Twenty years ago today, one of the reactors at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in the Ukraine exploded.
The accident happened at one of four reactors at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, 110km (70 miles) north of the capital, Kiev.
Throughout most of the following day the Soviet authorities refused to admit anything out of the ordinary had occurred.
It was only two weeks after the explosion, when radiation releases had tailed off, that the first Soviet official gave a frank account, speaking of the “possibility of a catastrophe”.
Official UN figures predicted up to 9,000 Chernobyl-related cancer deaths. But a Greenpeace report released last week estimated a figure of 93,000. Greenpeace said other illnesses could bring the toll up to 200,000.
A restricted area with a radius of 30km (19 miles) remains in force around the destroyed nuclear reactor which is encased in concrete.
The reactor is encased in concrete, but that is hardly the end of the story.
The Chernobyl disaster was not over when the sarcophagus took shape above the ruins of reactor number four in the summer and autumn of 1986.
Nor will it be over when a new giant arch – as tall as St Paul’s cathedral or the Statue of Liberty – slides over the top of the sarcophagus three or four years from now.
…For the last decade, the main concern has been that the hastily built sarcophagus might collapse, blowing tonnes of highly radioactive dust into the surrounding forests and waterways.
But work is now under way to shore up badly leaning walls, secure unsteady beams, and strengthen tilting supports under the plant’s giant red and white chimney.
By the end of 2006 it will be much stronger, though fingers may still need crossing in case of tornadoes or earthquakes.
It’s a measure of the urgency of these stabilisation tasks, that they are being carried out despite plans to un-do them again – and dismantle most of the sarcophagus – once the new arch is in place, some time after 2008.
It’s not only the unstable structure that is a major concern. There is also a problem dealing with the spent fuel from the other reactors. And then there are the unmarked nuclear graveyards:
The graveyards are described as a “radiation emergency” by one of the men responsible for them, Valery Antropov, because no-one knows where they all are, or what is in them.
They were intended to be temporary, but 20 years on, only half of them have even been mapped and inventorised.
An estimated 500 trenches in seven areas around the plant have yet to be studied at all.
“We know the graveyards are in these areas, but exactly where – so as not to step on them – we cannot be sure,” says Mr Antropov, a senior member of a waste and decontamination unit known as “Complex”.
Some of the trenches closest to the Pripyat river have been partly washed away by spring floods, others are slowly seeping radionuclides into ground water.
Neither was properly built, he says, one is too close the river, and the contents of both should really be somewhere deep underground.
“Where to store highly radioactive and long-lived waste is a huge problem,” he says.
“We have containers queuing up. We need to build a deep geological deposit, but Greens object. It’s a problem that people don’t want to see.”
Chernobyl was truly a nightmare. The Soviet response was so inadequate and infuriating that it contributed to the collapse of the Soviet system. They are holding vigils and other ceremonies today throughout the Ukraine, Belarus, and in Moscow (where there was a little incident). Even Ireland is having a ceremony. The Vatican has issued a statement.
Russia’s chief medical doctor said that people in the region would be monitored until 2056. “Some 1.5 million people in Russia have suffered as a result of exposure to radiation following the Chernobyl accident,” he said. Seven of the 600,000 reservists that were sent to clean up Chernobyl are ending a hunger strike today. They have been protesting their paltry disability payments ($110/month)
You can read about what caused the Chernobyl disaster, here.
