Chernobyl

Its so funny how post nuclear fallout type games increase in our perceptive value based on our overall understanding of radiation and ARS. Ive thoroughly enjoyed Fallout again.

Participant liquidation consequences accident on AES (Atomic Energy Station) Chernobyl

Badge also says Lenin and Len M.D. for leningrad military district

agripa said:

Graphite was used as a neutron moderator for the RBMK reactor. When the core exploded all of the graphite was from inside the core and contained a crazy amount of radiation. You could not build a dome over the reactor while the graphite rock was still emitting radiation on the rooftops.

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Thanks! So they plan to just build a dome over the reactor and not the entire complex? Was that clearly said at some point?
It's a great show but they skimp on these details which to me just brings on more questions with each step.

nisser said:

Thanks! So they plan to just build a dome over the reactor and not the entire complex? Was that clearly said at some point?
It's a great show but they skimp on these details which to me just brings on more questions with each step.

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It's 2019 and they STILL haven't completed the concrete coffin that's meant to encase the exposed core material.

Gavinmad said:

It's 2019 and they STILL haven't completed the concrete coffin that's meant to encase the exposed core material.

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The new confinement shelter has been rolled into place. They're finishing the airtight seals before decommissioning the OLD sarcophagus that was finished in the early 90's.


The old sarcophagus was designed to last 30 years. It's close but most of the work is done. The new shelter is like a modern marvel.

The new shelter is more permanent. The old sarcophagus was designed to last AT LEAST 30 years for one specific reason: the half-life of Caesium-137, which is where much of the airborne contamination came from is 30ish years.

The area's not fatal but still not THAT safe. The soviets brute-force decontaminated as much as they could, but under the old sarcophagus the core is still one of the most dangerous places on the planet....plus the old shelter was already starting to be compromised and allowing rainwater to leak into the exposed core, which would then irradiate it 10,000 roentgens before it seeped into the ground.

Friend was there ehh maybe 3 years ago, I stopped traveling so much with him and settled back in the US, Ukraine at the time was definitely not in my short list. I'll see if i can find a picture I care to use.

done

brekk said:

Episode 5 will get into the Sarcophagus.

They couldn't seal the entire site as the other 3 reactors remained in use. Last one went offline in the year 2000. No I'm not joking.

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Was that explained clearly in the show? I guess that's my one beef with the show is that a lot of stuff is glossed over expecting the watchers to have been wiki wizards and have this knowledge beforehand. They could have cut down on the 40 min of dog killing to clear up some of these things. The entire scene with dead people kicking debris into the reactor left me puzzled.

nisser said:

Was that explained clearly in the show? I guess that's my one beef with the show is that a lot of stuff is glossed over expecting the watchers to have been wiki wizards and have this knowledge beforehand. They could have cut down on the 40 min of dog killing to clear up some of these things. The entire scene with dead people kicking debris into the reactor left me puzzled.

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I think ep 5 should be about Legasov going to Vienna and outting the Soviet cover-ups...the shitshow he gets from that and how Chernobyl whistle-blowers like him ironically led to Gorbachev accelerating Glasnost which eventually ended the cold war. But not before Legasov killed himself.

I wonder if they'll throw in a couple extra twists since it was Russian leakers who tipped off the IAEA's Hans Blix, and not Eastern Germans or Ukrainians as previously believed.

What Dom said is kind of confusing to me too, how was any human able to take a picture next to the corium deposit?

I understand decay and half life to an extent, so perhaps 10 or 20 years later the radiation levels arent as severe. Why then is the site still highly radioactive?

You would think that if the corium isnt as deadly, then most of the surrounding area is also less lethal. But then there is the fact that Pripyat will be uninhabitable for 20000 years at the very least?

So many questions this show has brought forward.

It primarily has to do with how contaminated the object is in terms of radiation exposure/absorption and what the half life of that radioactive contamination is. That is part of the reason why some areas in Pripyat/etc are considered "safe" for short term exposure 30+ years after the fact, but there are parts even now where if you spend any amount of time near, you'll be in for a very bad day.

There was a vehicle graveyard close by the plant as all that gear was polluted after it was used in the area for the cleanup. They only moved it all out in 2015 as the stuff was too radioactive. I remember reading that it was one of the major no go areas in the exclusion zone for a while when people first started illegally visiting it back in the early 2000s.

One thing that always freaked me out is you can be perfectly safe in one area and walk 5 feet off a path or something and you're in some badass radiation.


Used to look like this:



Satellite: