This is why sand was used as a means to put out the fire. It needs mentioning that when the work became organized like this, when the effort was distributed across various institutions and supervisors, then, of course, there was much more order and clarity than in the first days when all the emergency problems were solved but not all work had gone smoothly. This is how the Americans fled. And they expected that the fire could spread to the 3rd block and cause damage there as well as in reactor number 4. But Legasov's daughter claimed to Moskovskij Komsomolets. Adamovich: I see, so on the 2nd of May [Unclear]. The Operative group itself however didnt show any tension at all. Somehow, irrespective of rank, irrespective of the task at hand, everyone worked like a finely-tuned team, especially in the initial days. This blog is dedicated to translating the text that comes from the audio tapes recorded by academician V.Legasov. These sensors were placed in various spots. What is going on there? But the most demoralizing part, which makes one worried and sick, is that the measures needed are known.[22]. All this was justified at the dawn of the nuclear industry. He consistently looked for possible sources of issues that would lead to accidents, systematized them, and made probabilistic evaluations of events, estimates of the likelihood of an event leading to a release of radioactivity. Based on the wind rose, on dispersion, within a radius of 300 kilometres, with entry into China, all life will be destroyed. However they also compared what many specialists say. But this reactor was not considered bad because of safety reasons. Immediately, it became evident that station management and the leaders of the Ministry of Energy were at odds. The next question arose when it became clear that the crater of the wrecked fourth block was exhausting a lot of radioactive gas. Legasov: Check that. But this was for a few days, and after a few days, everything, of course, recovered. But what does this increasing the reliability of the reactor mean? And that it was necessary to put nuclear energy sources into operation, to do this quickly. The fault of Anatoly Pavlovich Alexandrov is that he, albeit reluctantly, consented. But how to construct the concrete plate under the reactor - this was totally unknown to us. Also, the fundamental lack of containment, as practice has shown, cannot be compensated by the tightly sealed compartments. And this was preventing the creation of acceptable radiation conditions. So we organized a supply of these materials from our Armenian and Transcarpathian deposits and shipped them in by trains. These robots have played a huge role even today because many interesting things have been discovered with their help regarding the questions related to the nature and consequences of the accident. The Operative group had to take many decisions about accepting or rejecting help from abroad, that was proposed at some time. It was quite hard to get to these bubblers because the adjacent corridors were flooded with water from the time when they were trying to cool down the reactor with water. The next thesis relates to the particular specification of the design of the device, the defects in this design and the sequential description of the causes that led to the accident itself. And eventually, Major Antoshkin reported to us in the Government Commissions evening meeting that on that day, they had dropped 1100 tonnes of materials. plot-explanation chernobyl Share What examples did he give? It would melt there, absorb the heat and also act as a protective shield to some extent. Valery Legasov, 51, Chernobyl Investigator - The New York . However, the technological support for this complex cycle is outdated. The world accepts the normal standard of safety for any dangerous industry including nuclear power stations. It, in my opinion, is wrong. We started saving on containments. Chernobyl began, in my opinion, conditionally of course, in 1961; that is, in the very year when Gagarin flew into space or at the time of the last highest achievement of Soviet science and technology. FInally the third group of specialists, which in the most thorough way had researched all the maps from Government Hydro Metric service, integrated all the activity from land-based and air services, comparing that to data that was received from abroad. The system of a singular person being personally responsible for the quality of the devicewith all the facilities it was installed inwas absent. By the way, looking back, I want to say once again that the question of how positive reactivity was added is a matter of discussion. [5] The proposals triggered a significant backlash from the existing scientific leadership. This question was discussed at the Government Commission and was escalated to higher levels, and ultimately it was decided to defer the issue and that in the next year, 1987, and possibly in 1988, no construction work will be done on 5th and 6th blocks. This too was a point of concern. This was unambiguously established by the doctors. A big discussion arose about the so-called Compton effect. This is how many felt, so to say, in a subtle way, that the work of the Chekists, though not conspicuous, was positive, whereas the negative, helpless work by Civil Defense was noticeable in the early days of these events. From these telegrams, I immediately realised that no one [in the world] was prepared for this kind of accident. There were no dosimeters with proper scales for minimum to maximum doses. The knowledge existed; the experts, however, were not unanimous. And when I visited the Chernobyl station after the accident and saw what was happening there, I myself drew a precise and unequivocal conclusion, that the Chernobyl disaster is an apotheosis, the pinnacle of all the mismanagement that has been carried out for decades in our country. This is the third element. I fought against this project from May; an absolutely useless project. And the city of Pripyat was considerably decontaminated by about the same time when the sarcophagus construction was ending. I recall, perhaps, only one statement by Professor Ivanov from Moscow Engineering-Physics Institute. The operative group led by Nikolai Ivanovich Ryzhkov was created and almost the entire Soviet industry was allocated to the disaster. [5] Since December 1978, the Legasov family kept a high-bred pet chow-chow. But two weeks later, it happens in America, a phosphorous accident in two weeks. Thereafter, talk about the Novovoronezh station, the 1st block of which has already been built as a nuclear station designed to be operated in a continuous mode with a civilian crew, and describe the protection systems that have been used at that station. The first four tapes feature only Legasov giving a recounting of the entire event, from the moment he learned of the accident to his final days at the Kurchatov Institute. During the initial days, all this hadnt been organized and this was shocking. In reality, all this was stored in old and used books. Probability of such an event was extremely low, nevertheless, as a preventive measure and after some debate, the work to prevent this was approved, despite most of specialists being in doubt whether it was needed or not. Based on the simplest estimates that I could make, this commission seemed redundant, because with the system of wells and dams in place, the exchange of radioactivity between the water and silt would not pose any significant danger to the Dnieper sea. It was necessary to carry out a survey of the territory, to continue this reconnaissance, and to check how radioactivity was being spread by the wind, by the vehicles. Then Silayev called Gorbachev himself and asked that I go back. But yet, he, how should I tell you, well, didnt want to die for this philosophy. Regularly, several times a day, the leaders of the GC spoke to comrades Dolgikh Vladimir Ivanovich, Rizhkov Nikolai Ivanovich. This was an enormous task that required moving masses of people, creating the necessary control systems and quickly planning the logistics and work. And he did a lot to bring about Gosatomenergonadzor, where he eventually went to work, to the organization that at least controlled the composition of the equipment that went there. While individual researchers had proposed various solutions for dust suppression, in the summer of 1986, one of the main challenges was preventing the spread of contaminated dust over large distances. The unfortunate result is that this copy of the English text cannot be easily navigated and copied without clicking different menu items, scrolling through ten separate pages, and editing out the various annotations. Many young people arrived. But, at the same time, they didnt report other things like the appearance of typical radiation injuries and so on. What is the real situation there? In response to this, I outlined the situation for him; that basicallyas it was after the 2nd of May; the call was around the 4th or 5th of Maythe radiation emissions from the destroyed block have ceased, and the situation is currently under control. This is what makes the Minsk station and the Finnish station distinct. The levels of radioactivity in that water were quite high, up to a curie per litre in some places and at certain points in time. This blog is dedicaded to the text that comes from academician V.Legasov audio tapes which he recorded after the Chernobyl accident and not long before his death. It was wrong. Two of these ten projects, I am afraid, will have the same fate, and for roughly the same reasons. This makes it the best station in the world, Loviisa. But since Sidorenko was put in charge of this laboratory (the whole department), everything was routed towards developing documents, procedures and standards to make things better on existing nuclear power stations. Nevertheless, the information I had convinced me that not everything was well in the development of nuclear energy, as it seemed to me. This station had a proper training simulator where everyone had to undergo regular training, and the various situations that could arise at a reactor were simulated. Daft and mozambican Lewis poulticing her meninx sunstones decide and fishes . I, of course, moved around in this circle, choosing my task. Legasov: But after the 2nd of May, there were traces of a glow a few times in some spots. So, for the Ministry of Medium Machine Building and, in this sense, also for Anatoly Petrovich Aleksandrov, there was an impression that this reactor, if operated properly and with reliability, is very good and normal. It was an integral device that had to be placed into the belly of the wrecked 4th block and would have provided continuous information about the temperature there, about radiation fields and some other parameters. [1] Around June 1987, he attempted suicide but was saved by his colleagues. Thats why we quickly discontinued this measure. And at the same time, England first and then the United States of America began to develop their energy sector, not as separate nuclear power plants but as a nuclear power industry. A temperature at which a vapour-zirconium reaction could begin, accompanied by the generation of hydrogen was, in principle, unacceptable, be it routine work or technical conditions. Do you understand? He is now mainly remembered for his work as the chief of the commission investigating the Chernobyl disaster. It is about 15-20 years within which all the questions we are discussing here must be resolved. And I would very much like to ask to make such a statement that, as of today, we do not have safe nuclear energy, or a concept of safe nuclear energy, or even a concept of a safe nuclear reactor that is completely ready. Besides, the very fact of the appearance of this RBMK device, from the perspective of international and generally normal safety standards, was illegalthe fact of its appearance. Dip asbestos sacks filled with polyethylene chips into appropriate solutionsthis would produce foamand then use these sacks to close the gaps on the roof of the sarcophagus. When the first experiments in 1982 and 1983 showed that during a coastdown, the turbine does not maintain the necessary electrotechnical parameters to serve the stations own needs, nobody even thought about solving this problem from the other side, more precisely, reducing the time needed for the backup diesel generators to start and output at the required levels. But the author of this article, an American, criticized the French, said that they shouldnt be doing it (for political reasons, economic reasons). It appeared that I had been summoned to Moscow to take part in the Politburo meeting that would take place on the 5th of May. When comrade Gusev came to the site with his team, the main design elements were being sketched out. In this particular aspect the station was rather poorly placed. They did not violate the formal order in which the scientific leadership was under the Institute of Nuclear Energy. This roughly is how things were. Of course, all this was done in the name of productivity. How can I listen to Valery Legasov tapes? [7] Legasov was impressed by the operation of the KGB in the area but considered the Civil Defence group to be in shambles. It became clear that one group of researchers had to work solely on the tasks related to reactor number 4, while another would tackle its surrounding area. Make sure to subscribe to his Youtube channel. The explosion was volumetric in nature. In case the Dniepers water became contaminated above the permissible concentrations, the city could be supplied using alternate sources of water. A whole variety of questions must be posed. But, in practice, the effort to put this needle in the right place from a helicopter was huge; and nearly no information was received from it. This is the problem. And this hack job was just mind-boggling for us. For example, the status of contamination on the roofs of buildings of the 3rd and 4th blocks was measured many times. For example, the Politburo correctly decided to create a relevant nuclear organization within the Academy of Sciences; because there is no alternative, no competition. The air force, the helicopter groups, worked very precisely. Thus, in this way, the inevitability of nuclear energy became apparent in the 60s but the pace was lost. An appropriate team was gathered at night and approximately within three to four hours, they departed to the site. The composition included heads of the main institutions associated with the work around Chernobyl and also leading experts, such as academician Sokolov, academician Mikhalevich and academician Trefilov, who were associated with particular tasks of ecological or technical nature related to the liquidation of the consequences of the accident. So the situation has only worsened. I only know that the population was informed at night and early in the morning by going to all the flats and placing on duty. If the philosophy had specified mandatory containment, we would not have the RBMK reactor and this conversation wouldnt be. In the tapes,. In his personal life, he composed poetry and encouraged its publication. No information was received about radiation-related injuries and this fact, while not conclusive, did calm us down somewhat. I tried to establish such things that would bring the institute together, like the Kurchatov General Council, the institutes general seminar, and setting up various publications that would, on order, sit on the desks of researchers so that they could quickly get all the news from their field. Frequent device stoppages, frequent cracks inside crucial structures, imperfect operation of gate valves, malfunctioning channels inside the RBMK reactorsall this was happening every year. [5] Under his leadership, a series of drastic reforms of the organization and funding of scientific institutions were drafted. So we had to send a considerable number of helicopters to take the measurements and investigate. The heating up could continue and some vertical movement of this fuel mass may occur. I was thinking about what should be the percentage of nuclear energy, and why it should be present in the Soviet energy sector. In the next section, after the consequences of the accident have been described, the current research and agricultural measures that are being carried out right now must be outlined. Maybe someone is trying to create it now. Since this happened on the night between Friday and Saturday, some were at their dachas. Where did this come from? New approaches were not welcomed. V.A.Kabanov, with the help of the heads of the Ministry of Chemical Industry managed to organize production in Dzerzhinsk that was sufficient for our needs. Sometimes, they managed to ask the Chairman of the Government Commission, or one of the members of the Commission, about some particular, specific topic. And when comrade Vedernikov and his team replaced Gusev, the construction of the sarcophagus had already begun. Although the power plant is called Chernobyl Station, it is situated 18 kilometres away from this regional city. It was not in the design, but it was there and not shown in any of the drawings. It was partially used in his [TEXT UNAVAILABLE IN SOURCE]. But with the illness of Aleksander Sergeyevich Kochinov and after the subsequent events, everything has changed. April 26 19 Valery Legasov dictated a tape recorder in. March 23, 2022 . The question should be thought through in such a way that the understanding of safe nuclear energy is as wide as possible and not limited only to the question of creating a safe reactor. The same thing was done to all surfaces that could produce dust. I already had 180 roentgens in me and, thank God, I knew how to act in situations like these. After we figured this out, and after the most active isotopes had already decayed, then mainly around August-September, very active work began, carried out by the military organizations, to decontaminate Pripyat. All this reasoning should be correlated with actual graphs: when what was emitted and when it stopped. And further, figures of fuel release, they are less clearly known. After the medics signed, it was announced that the city is being evacuated. Many prefabricated houses were ordered, made both in Finland and in the Soviet Union. All this was well-coordinated, and if memory serves me correctly, then the numbers were as follows: tens of tonnes were dropped on the first day, then hundreds on the second and third day. [7][1] The team began to be concerned with small areas of reactor activity, as well as the integrity of the concrete pad. I cannot leave unmentioned the huge role that Marshal Aganov played along with his engineering troops. This gave the impression that the reactor was live, that something serious had certainly happened. In fact, everything continues by inertia. All people responsible for the various operations would be invited. Valery Legasov's Tapes Tape 1 Tape 1 is Legasov explaining when he first heard there was a problem at Chernobyl and how he was forced to go to Chernobyl. Yes. To weld more. This was evidence that the temperatures were still high there. The station personnel was also surprising in a way. As far as I can imagine, but this is within my ability, Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev, I spoke with him three times. Look, the fire ended, Adamovich: It started at around four or five in the evening. We needed liquid nitrogen to cool down the block after we concluded that we were dealing with a cyst, he responded with a smile that the required trains had already been ordered. During the flight, our conversation was nervous. Valery Legassov transcriptions from his tapes, 100% found this document useful, Mark this document as useful, 0% found this document not useful, Mark this document as not useful, Save Valery Legassov transcriptions For Later, Recording number 1 of 5 of Valery Legasov, Still, all my life I did not think that I would have to go to such, at least the age, in, which I am now, having just experienced my fiftieth birthday, to essentially refer, to a memoir part of something, a part of a tragic, in many ways confused and, But there have been such events, such a scale and such participation of. [5][7] Despite lacking information about the state of the reactor, Legasov proposed and managed the effort to extinguish the reactor fire which would otherwise release a massive amount of radiation,[11] although the team was in continual discussions with other scientists by telephone. But, additionally, at least three major design mistakes were made in this device. This measure turned out to be pointless because when I had proposed it, the extent of the destruction of the reactor was not yet known and neither was known the natural air circulation, its natural flow. The Government Commission itself had already been relocated by this time. Earlier I had started to talk about how the work in the Government Commission (GC) was organized. For me it seemed to be important that during this proactive stage the measures to supply people, to create proper living conditions for them, to gather experience for such a large scale work organisation. It also decomposes the same way. A considerable number of staff members was injured. In case of another situation, another team will assemble and so on. That the accident did not pose any threat to the people in Western Europe and other countries. 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