The Chernobyl disaster

Since 1986 lives and will long live in our hearts is a terrible word: Chernobyl. This word has become synonymous with horrible disasters that caused large casualties. A heavy blow struck Ukraine the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. Chernobyl — a small town located on the banks of the Kiev reservoir between the rivers Uzh and Pripyat, the city which is surrounded with green forests. Summer came to rest here, a lot of people because the place was very colorful. Not so long ago on the Pripyat river built a city and called it Pripyat. It was a garden city! Beautiful boulevards and plenty of greenery made it
a pleasant resting spot.



In 1972, right outside of Chernobyl began to construct the most powerful in the USSR nuclear power station. By 1985, already finished to build four units and began to build the fifth. The night of 26 April 1986, did not foretell anything bad. At nuclear power plants conducted an experiment on the allowable load. But what an experiment! Was disabled the whole protection system of the power plant he moved to unmanaged state. Operators tried to stabilize the situation, but it was too late. And now, exactly 1 hour 24 minutes a night he heard two explosions at reactor 4, and it began to burn.

Within five minutes the firemen were on the spot. By the morning they managed to localize the blaze and extinguish it. But the worst was yet to come. The fourth reactor was completely destroyed, on all territory of the NPP was the scattered pieces of uranium and graphite emitting radiation. And the city continued to live my life for another two days. Residents no one warned about the disaster. Hundreds of thousands of people walked the streets, went to the countryside. Kiev hosted Cycling competitions. The days were hot, many people decided to spend the. And nobody felt that the green grass and trees were their enemies. Some people received these doses of radiation, that after a while died.

On 28 April, the column from 1100 buses took out from Pripyat, Chernobyl and other settlements of the exclusion zone residents. They were allowed to bring only ID and some food. The rest of the property was abandoned. And so the first days after the accident of the apartment with all the equipment, Packed with the goods the shops were for marauders Paradise. Police with great difficulty managed to prevent the theft of property. Life within a radius of 30 km from Chernobyl stopped, only occasionally was there a thrill.

Meanwhile, the Chernobyl work was in full swing. It was necessary after the reactor has burnt out, reset all fragments of uranium and graphite from the roof and collect them throughout. But first, a few words about the structure of the reactor.

The reactor is a huge trench filled with graphite. Walls, bottom and roof of the reactor made of lead (Lead is almost the only substance that does not transmit the radiation). In graphite-made holes in which are put the rods of uranium fuel. Due to a nuclear reaction released an enormous amount of heat. (A piece of uranium the size of a palm contains more energy than the whole train of coal. In addition, nuclear power plants, unlike thermal power plants, does not burn atmospheric oxygen and does not pollute the atmosphere). Heat is supplied to steam turbines that generate the current. The turbines are located in the building above the reactor. On top of the reactor is closed. The force of the explosion this cover knocked out, and everything inside start to burn.

In the early days of the reactor could not come, because the temperature in it reached 5 thousand degrees. At this time over nuclear power plant hung radioactive cloud which spread by the wind. The cloud three times circled the globe, the result of a lot of radiation spread all over Europe. Most of all, of course, went to Ukraine and Belarus.

Meanwhile, the liquidators tried though as-that to bring the cloud to the ground. Helicopter reactor bombed sand, watered. But it was very inefficient, and the air was 77 kg of radiation. This is equivalent to how at the plant dropped to a hundred(!) atomic bombs and at the same time.

When the reactor is burned out, you need to gather all the fragments of uranium and graphite. All work was done by hand. Liquidators in masks and costumes of lead shoveling shovels and chose hands pieces of radioactive material, dumped them into the burned-out reactor. Following site clearance work began on the construction over the reactor sarcophagus (huge box) to prevent leakage of radiation. Now developed and implemented a project "Shelter" on which the fourth reactor is fully lowered into the earth, and he will forever cease to be a headache.

After the Chernobyl accident many advocated its closure. In December 2000, it was closed due to outdated and imperfect security system. But what about the radiation that robbed Ukraine of hundreds of hectares of land? The period of disintegration of different radioactive particles is distinguished — from eight minutes to hundreds of thousands of years, but almost all of them (except for uranium) break apart within 30 years. So it is quite likely that in 15 to 20 years to Chernobyl and Pripyat will return again and people will live, and they will again become beautiful cities.