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Putting A Lid On Chernobyl
slicer622 writes "Chernobyl is finally getting a containment structure (Washington Post). Billed as the largest moveable structure ever built, its designed to help take apart the wreckage and keep most of the radioactive material from spreading. It will be 800 feet across, and 300 feet high and will cost $800 mil."
I always wondered what a Quake 3 map would look like in real life... :)
:)
For those of you who map, you'll know what I'm talking about.
"The shelter is designed to keep water out and dust in for 100 years"
Great, in 2108 we are screwed again.
what happens if the existing "sarcophagus" fails after the bigger one is built over top of it? Couldn't this still be a disasterous problem? After all, I've heard before that if it were to cave in, it'd be like having the accident all over again.
Because Chernobyl Fallout.
Ties in nicely with the story today about radioactive Christmas trees being sold by russian businessmen.
(Spudley Strikes Again!)
They want to reopen Chernobyl. This article states "Officials from the European Bank for Reconstruction have criticised plans by the Ukrainian authorities to reopen a reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. They say they are concerned about the safety of reactor number three, which sits next to the remains of the world's worst nuclear disaster, because of a failure to put in place extra safety measures that had been agreed. " Here is a link about the facilities.
Chernobyl is named for a small, bitter herb, "chernoblis", that grows in the region. Of course, that's the Ukranian word. In English, the herb is called "wormwood."
...
No joke.
Of course, to quote my father when he heard that, "That's nonsense. Chernobyl wasn't a star. A star is a
!!!
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
Leave it to the Russians to come up with a solution that is, in essence, one big matrioshka doll.
Now I want to see the heir of the peasant who invented these things sue for IP infringement.
My
Limekiller
This reminds me of a "new" Twighlight Zone episode circa 1987, where a guy has a fallout shelter in his basement.
His wife and kid go to the grandmothers for the weekend. Meanwhile, he's chilling with his friend drinking a beer, and a nuclear bomb touches down. They both go into the fallout shelter. They guy thinks he's lost his wife and kid forever.
Months go by in the fallout shelter, and external radiation levels aren't going down. They can't tell if the detector is broken, or what. Eventually some "scavengers" come pounding on the door, and the father has to stop his friend from making any noise.
More months go by, there's an argument and the friend finally says fuck it and leaves. Now the father is by himself, and even more months go by... finally he decides it's hopeless, puts on his sunglasses and heads out of the fallout shelter.
Next scene, the wife and son are looking at the father's grave. Talking about him, etc. Then the camera pans up, and there's the city about 10 miles away with a huge glass dome over it.
I found this summary of the episode as well:
Shelter Skelter
Teleplay by : Ron Cobb & Robin Love
Based on a story by : Ron Cobb
Directed by : Martha Coolidge
Starring : Joe Mantegna; Joan Allen
Summary : A survivalist believes he has lived through a nuclear war in his shelter. In reality, it was an accident which destroyed his town and contributed to bringing peace to Earth, and he has been entombed for ever.
It will be 800 feet across, and 300 feet high and will cost $800 mil.
The dome itself will not cost $800 million, the whole project, including cleaning up inside the dome once it's there, will cost $768 million.
- Peter
I stumbled (ok Googled) across some interesting and moving photos from Pripyat, the town where the Chernobyl workers were housed.
Shocking and worth a read / look.
About 7 years ago they built a huge concrete wall that goes underground and is meant to stop the flow of groundwater(to some extent) from the contaminated areas. The last I read of this said that the wall had begun to fail. The Pripyat River, which was Chernobyl's water supply, was severely contaminated.
This map shows the "hot zone." It actually covers quite a large area.
A lot of stories about the Chernobyl accident can be found here.
Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster On April 25th -26th, 1986 the World's worst nuclear power accident occurred at Chernobyl in the former USSR (now Ukraine). The Chernobyl nuclear power plant located 80 miles north of Kiev had 4 reactors and whilst testing reactor number 4 numerous safety procedures were disregarded. At 1:23am the chain reaction in the reactor became out of control creating explosions and a fireball which blew off the reactor's heavy steel and concrete lid.
The Chernobyl accident killed more than 30 people immediately, and as a result of the high radiation levels in the surrounding 20-mile radius, 135,00 people had to be evacuated.
I've seen more than enough movies to realize that this is a mere cover story to hide the real purpose of this "container" -- sheilding a priveleged few thousand against a rogue earthbound asteroid.
I'll bet you ten bucks that nobody knows where Bruce Willis is right now, either.
Can't fool ME.
My
Limekiller
according to this article The impact on wildlife and even humans is not as worse as people thought it would be.
For example: Years ago, some researchers theorized that a severe nuclear accident like the one at Chernobyl would cause such severe genetic damage that animals would be born showing drastic changes in appearance. So far, the Chernobyl accident has not borne that out, the researchers note.
and
"For instance, there are probably two million people in the contaminated areas, and only a few thousand are actually sick from diseases than can be reasonably linked to the high levels of radioactive contaminants. We really don't know why this is yet," said Dallas.
Psssst - I know where you might be able to pick up a suitable enclosure really cheaply, if you don't mind using second hand equipment. As an added benefit - it seems to do a good job of discouraging tourists! ;-)
"If you create user accounts, by default, they will have an account type of Administrator with no password." KB Q293834
Of course all the animals were radically affected. Approximately half of these animals are now gigantic and are terrorizing Japan as we speak. The other half have become smart-talking, hip ninjas.
sic transit gloria mundi
After this tragedy occured soldiers were volunteered
to go there and die fighting with fire and radiation. Many lost their homes and were evacuted to the town i lived in. We got lucky - the wind was in the other direction. Nevertheless streets had to be washed literally - trucks were spraying water everywhere trying to wash off the radioactive dust.
Many thousands of people died in Chernobyl. Many more are STILL dying from this disaster. It was a tragedy. Please don't joke about it. It's beyond "dark humor" IMHO.
"If it weren't for the radioactivity, I could almost call the job 'a piece of cake,' but the radiation makes it hugely complex and extremely difficult."
Yea... and if it weren't for the radiation you wouldn't even be building the 'piece of cake'.
-------
"In times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act."
-- George Orwell
You can't build a reactor cover before a plant blows and hope it to be of any use. Unless you really want to ignore the nasty effects of a nuclear blast. Any structure built over a reactor would be blow sky high, and throw the structure materials off at hundreds of miles per hour, turning the entire plant into one giant nuclear claymore mine. You build them so they don't blow up, and use common sense, which the soviet government did not have, the test they demanded are what caused the accident.
--Nuintari
slashdot : where an opinion can be wrong.
It will be 800 feet across, and 300 feet high and will cost $800 mil.
And after being used to move the Chernobyl remains, Cowboy Neal will be using it as a car.
This is left as an exercise for the reader.
Not to mention that the process would be worse than the equivilant of cleaning up the dog's accident on the carpet and carrying it, balance pecuriously on a peice of newspaper, right over you family xmas dinner, on the way to the trash can.