Chernobyl

The event that inspired nesting hawks and far too many video games.

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Chernobyl (Чернобыль) (Ukrainian spelling Chornobyl (Чорнобиль)) is a city in Ukraine with a population of about zero. It's often conflated with Pripyat, which has a population of even fewer people.

When the V.I. Lenin Nuclear Power Station was built nearby in the 1970s, it became known as the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. And when it exploded in 1986, it became known as the Chernobyl disaster.

Spelling note

"Chernobyl" (Чернобыль) is the Russian form of the name, while "Chornobyl" (Чорно́биль) is the Ukrainian one. At the time of the accident, Russian was the dominant language due to its status as a lingua franca of the Soviet sphere of influence, so most writings related to the accident use the Russian transliteration. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Ukrainian was declared the official language of Ukraine, and so "Chornobyl" is more correct when referring to the present-day deserted town, especially in light of spelling reform campaigns such as KyivNotKiev. Another common spelling is "Tschernobyl," which is used in German.

Nuclear disaster

The Chernobyl disaster is remembered as the most devastating nuclear accident to have ever occurred, and is often used as fuel for the anti-nuclear movement. On 26 April 1986, as a result of a poorly thought-out experiment, Reactor #4 suffered an uncontrolled power surge.

First, a brief note on nuclear physics. As radioactive material such as Uranium decays, various particles are released. If neutrons are absorbed by other Uranium atoms, those atoms become unstable and release more particles as well. Under normal circumstances, this process isn't self-sustaining but rather "sub-critical", and most of those neutrons will escape. For example, 100 atoms decaying will only only cause another 20 to decay, and then four or so, etc. This rate of reaction can be altered through various means, such as changing the density or shape of the Uranium fuel or adding and removing other materials. A "moderator" acts to slow down neutrons, which increases the chance of them being absorbed by the Uranium, thus speeding up this reaction, whereas a "neutron absorber" or "poison" absorbs the neutrons instead, slowing the rate of reaction. A reaction rate of one is self-sustaining or "critical", 100 atoms will decay, causing 100 more to decay, and another 100, and so on. Above this is "super critical", e.g., a reaction rate of 1.1 will mean 100 atoms decaying will cause 110 atoms to decay, which causes 121, then 133, then 146, and so on. Control rods contain absorbers and slow it down. By adjusting the moderators and absorbers in the core, it can be brought below or above critical as needed to alter the rate of decay and thus heat production.

Note that even while a core is "sub-critical", it is still producing a lot of heat, and only the rate of how much heat is generated is slowing down. Like most conventional power sources, nuclear power plants consume a bit of energy while producing it as well, mostly to pump the water through the system, but also to run the computers and switches and so forth. In the event of a power failure or other accident (e.g., a powerline collapsing due to a storm), control rods would go into place and backup diesel generators would be turned on to pump cooling water through the reactor. But diesel generators don't turn on instantaneously, and in the crucial minute between power failure and the diesel generators, the reactors could overheat and possibly suffer damage or a meltdown. However, there is still residual mechanical energy in the whole system that in theory could be redirected. For instance, the turbines themselves are still spinning, and this energy could be redirected to the pumps, and there would theoretically be enough energy to run the pumps until the diesel generators are online. Something the managers of the Chernobyl power plant wanted to test.

However, the test required a specific set of conditions to be performed safely. Due to other needs and electricity demands from other industries, the plant was forced to delay the test until the middle of the night, when an entirely different crew took over–an inexperienced crew who hadn't even been briefed on the test in the first place. To force the test through, the power was dropped too low for too long to cool off. But as every good nuclear engineer knows, one of the elements generated from nuclear reactions is Xenon, which happens to be a neutron absorber. This effectively reducing the rate of reactions, causing the core to remain sub-critical in spite of everything else being in place. This is a problem that's been known since the development of the atomic bombs, and under normal operating conditions, nuclear power plants simply "burn" away the Xenon as quickly as it is produced. To properly deal with Xenon poisoning, a good crew would have to restart the plant and slowly bring the core to critical and carefully burn off the Xenon, a process that usually takes a full day to do safely. But the current crew needed that test done ASAP, so to try to bring the core to critical again, they pulled out almost all of the control rods. This seemed to work, and the core finally returned to critical... and then the Xenon burnt off all at once. So the core almost instantaneously went from being critical to deep into supercritical territory, and probably reached a point where no crew whatsoever could have prevented a meltdown. But a local disaster was about to be made into an international catastrophe. The crew hit the equivalent of the "SCRAM" button to drop all the control rods back into place, which would've worked except for two issues. First, the tips were made of graphite, which is a moderator and thus actually increases the reactivity rate for a short moment before the rest of the rod moves into place. Second, the shear amount of heat that was in the system caused the rods to expand and jam with the graphite tips stuck in the worst possible place...

Seconds later, the pressure tubes of the reactor ruptured, exposing the molten fuel and the graphite moderators to the air, which instantly caught fire and possibly caused a secondary explosion (although this wasn't confirmed). Both the explosion(s) and the consequent fire released 50 tons of radioactive particles into the atmosphere that eventually spread outside of the USSR, releasing 400 times more radiation than the Hiroshima Bomb. A number of fireman and other rescue workers raced to the power plant; they made up the majority of the initial casualties.

Over the next six months, 200 tons of radioactive materials were sealed inside of a 300,000-ton shelter called the Sarcophogus, which was made from steel and concrete. Its construction claimed the lives of 30 workers.

30 years later, the previous containment structure was falling apart. 300 metres away from the reactor, where radiation levels are low enough for builders, they constructed two halves of a giant steel arch taller than Big Ben mounted on two concrete runways, and slid together the largest structure ever moved across land at 36,000 tons, sealing the previous containment facility within it. Inside the dome are attached two giant robotic cranes with ventilation and control systems that began the years-long dismantling of the reactor in what is easily the most impressive crane game in history.

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  Reactor 4 shortly after the explosion.

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  Decontamination team at the Chernobyl site.

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  Spraying decontamination fluid near the reactor.

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  Dust cleanup on the roof of the third and fourth power units.

There is some controversy over the exact causes placement of blame. The direct cause of the explosion was the experiment that the reactor operators attempted to conduct — cooling the reactor using the kinetic energy of the turbine rotors after an emergency shutdown. The underlying cause of the explosion was the poor design of the reactor (inserting control rods with graphite tips which initially intensified the nuclear reaction instead of halting it) and the power plant itself (there was no containment building around each reactor, which allowed the fire to spread the particles into the atmosphere).

Effects

Medals issued to the "Liquidators", or cleanup crew

As a result of graphite fire, radioactive particles were spread around the globe, which is how the world found out — glasnost having not really taken off yet. The first official account of a minor problem was doubted when increased levels of radiation caused an alarm at the Forsmark nuclear power plant in Sweden.

Firefighters and other first responders were not fully aware of the danger they were in. Although they were trained on the dangers of radiation and how to deal with radiological emergencies, as would be expected from a resident fire brigade at a nuclear power station, they initially did not realize the full extent of the accident; most of them assumed it was a turbine explosion or a small fire. 237 emergency workers suffered from acute radiation poisoning, and 28 of them died in less than 3 months.

The "atomic city" of Pripyat (population about 50,000) that housed the power plant employees and the nearby regional capital of Chernobyl (population of 15,000) were evacuated. It is often said that personal belongings were left in the city until being looted recently, but this is not true; the residents were allowed to collect their belongings in an organized manner once the area was decontaminated. Only large low-value objects, such as beds, were left behind. However, almost nothing was taken from public buildings such as the hospital. The Soviets didn't acknowledge or even warn the public about the incident until 36 hours later. Massive parades in nearby cities were held as scheduled on 1 May. Some Soviet officials later admitted their lack of competence and attempts to "avoid panic".

Nowadays, the remnants of the reactor are covered with a steel structure officially called "Object Shelter" but commonly known as the "sarcophagus." A popular misconception is that the sarcophagus is made from concrete. Actually, only the "stairs" on the north side are concrete, and the rest is assembled from steel elements resting on large steel support beams. The plates are not welded to the beams, as this was impossible due to high radiation. An exclusion zone has been established around the Chernobyl plant, where settlement and all economic activity is forbidden. There were three more reactors at the site which continued to be operated for some time after the accident. The last one was shut down in 2000.

The consensus report of the Chernobyl Forum, a collaboration of 8 UN agencies and the governments of Ukraine, Belarus and Russia, projects the disaster will eventually cause a total of 4,000 additional cancer fatalities, and suggests that psychological impacts caused by fear of radiation combined with inappropriate emergency response were a bigger cause of suffering than radiation itself. This conclusion is extremely at odds with the worldview of anti-nuclear activists, who often attack the report and single out the World Health Organization from the collaborating agencies for alleged collusion with the nuclear industry or the IAEA. Several alternative "counter-reports" were also published.

On the positive side, Chernobyl has become an unlikely wildlife sanctuary due to the lack of human presence, and the animals that thrive there are mostly surprisingly normal. While a few parts of Chernobyl have suffered greatly such as the Red Forest, even the most contaminated parts have vastly diverse wildlife where Lake Hlybloke, the most contaminated waterway in the world has greater species diversity than any other Chernobyl lake. Gray wolves flourish especially in the exclusion zone and are in the process of spreading from the zone.

Russia shits on the bed

“”We will restore everything. It will all work again. But this is as if someone came to your house, saw that everything is well and beautiful, and therefore shits on your white bed. They are jealous that we can do something.

During Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Russia military captured and occupied Chernobyl for one month. According to Ukraine, the Russian military looted 44 vehicles, 1500 radiation dosimeters, and destroyed irreplaceable computer software that was custom built for monitoring the site, an estimated $135 million in losses, all of which are war crimes. Tracking information indicates that some of the equipment is nearby on the Belarusian side of the border and some has moved within Belarus. Nine civilian employees were killed and five were kidnapped by Russian forces, also war crimes.

Wormwood "revelations"

“”And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters; And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter.

—Revelation 8:10-11, KJV

Certain Christians and other woo supporters who would know better if they looked things up outside the Bible claim that "Chornobyl" is Ukrainian for "wormwood." This is to fit the disaster into the Revelation of John, a series of hallucinations claimed to be a prophecy of the end times.

While "wormwood" may refer to any plant in the genus Artemisia the word used in the Book of Revelation (αψίνθιον, apsinthion, or άψινθος, apsinthos) most probably refers to absinthe wormwood, Artemisia absinthium. "Chornobyl" (literally "black plant" or "black grass") is Ukrainian for mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris), a plant different from wormwood both in appearance and symbolism.

The wormwood claim was first made by one Serge Schmemann in the New York Times a few months after the disaster, citing "a prominent Russian writer" — who, curiously, has never come forward since, or been named by Schmemann. Funny, that.

See also

• Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment
• Fear of radiation
• Fukushima I
• WHO-IAEA conspiracy

External links

• Chernobyl Nuclear Accident Government Documents - CIA, Department of Defense, Department of Energy, Congressional, GAO, and Foreign Press Monitoring Files
• Hilliont Chernobyl - photo gallery including shots from inside the sarcophagus and from its construction
• Chernobyl's arch: Sealing off a radioactive sarcophagus - on the New Safe Confinement
• At Chernobyl, Hints of Nature’s Adaptation, The New York Times
• Postcards from Pripyat, Chernobyl - footage today of Pripyat and Chernobyl, taken by a drone.