyl. Witnesses recalled how women with children were moving along this road, which was practically glowing from radiation. Be that as it may, it is already clear that the mechanism for making the most important decisions directly related to the preservation of people has not withstood a serious test.
Later it was revealed that the USSR secret services were aware that after the catastrophe in the radiation zone of Chernobyl, 3.2 thousand tons of meat and 15 tons of butter would be prepared. The decision they made can hardly be called anything other than criminal: "... the meat is to be processed into canned food with the addition of pure meat. ... to be sold after long-term storage and repeated radiometric control through the public catering network."
During the processing of livestock from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, it turned out that some of this meat contains radioactive substances in huge quantities, significantly exceeding the maximum norms ... And in order to avoid a large accumulation of radioactive substances in the human body from eating contaminated food, the USSR Ministry of Health ordered as much as possible disperse this meat more throughout the country ... master its processing at meat processing plants in remote regions of the Russian Federation (excluding Moscow), Moldova, Transcaucasia, the Baltic States, Kazakhstan and Central Asia 
Later it turned out that the KGB controlled everything. The secret services knew that during the construction of Chernobyl defective Yugoslav equipment was used (the same defect was supplied to the Smolensk nuclear power plant). A few years before the explosion, KGB reports pointed to flaws in the design of the station, cracks in the walls and delamination of the foundation ...
In 2006, the American research organization Blacksmith Institute published a list of the most polluted places on the planet, in which Chernobyl was in the top ten. As you can see, four places in the top ten are cities of the former Soviet Union
- Sumgayit, Azerbaijan
- Linfeng, China
- Tianying, China
- Sukinda, India
- Vapi, India
- La Oroya, Peru
- Dzerzhinsk, Russia
- Norilsk, Russia
- Chernobyl, Ukraine
- Kabwe, Zambia
On the night of April 25-26, 1986, the world's largest nuclear man-made disaster occurred - the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant
The Chernobyl accident is one of the most horrific examples of the danger that nuclear power can pose if it is not kept under constant control. However, the accident itself could have turned into something much more terrible if not for the actions of three people.
Probably everyone heard that after the accident at the nuclear power plant in Chernobyl, firefighters pumped out heavy radioactive water from under the reactor, and the widest sections of the public became aware of this heroic deed.
But few people know that before the water was pumped out, it had to be drained from the solid concrete box in which it was located. But how to do it? After all, the exhaust hatches were under a thick layer of radioactive water.
The second explosion was inevitable!
Few people know about the threat of a second explosion of a nuclear reactor, this information was not replicated for a long time, the possible consequences were too horrifying. A new round of the tragedy unfolded on the fifth day after the first explosion, then it became clear: if decisive action is not taken, the catastrophe will claim even more lives and lead to the pollution of large areas in Russia, Ukraine and Europe.
After the accident, when the fire was brought down, the reactor became hot. It seemed to be in a suspended state, having under it the so-called barbater pool, which, as a result of the destruction of the pipelines of the cooling system, was filled with water. To limit the impact of radiation from above, as is already known, the reactor was sealed with a giant cork made of sand, lead, dolomite, boron and other materials. And this is an additional burden. Will the red-hot reactor withstand it? If not, then the whole colossus will collapse into the water. And then? - No one in the world has ever given an answer to such a question, what can happen. And here it had to be given immediately.
The temperature of the explosion was so high that the reactor (containing 185 tons of nuclear fuel) continued to melt at an incredible rate, getting closer and closer to the water tank that was used as a coolant. It was obvious: if a red-hot reactor comes into contact with water, then a powerful steam explosion will form.
It was necessary to urgently find out about the amount of water in the pool, to establish its radioactivity, to decide how to divert it from under the reactor. These issues were resolved in the shortest possible time. Hundreds of fire trucks participated in this operation, diverting water to a special safe place. But calmness did not come - the water in the pool remained. There was only one way to release her from there - to open two valves that were under a layer of radioactive water. If we add to this that in the barbater pool, which looked like a huge bathtub after the accident, there was pitch darkness, if the approaches leading to it are narrow and also dark, and there is a high level of radiation around, then it becomes clear what people had to go to who were to carry out this work.
They volunteered themselves - B. Baranov, shift supervisor of the Chernobyl plant, V. Bespalov, senior control engineer of the turbine shop unit number two, and A. Ananenko, senior mechanical engineer of the reactor shop number two. The roles were distributed as follows: Alexey Ananenko knows the places of the valves and will take on one, the second will show Valery Bespalov. Boris Baranov will help them with light.
The operation has begun. All three were dressed in wetsuits. We had to work in respirators.
Here is the story of Alexei Ananenko:
We thought about everything in advance so as not to linger on the spot and meet the minimum time. They took dosimeters, flashlights. We were informed about the radiation situation both above and in the water. We went along the corridor to the barbater pool. Darkness is total. They walked in the beams of lanterns. There was also water in the hallway. Where space allowed, they moved in dashes. Sometimes the light went out, they acted by touch. And here's a miracle - under the arms of the damper. Tried to turn - gives in. My heart skipped a beat with joy. And you can’t say anything - in a respirator. Showed Valery another. And he succumbed to the valve. A few minutes later, a characteristic noise or splash was heard - the water went.
There are other memories on this topic:
"... Academicians E.P. Velikhov and V.A. Legasov * CONvinced * the Government Commission of the possibility of another cataclysm - a steam explosion of catastrophic power, from burning the reactor base plate with molten fuel and getting this melt into water-filled B-B (under-reactor premises of two-storey bubble pools). According to academicians, calculations show that this explosion can completely destroy the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and cover all of Europe with radioactive materials. There is only one way to prevent an explosion - you need to drain the water from the sub-reactor bubble pools (if it is there, and did not evaporate during the fire after fuel poisoning, which was on the evening of April 26 - on the night of April 27).
In order to check the presence of water in the B-B, the workers of the Chernobyl NPP opened a valve on the tube of the impulse line coming out of the B-B. They opened it - there was no water in the tube, on the contrary - the tube began to draw air towards the pools. This fact did not convince scientists of anything, they continued to demand more weighty evidence of the absence of water in B-B. The government commission set the task for the leadership of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant - to find and indicate to the military such a place in the B-B wall (and this is 180 cm of the strongest reinforced concrete), in which it would be possible to make a hole to drain the water using the explosion method. How dangerous this explosion could be for the building of the destroyed reactor, there was no information. On the night of May 4, this order reached the deputy chief engineer of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, Alexander Smyshlyaev, who immediately forwarded it to Igor Kazachkov, shift supervisor of unit No. 3. Kazachkov replied that breaking through a nearly two-meter wall in conditions of increased radiation is not the best way to dehydrate pools, and that he will look for a more gentle option. Having looked at the technological schemes, I. Kazachkov decided to investigate the possibility of opening two valves on the B-B emptying lines. He took a flashlight, a DP-5 dosing device and, together with the operator M. Kastrygin, went to the valve room. The room was flooded by about 1.5 meters with radioactive water with a DER over 200 r/h (the gauge needle went off scale), but the valves themselves were intact, because the explosion did not reach these rooms and did not destroy anything. Returning, the shift supervisor reported to Smyshlyaev that without pumping water from the pipeline corridor, it would not be possible to open the drain valves. But in any case, it will be easier to pump out the “dirty” water than to blow up the B-B wall.
Yes, and radioactivity in the semi-flooded basement floors of the station will decrease sharply. The proposal of Igor Ivanovich Kazachkov was accepted. On the morning of May 5, the Government Commission sent to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant a team of military and firefighters, which had long been preparing to pump out the basements, led by Pyotr Pavlovich Zborovsky, captain of the civil defense troops (civil defense). From the Chernobyl NPP, at the initial stage of preparing the operation in early May, he was assisted by V.K. Bronnikov, who at that time acted as chief engineer ...
When its level near the drain valves B-B under unit No. 4 dropped to about 50 cm, senior engineers A. Ananenko and V. Bespalov went to them, by order of the head of the reactor shop V. Grishchenko. They were accompanied by B. Baranov, head of the station shift. Dressed in diving suits, with lanterns and adjustable wrenches in their hands, they reached the valves, checked the numbers by marking. Boris Baranov stood on the insurance, and Alexei Ananenko and Valery Bespalov manually began to open the drain lines. This took about 15 minutes. The noise of the water draining from the lower floor of the pool convinced them that they had achieved the desired result. Returning after completing the task, they checked their dosimeters (they were given DKP-50 optical dosimeters, military-style “pencils”), they had 10 annual norms.
."
Returning, Alexei Ananenko gave an interview to the Soviet media. There was not the slightest sign that the man had received a lethal dose of radiation poisoning. But none of the daredevils managed to escape their fate.
Many sources indicate that Alexei and Valery died ten days later in a Moscow hospital. Boris lived a little longer. All three were buried in tightly sealed zinc coffins. However
A few months later, it was determined that the molten lava could indeed set fire to the reactor. Soviet scientists suggested that the possible area of pollution could reach 200 square meters. km, modern experts tend to argue that it would take about 500 thousand years to eliminate the consequences of radioactive contamination from a potential explosion.
So these three almost certainly saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of people across Europe.
But almost no one knows about their sacrifice ...
Valery Bespalov was still working at the Chernobyl plant in 2008: http://www.webcitation.org/6dhjGCHFo
Oleksiy Ananeko is currently Director for Institutional Development of the Ukrainian Nuclear Forum Association: http://www.webcitation.org/6dhhLLaZu
By the way, here is a fairly recent interview with Alexei Ananenko about those events: http://www.souzchernobyl.org/?id=2440
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I can tell you more about it, but here's how it went