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Interview With Chernobyl Engineer
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."
For once in your Slashdot browsing days, read the article! It's really interesting and worth your time.
Stood there and watched the blue ionized air as it poured out of the reactor?
but he didn't think it was the radiation
I submit that he was grasping for any alternative he could make himself believe that didn't involve him dying a horrible death.
"Tell me doctor, with all of your defenses, are there any provisions for an attack by killer bees?"
One of the most interesting bits of the interview is this:
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.
There you have it. From a man who nearly died and is still sick today from Nuclear power.
It's imperative for people to realize that Nuclear Power is not devil incarnate. By stopping Nuclear development, you are slowly killing yourselves with Coal and Oil plants. The number of people killed by nuclear power rate in the dozens (most at Chernobyl). The number of people killed by coal plants rate in the hundreds of thousands. Think about it.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
"In 1986, the Russians were our enemies."
Who do you think "we" are, that we had the same enemies in 1986?
Seriously - you went to the Soviet Union while it still existed and did a large, statistically significant sampling of people with respect to the appearance of their teeth? Enough to make generalizations about dental care for several hundred million people?
Wow. Good job.
He says in the interview that the control rods were dropped by his colleague, but from what I recall it was much, much too late. The core was so hot that the rods warped and jammed.
The disaster was caused partly by one engineer previously over-riding automatic safety protection in order to increase reactor power to levels needed to run a safety test.
Moreover manuals were outdated with areas simply crossed out. Human error at its worst.
Regardless of how you feel about nuclear power politically, the heroism demonstrated by the crew at Chernobyl was incredible-and deserves commendation.
If not for them, things could have gotten much worse. Many of these brave men knowingly gave their lives.
I may have a sense of humor and love the Simpsons, but this is not something to joke about.
Sadly, a fake, I believe.
I believe that it would be the amount of radiation he could have on (in?) his body and maybe also a bit of superstition?
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
Thanks for pointing this out for us. A man on the brink of death, about to endure months of intensive treatment after one of the most horrific nuclear accidents in history, grasping for a reason to doubt the mortal danger he was in and the inevitable pain he would have to face. Hilarious.
That is just sad. RTFA. Are people just incapable of understanding heroism anymore?
Right on. The only safe way to generate nuclear power is to have the government do it. Like in Soviet...oh yeah.
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)
Strong regulation is essential for nuclear power. I don't see that private or public ownership automatically provides a better system. Public ownership works well in France, but was a disaster in the USSR. Britain's nuclear industry was state owned until quite recently and is hardly a convincing example of state superiority.
Geeeeez...not to stir the tinfoil hat crowd, but it sounds like you almost couldn't've scripted things to have gone much worse.
This space intentionally left (almost) blank.
One moronic bigoted stereotype deserves another eh?
For those of you who make fun of the Soviet system wen you probably wheren't even born then, this is a lesson: Soviets took care of their people well and their medicine was top.
Quick question: how many people here would honestly trade their political, civil, and economic freedom just for free health care? It's okay if you do, just be consistent about it. I suspect there aren't many who'd agree with this, though. Otherwise, you can't just point to Communist nations and say "well, if you ignore the mass murder and gulags, it really wasn't that bad. . . "
Nuclear power will never work in the US for that very reason. Power is a private enterprise.
You're kidding, right? Was Chernobyl run by a private enterprise? No, the world's worst nuclear power accident was caused by exactly what you are proposing- putting it in government hands.
I don't know what makes you think government is the ultimate safety blanket. Governments are big, bloated, and not accountable for their actions. Just look at how they sit in Washington and go back and forth like children trying to decide who reported for duty and who did what on a boat 40 years ago. Yeah, these fuckers will keep us safe.
A private company at least has to endure the threat of going out of business if something bad happens. Unfortunately, that isn't always enough. But I'll still take it over Kerry or Bush.
Being a 4th generation american let me step up for the rest of us and clue you in:
Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves, therefore, are its only safe depositories.
Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, Query 14, 1781
If a nation expects to be ignorant -- and free -- in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.
Thomas Jefferson, letter to Colonel Charles Yancey, January 6, 1816
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. --Edward Abbey (1927-1989)
Ever heard "Freedom isn't Free" The United States of America is better then every other nation so long as each and every citizen does their part to keep the government in check. If you don't believe me, read the constitution it shouldn't take very long for you to get the theme of the document. The duty of every citizen is to watch the government like a child trying to get away with something.
If you accept everything your government tells you as gospel, you become the trailer park woman on Jerry Springer who believes everything her derelict 13 year old drug addicted car thief son tells her. "And I did axe him, I taid Timmy, where'd you get dat Merchedes Benz? And he did tell me dat he had done founded it." Just like being a parent you need to be in your kid's (government's) face 24-7. It's your duty to, it's your job and responsability to cry foul. Living in the US you get all these great rights and responsabilities, but they aren't a gift. You have a job to do in exchange for them.
I'm reminded as well of Lewis Black's comentary where he adds "Ever here people say 'America is the GREATEST country in the world', but they've never been to another country? How do you know? How do you know for sure that there isn't something better out there? For all you know there are countries out there just giving stuff away for free, like HEALTHCARE!"
Yeah if you think the US has gone downhill, or if there's just one thing or two that another country does better, it isn't the US government that's been slackin' IT'S YOU!
That concludes how to be American 101.
I boycott signatures
Sigh. No wonder we can't agree on simple issues. You don't trust private industry. I don't trust government.
You should study the record on nuclear power in the USA. Zero people have been killed by private nuclear power, (except in non-nuclear related ordinary accidents like falling off a ladder at a nuke plant) but many have been killed and many endangered by government programs.
The number may be different today, but some years back they said that 98% of the high level nuclear waste in the USA is from weapons, not power plants. Yet nearly 100% of the national debate and are directed at the 2% civilian waste, because most facts about weapons waste are classified and because civilians are not asked to give their opinion about weapons programs.
Still because industry's #1 priority is profit, they are ineligible for trust in your eyes. Politicians, motivated solely by re-election are more credible to you.
In the USA and many other countries, nuclear power plants are owned and operated by non-profit government utilities. If those plants are demonstratively safer than profit-motivated plants, the evidence should be plain from the records. Can anyone cite such evidence?
As long as we need a majority to change anything, and as long as we can't find a majority to decide whom to trust, we're stuck with perpetual gridlock. The status quo, no matter how good or bad, reigns supreme.
I feel the same way. The description of the ionized air is extremely eerie, and I can't help but imagine the devastation, and horrible beauty of that scene. It gives me the creepy crawlies. Just something about a force so powerful that you can't actually feel until your body starts what amounts to dissolving.
-Jesse
Nothing says "unprofessional job" like wrinkles in your duct tape.
There is a primary difference between coal/oil and nuclear. Nuclear can't be cleaned up. It can be moved from one spot to another though. How about we put it in your backyard for starters?
Sure. A few hundred kilometres north of here is the Canadian Shield, which has been geologically stable for about 3 billion years. Vitrify the waste (turn it into glass with radioactives as dopants), put that in standard radioactive waste storage barrels (you know, the kind they test by dropping 30 feet onto spikes), and put those at the bottom of a mine shaft in non-porus shield rock. Plug the hole with clay, and it'll stay there until north america is subducted back into the mantle. The barrels decay after a few centuries, but they're mainly to prevent tampering and accidents in transit. Vitrified waste in non-porus bedrock in geologically stable areas goes nowhere.
The volume of waste to deal with is also far lower than, say, the volume of arsenic, cadmium, mercury, and other heavy metals that have comparably nasty effects that we have to dispose of on a yearly basis.
As for cleanup - most of the wastes are still heavy elements. They can be concentrated and removed from contaminated areas following a hypothetical nasty accident the same way other heavy metals are.
And the answer has to be better than 'bury it'.
What could possibly _be_ better? Any reprocessing scheme will give you more opportunity for contamination that sticking it in the shield for the rest of eternity. There really isn't much waste to _deal_ with - last I heard all of the high-level waste produced by the world's power reactors would fit in a couple of swimming pools if piled in one place.
If you really need fancy toys, look up the actinide-burning fast neutron reactor designs that others have proposed for destroying radioactive waste.
> 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'.
You basically have one of two choices to make in the coming (10ish) years: Nuclear or Coal. No other technology is at the point where it can be made ready to deploy when petroleum starts (~50+yrs, generous est.) to run out and gets really, really expensive.
So take your pick: the world has the technology to create Nuclear reactors whose byproducts are non-radioactive (simply depleted uranium).
The alternative is to pump thousands of tons of burning coal into the atmosphere.
With a mind for safety, Nuclear is *SAFE*. The same *CANNOT* be said of coal.
-lw
Mods: Disagreeing with me != my post Offtopic / Flamebait.
World without hate or war, invaded. Tragic?
To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.
-- Theodore Roosevelt
(any typos or misspellings are mine)
It was worth reading. It made me sad and rethink about life. :)
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
There is a primary difference between coal/oil and nuclear. Nuclear can't be cleaned up.
So how do we clean up the billions of metric tons of coal byproducts released into the atmosphere every year.
How about we put it in your backyard for starters?
Why do I always hear this back yard argument? If you took an average size suburban house and made it water tight, all of the nuclear waste made by all of mans reactors since the beginning of the nuclear age wouldn't even fill the basement.
Tell me, what have you read of experimental nuclear reactors called PBMR's? Read this and pay close attention to the section labeled "Gas turbines heated by nuclear furnaces. When people mention nuclear energy, all they can think of is some 1950's, slow neutron reactors. Because of careless mistakes by humans, not their machines, all development of nuclear research has been severely limited. The much safer and, fool proof, technology of the PBMR's could have replaced most of the older reactors in this country if it weren't for panicky people who rely on sensational news outlets for their education. Who knows what we would be capable of now if development hadn't ground to a halt.
Because the president said so:
(emphasis added)
It's your duty to, it's your job and responsability to cry foul. Living in the US you get all these great rights and responsabilities, but they aren't a gift. You have a job to do in exchange for them.
Yes, it is your duty to cry foul, if something foul is indeed being done. However crying foul to the point where the government is crippled from fulfilling it's main duties (national defense, and regulation of interstate commerce) for your own personal gain is NOT Patriotic.
A good example of this is the American media. They LOVE a good story they can attack a president on. When Bill Clinton tried to kill Osama Bin Laden the media screamed "Wag the dog, Wag the dog!" and the American people followed like sheep. Now, with Iraq the American media spews shit about no WMD, even though Iraq was planning terrorist strikes against America and the people follow along once again, calling Bush a nazi even though like Clinton, he is trying to protect them against an unseen monster.
So how many people have to die before people open up their eyes? Did Clinton step down his effort to catch Bin Laden because of the Media and "American Patriots" who were assuming the worst about him? Will Bush be afraid to use force the next time America is threatened?
Questioning your government to the point of them becoming ineffective because the media "told you so" isn't patriotic, it's being led like a sheep to your own slaughter.
For all you know there are countries out there just giving stuff away for free, like HEALTHCARE!
That isn't such a good deal, people from other countries constantly come to the US for healthcare. Not to mention, many of the european countries are going to have to cut back on socialist programs like universal health care in 20-25 years because there will be way more people retired than working.
Yeah if you think the US has gone downhill, or if there's just one thing or two that another country does better, it isn't the US government that's been slackin' IT'S YOU!
You are right about this, go out and VOTE people. If you don't like the current political parties, find one that appeals to you or make your own and VOTE. While you may think that a third party vote is "throwing your vote away" a third party only needs about 5% to get federal campaign funds for the next election.
- Quick question: how many people here would honestly trade their political, civil, and economic freedom just for free health care?
Quick question: How many people here [in the U.S.] would honestly trade their political, civil, and economic freedom just for the illusion of safety? I think we already know the answer to this...I say, nuclear power becomes a more viable option when you can tell me what to do with the waste it generates.
Currently, wastes from using fossil fuels are dumped into the environment and basically ignored. How is this fundamentally better than burying nuclear waste?
Including or excluding the spent fuel?
However crying foul to the point where the government is crippled from fulfilling it's main duties
Explain how this is possible. Are you implying that George Bush reacts so poorly to verbal criticism or adversity that he would be paralyzed and unable to perform his duties? (On the other hand, given his reaction when told of the unfolding 9-11 events, you MAY have a point there.)
That isn't such a good deal, people from other countries constantly come to the US for healthcare.
It's not a "good thing" for the class of Americans who can afford decent health care. You make a significant overgeneralization, however, when you say people from other countries...; in actuality it's RICH people from other countries who come here for treatment, in part because we have generally good health care available to those (like them) who can afford it, but more to the point, our American health care is less clogged-up (i.e. less waiting) for those who can afford it BECAUSE THERE ARE SO MANY PEOPLE WHO CANNOT AFFORD IT and thus do not "get in the way" of the more affluent, as happens in their home countries with health care rationed by need rather than by ability to pay.
To ensure perfect aim, shoot first and call whatever you hit the target
They won't accept blood given by homosexuals either. Because somehow, they feel that the people who fuck without taking simple precautions are the same peoplas as those who want to waste an hour to give blood. And you know, teh gheys habe teh AIDS OMG.
True, but what does it say about America when the level of care and protection of law one recieves is directly related to the size of your bank account? At least in Soviet Russia nearly everyone was treadted with an equal lack of care.
Nuclear reactors don't emit beta particles at a high enough energy to create Cerenkov radiation in air. On the other hand, Cerenkov radiation in molten glass (which is now solidifed and known as Chernobylite) coming up through the air and scattering off dust is quite plausible.
Sustainability and energy independence essay