What Happened After the Chernobyl Disaster?

This is the second part of a two part series of blog posts, where we take a look at the fascinating story surrounding the Chernobyl disaster and the physical, cultural and scientific effects it had on humanity. If you haven’t read the first part, I encourage you to do so before reading this one.

Picking up where we left off last time: the second explosion had just erupted, and the firefighters had been called. All the fires from the accident were contained within roughly 6 hours, however, the severity of the situation was far from depleted. If it wasn’t for a group of three brave volunteers, known as the “suicide squad”, Chernobyl’s impact could have been much, much worse.

In early May, Reactor 4’s core was still melting down: there was a smouldering flow of molten radioactive metal (like “lava”) slowly burning through the ground. Now the Soviets were actually aware of this, however addressing it was not at the top of their priority list, as they believed that any impact it may have would not happen for a while, and when it did, may not be that significant. However, they had totally disregarded something: there was a huge pool of water below the melting reactor. This was a mix of the coolant for the power plant, and the water used by the firefighters to extinguish the fires. If this “lava” was to come in to contact with this water, it would have triggered a second steam explosion, resulting in the destruction of the entire power station, including the three other reactors… a mega explosion which could have wiped out half of Europe, leaving it risky to live in for 500,000 years.

So, the question the now petrified Soviets were posed with was: “how do we prevent the lava reaching the water pool”. The obvious answer they came to was to drain the pool. But the problem was that the valves were completely submerged in radioactive water.

Eventually, firefighters were able to use specialised hoses to drain much of the water, leaving it at about knee-height in most areas. Then, just as heroically as in the popular accounts of this story, three plant workers volunteered to equip wet suits and go and turn the valves manually. Alexei Ananenko, Valeri Bezpalov and Boris Baranov. Those three men may be the reason you are still alive today.

The amount of radiation they were likely to receive deemed it a suicide mission, hence the name of the group. They were promised that if they were to succumb to acute radiation syndrome, their families would be supported in their absence.

It was no simple mission, wading through knee-height radioactive water in almost pitch-black, looking for a set of specific valves in a corridor stuffed with them. But incredibly, they managed it. Alexei Ananenko said in an interview with the Soviet press, “When the searchlight beam fell on the pipe, we were joyous”. He continued, “it led to the valves … we heard a rush of water of the tank … and in a few more minutes we were being embraced by the guys”.

The bravery and courage these men had is nothing short of miraculous, and they should be remembered. And following the theme of miracles (and contradicting popular accounts), all three men survived, two of which are still alive today!

The aftermath

So, one of the biggest questions you may have (or potentially know the answer to already), is what was the impact of Chernobyl. Well, it claimed at least 9,000 lives. Now the words “at least” are extremely important in that sentence. It is incredibly difficult to measure the affect of the radiation released from Chernobyl. The primary way it will have taken lives, is through the causation of a malignant cancer, which in turn will have killed the host. Therefore, there is no definitive way of telling whether those dying of cancer have got that cancer through radiation, or one of many other causes. However, we know for a fact that the incident released over 400 times the amount of radiation as the Hiroshima bomb in 1945, and much of that radiation did get carried a substantial distance away from Chernobyl. No one will ever be able to put an exact number to the number of deaths, but some predict that tens if not hundreds of thousands have got cancer as a result. Medical impacts aside, there is no doubt the inside affected millions in various ways.

Radioactive particles contaminated the atmosphere and rained down on cities, forests and roads. Consequently, the Soviets had to find a way to sterilise as much as possible, put out fires, clear debris, clear contaminated waste. And they did just that. For all of the stick you may give the Soviets for allowing such an incident to happen, they have done an excellent job at covering their mess.

They sent in roughly 600,000 so called “liquidators” to clean up the situation. They comprised of firefighters, soldiers, janitors, miners and so on. The jobs involved felling trees, hosing down streets, destroying contaminated animals and building a huge concrete sarcophagus over the exposed reactor. They must be truly commended for what they did, for not only did they put an end to Chernobyl’s devastation, but they did it all whilst knowing that they were being irradiated and having their life spans shortened.

Chernobyl today

35 years later, is Chernobyl safe to visit? Although the immediate area surrounding Chernobyl won’t be officially be deemed “habitable” for 20,000 years, the worst has long since been over. In fact, some people do live relatively close, and have done for many years — they are fortunate enough to not have succumbed to acute radiation syndrome.

You can actually now get tours to visit the power plant, and Pripyat. And if you do decide to go on one of these tours, you actually don’t really have to worry about the radiation. If you travel along the paths, the most radiation you will encounter will be the same as background radiation we get at home (0.17 micro sieverts). However, if you decide to stray a bit into the forest, which the guide will probably take you through, the radiation will probably be doubled (0.34 micro sieverts). This is still 10 times less than the radiation you’ll encounter on the plane journey you took to get there.

Some visitable spots around Pripyat or the power plant can reach radiation levels much higher. However, scientists say that at these spots, you’d have to be constantly exposed to that radiation for 20,000 hours — which is a bit over 2 years. So yes, if you are living in Chernobyl for a few years you will get a high dose of radiation and it will be very dangerous, but for a 30 minute tour, there is nothing to fear.

It is not possible to go inside some parts of reactor 4, as the radiation levels still are dangerously high. Most tours only let you view the reactor from 200 metres away. Furthermore, when you leave Chernobyl, you will be scanned for radiation and then recommended to have a shower that night (just as a precaution).

Weighing 36,000 tonnes, the construction of the Chernobyl New Safe Confinement was completed in 2019 and costed 2.1 billion euros. It has an expected minimum lifetime of 100 years.

And on that note, we reach the present day. I hope you enjoyed reading this two part series of blog posts as much as I enjoyed writing them. I feel there are many lessons to be learned, and mistakes that must not be made a gain. It was Einstein who introduced the massive potential of nuclear energy with his most famous equation, E = mc². But, Einstein himself said that he would “have never lifted a finger” on nuclear energy if he didn’t feel had to, for he knew the danger it posed to humanity.

Originally published at http://thephysicsfootprint.com on February 14, 2022.