Interview With Chernobyl Engineer 584
An anonymous reader writes "New Scientist has posted an interview with a former Chernobyl engineer, Alexander Yuvchenko, who was not only there the night of the explosion, but is still alive today to tell about it. A fascinating recollection of some pretty heroic acts."
Quite a few (Score:5, Interesting)
Treatment was prompt (Score:5, Interesting)
Would Be Interesting to View in US (Score:5, Interesting)
Anyone up for recording this and making it available?
Back in 1990 I caught a photo exhibit by Igor Kostin [time.com] in Baltimore, MD. He was the first photographer in the area after the accident [infoukes.com] and toured it afterwords, taking many pictures [time.com] which are still very disturbing to remember.
It's remarkable how optimistic he is on nuclear power, even with his concerns of safety above finanancial or even political concerns.
Re:Treatment was prompt (Score:1, Interesting)
But seriously, even taking this as positively as possible, it's still a kilo of cure instead of a gram of prevention.
heroism in the face of bad design and decisions (Score:5, Interesting)
Although the fire itself was caused by human error, the RBMK style reactors are much worse than the machines run by the US or western Europe and the powers that came up with that style of reactor are at least partly to blame for that tragedy.
The end isn't in sight yet, the "coffin" that is encasing the bad reactor is cracking, it may collapse causing another giant radioactive cloud of dust to blow all over the Ukraine, Russia, and Europe.
"My neighbors don't know who I am" (Score:4, Interesting)
I had no idea that someone who was involved in Chernobyl would feel the need to hide the very fact that he was there.
What if this man was your neighbor and Chernobyl was your hometown? Would you harbor a grudge against him because he worked there?
After all, just because someone was there doesn't mean they were responsible for the accident. Like he said, "there was nothing we could do."
Why Nuclear will never work.. (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm fine about it, as long as safety is put head and shoulders above any other concern, financial or whatever. If you keep safety as your number one priority at all stages of planning and running a plant, it should be OK.
Nuclear power will never work in the US for that very reason. Power is a private enterprise. Don't ask me why that is just the way this country thinks. Private industry will never put safty as number one priority. It's number one priority is profit. Companies will skimp on safety to maximize profit. Yes I know that we do have nuclear reactors in this country now. They are extremly regulated. They are being deregulated every day. When they are de-regulated enough for the companies, a disaster will soon follow. (5-10 years)
Re:Treatment was prompt (Score:5, Interesting)
You're kidding, of course. Although the USSR's health care system was universal, the quality was utterly abyssmal for the average citizen.
I was unfortunate enough to see first-hand the state of Soviet-era medical facilities and the quality of care in the mid 1980's. Many third-world countries had much better medical care than that of the "typical" Soviet hospital that we toured. And, given that this was a state-sponsored tour (as was everything that we saw), I suspect that it was something better than typical.
-h-
Catch-22 (Score:3, Interesting)
Unfortunately more stations means more opportunity for smaller incidents... Tut mir leid.
Re:heroism in the face of bad design and decisions (Score:2, Interesting)
There was already a fire in the area that kicked up radioactive dust and sent it back into the air. I read somewhere before that the disaster at Chernobyl released about as much radioactive material into the atomosphere as one nuclear weapon test.
Scary.
Still remember... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Safety of Nuclear Power (Score:1, Interesting)
but no need to worry anymore. now were dismantling all our high-standard plants here, so the big companies can sell us the power generated by nice russian RBMK reactors.
ah heck. i dont need no power plants. my power comes right out of this little outlet in my wall.
Re:heroism in the face of bad design and decisions (Score:2, Interesting)
Interesting, IMO. (Score:4, Interesting)
What do you think about nuclear power?
I'm fine about it, as long as safety is put head and shoulders above any other concern, financial or whatever. If you keep safety as your number one priority at all stages of planning and running a plant, it should be OK.
This is why this is not going to happen in the U.S.
Re:Safety of Nuclear Power (Score:4, Interesting)
The reason why this isn't done (save for some allowance for the second case I listed), is that the government considers it a threat to national security. Their problem with these options is that evil terrorists may intercept nuclear materials shipments, then use them for evil deeds. So their solution is to pile it all in a big cave somewhere. *sigh* Things are pretty bad when our own government doesn't understand. [llnl.gov]
Re:Treatment was prompt (Score:3, Interesting)
If the English healthcare system is so great, why is there a separate, private healthcare system there for those who can afford to pay? How long does one wait for an elective surgery like, say, a hip replacement?
Re:Treatment was prompt (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Why Nuclear will never work.. (Score:5, Interesting)
The best example for nuclear power safety is the fact that after 50 years of operation of hundreds of Nuke power plants only 1 serious accident occurred - and that was at a poorly designed USSR station that would never have been allowed to be built in the US.
But, nowadays, we have some relaly, really, really fail safe designs that could be used like the Pebble Bed Reactor [wikipedia.org] that can never ever melt down even assuming a complete and total failure of all safety backups, coolant etc (of course, it could still cause contamination if a break in the cooling or such occurred).
Now, OTOH, you have people like the US Navy who have a *perfect* record for Nuclear safety simply because if their was ever an accident the Navy knows that would likely be the end of all their Nuke powered boats (helluva a motivator eh?)
Re:Safety of Nuclear Power (Score:3, Interesting)
What options do we have today that we didn't have in the 1950's? How many of those are capable of outright replacing the Coal/Oil/Nuclear infrastructure?
Re:real-life Radioactive Man? (Score:4, Interesting)
Yeah? Clean it up! (Score:2, Interesting)
And even when it's done well (most U.S. plants appear to be safely constructed and maintained), how can we guanantee it's safety through administrations or government overthrows? How many people were needlessly affected (in Russia and elsewhere) because of Soviet political bullshit?
Chernobyl is fucking TERRIFYING. There's a reason why that S.T.A.L.K.E.R. game is based on that location.
I say, nuclear power becomes a more viable option when you can tell me what to do with the waste it generates. And the answer has to be better than 'bury it'.
Re:Treatment was prompt (Score:5, Interesting)
Have you ever seen anything about the ice surgeons performing heart surgery with no life support? They administer drugs to block adrenaline, and pour crushed ice around the body until the heart stops. From there they have about 60 minutes to get in and out. When they are done they wrap the person in heated blankets and heating pads and inject them with a large dose of adrenaline, maybe an electric shock if necessary. The lesson is that the tools are only half of the story; the doctors are the other half.
Re:Quite a few (Score:5, Interesting)
You really should read this interview, it's both fascinating and scary as hell at the same time. I don't think I'll forget his description of the light from the ionized air above the reactor for a long time.
Chernobyl = 100s of nuclear tests (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Treatment was prompt (Score:5, Interesting)
As someone, who was not only born then, but also lived there -- in Kyiv -- at the time, I authoritatively state: you are wrong.
This is a sign, that nuclear engineers were a really prized folk. Dozens of firefighters and lower-rank workers died right there -- radiation is like that, you don't feel it, until it is too late and noone bothered to warn them. Soviets most certainly did not care of their people, unless -- as in the case of these engineers -- educating them took a while.
They flew these guys to Moscow, which also means, that Kyiv -- Ukraine's capital, a city of 2.5 million people merely 100 miles away -- did not have the proper facilities. The medicine was not top -- individual scientists and labs did have notable successes, but the public health was awful.
Re:heroism in the face of bad design and decisions (Score:2, Interesting)
And the next guy down is correct, squat switches fail all the time.
Re:Yeah? Clean it up! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Yeah? Clean it up! (Score:3, Interesting)
I agree with you about oil and coal, but there are options where they are looked for.
Re:Safety of Nuclear Power (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Yeah? Clean it up! (Score:3, Interesting)
Wind and solar energy accounted for less than 2% of our (USA) total power consumption from 2001. Our solar technology basically hasn't changed since the mid-70s - it's about 2% efficient. These are not technologies that we have significantly invested in, and the time to find an alternative is almost up.
Shortly put, we don't have any other options - unless there is a gigantic scientific blitz of research. Truth be told, the way we're heading I'll be surprised if we get *anything* accomplished before it's too late to roll out a solution.
-lw
Re:heroism in the face of bad design and decisions (Score:2, Interesting)
Also keep in mind that many other systems (fire control, navigation, radar) are inhibited while on the ground. One of the ex-USAF guys I work with had an amusing story--this is secondhand, so take it with a grain of salt. They needed to check something out on an aircraft, and it required WOW=false. So they lifted it off its wheels and started to power up the equipment, when they found that the radar had energized--keep in mind an airborne fire control radar is a bit stronger than a cop's radar gun.
By the time they shut it off, it had burned a hole a few feet in diameter through the (luckily unoccupied) hangar across the runway.
--Ribald
I was born like 300 km from reactor. (Score:2, Interesting)
Interesting fact... (Score:4, Interesting)
I thought that was fairly interesting, that they have a lifelong ban on all people's blood that lived/were born within a certain perimeter of the accident.
Re:Russian R.B.M.K reactors were badly designed .. (Score:4, Interesting)
The upshot to this design is that if something breaks, the reflector simply stops, and the core cools down back to it's normal static decay rate. For instance, you have a power surge that causes a turbine trip, which in turn causes a surge in high pressure steam feed. The operator or automation would take note of it, tripping emergency venting on the secondary coolant loop, finally ordering the reactor to SCRAM. The refector stops moving and things cool down and the community relies on the auxillary generator until a technician can come out to check things out before resetting the system back to normal power generation.
Re:Treatment was prompt (Score:3, Interesting)
How is your son doing now?
My question about the Chernobyl disaster is..... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Yeah? Clean it up! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:My question about the Chernobyl disaster is.... (Score:2, Interesting)
or was the outcome unavoidable....
sorry no links - but briefly from what I read in russian press -the outcome after the things they did was unavoidable. But then ALL similar reactors were equipped with new features which will make the similar situations avoidable. So now if the things at any power plant will go the same way - then there will not be tragedy.Summer without lettuce (Score:2, Interesting)
It's weird, I don't remember the drastic explosion, the incredible loss of life, the aftermath, except the fact that I couldn't eat lettuce that summer.
Odd the things you remember.
Re:Quite a few (Score:3, Interesting)
It was accompanied by an overwhelming sense that my mind's picture was superimposed with the old farmer Neham's well. From Lovecraft's "The Colour Out of Space".
OK, the reactor light was blue while the color in the story was unidentifiable... but other than that they appeared so alike in my head as to really creep me out.
Even the results of exposure were horribly similar.
Re:Yeah? Clean it up! (Score:4, Interesting)
Couple this with the new intrinsicaly safe nuclear reactors (these are reactors which, due to their design, have physical principles which mean they shut down themselves if anything goes wrong...no faulty electronics, we're talking simple mechanics here) and yeah, nuclear power is the only green power there is.
What bugs me most is that so-called 'action groups' like Greenpeace haven't a fucking clue. But then again, that's becuase they have hardly any PHD's working for them...and when they do, those phd's are for law, no (applied) physics, no chemistry...the only technical phd working for Greenpeace in the Netherlands came from fucking Aeronautics! A bloody plane builder! Greenpeace and it's ilk, whilst doing some good work, is ignorant becuase they're staffed like a goddamn PR firm.
Oops: sorry for the rant
Re:Quite a few (Score:2, Interesting)