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. This general downfall of Soviet technology, the reasons for which can be discussed extensively and for a long time, it was simultaneously the beginning of Chernobyl. This organizational aspect should also be described. Legasov: What didnt happen didnt happen. They signed it the next day at 11 am. [7] Legasov considered these containment steps to be excessive but understandable, while also provided the infrastructure for the eventual construction of a shelter sarcophagus over the reactor. Our main goal was to prevent 2,500 degrees there. The assumption was that all this lead will get into the hot zone and evaporate, which is impossible because most of it condensed at the upper levels. After some considerations, the Government Commission allowed them to use their cars. Legasov: Because 2,500 degrees is the melting point of the uranium dioxide pellets, and the main radioactivity sits inside these pellets. Boris Yevdokimovich probably made a mistake but it is hard to say. His report was noted for its great detail and relative openness in discussing the extent and consequences of the tragedy,[24] disclosed to Western media some defects in the RBMK reactor design such as the positive void coefficient, as well as problems with operator training. The question arose about what to do with the 5th and 6th blocks. For example, at the meeting on the 14th of June, Nikolai Ivanovich Ryzhkov said in his speech that this disaster did not seem accidental to him; that nuclear energy with a degree of inevitability was heading towards such a tragic event. Many residents later, in six or seven days, were drinking milk, Legasov: Well, somewhere. So they voted him down at the elections to the Academic Council. At the same time, videos and photos of the rooms of reactor number 4 were taken continuously which allowed the engineers to select the proper solutions for the construction of the sarcophagus itself. Regularly, several times a day, the leaders of the GC spoke to comrades Dolgikh Vladimir Ivanovich, Rizhkov Nikolai Ivanovich. It had already been decided to assign the construction of the sarcophagus to SU 605, a department in the Ministry of Medium Machine Building; and that a thorough assessment of the internal condition of reactor number 4 had to be carried out, of the structural soundness of its remaining building, so that the project could rely on some analysis, on some verified data. But nevertheless, the psychological shock and, say, because of that psychological shock, cardiovascular dystonia was found in a large number of experts and continues to be found up until now. Valery Alekseyevich Legasov ( bahasa Rusia: ; 1 September 1936 - 27 April 1988) adalah kimawan anorganik dan anggota Akademi Ilmu Pengetahuan Uni Soviet. Say from cows who. In my opinion, it was unlikely. It is about an article that was requested to be written by the magazine Scientific American and must have a summarizing philosophical character. The medics objected. It means adding more and more instruments to it, some additional diagnostics tools and so on. Now it is necessary to describe in detail how the experiment itself went, who approved it, who didnt approve it, how procedures were violated and how the accident developed. But to make it the primary method of work based on that, it was absolutely obvious that this was impossible. For example, the head of the district executive committee, Plyushch, had to make preparations for the evacuation. The evacuation itself took place in an exceedingly organized manner. Legasov: In total in the reactor? 56 in Moscow and graduated with a gold medal. Recently, all of us became concerned about the quality of training and readiness of the personnel who design, build and operate nuclear power stations, because the number of facilities had sharply increased, but the quality of the personnel involved in this process had likely decreased and was decreasing before our eyes. The trip was in the evening. Thats why more staff is needed to operate our stations, there are many poor devices, many imprecisions in the operating systems that service the station. As of today, it has been absolutely reliably established, and it must be unambiguously written, that there were two consecutive explosions, the second more powerful than the first. His headmaster observed that Legasov "is a grown up man, a future statesman, a talented organizer. What should I do? And the second one answers, You do what is crossed out. Can you imagine? He was at a loss because for him, the situation was, how do you say, not planned for. In fact, everything continues by inertia. The first decontamination efforts began even while the conglomeration processes inside reactor number 4 were ongoing. At points, he would pause to criticize a chairman or a specialist for higher rates of workplace injuries, or poor financial performances, or for improper executions of technical operations within our ministry. And there is still so much to do! Of course, all this was done in the name of productivity. But I get only 180 and for me, a bonus of 100 roubles is important. The chairman of the Politburo, M.S.Gorbachev immediately warned me that, at that moment, he was not interested in the culpability and causality of the accident. The severity of the radiation conditions meant that the reactor could only be approached from the air, and even then nothing could get closer than about 200 metres above the reactor. Because the discussion itself shows that there were several ways to get the reactor to the state it was in. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. The temperature inside the destroyed block would be limited by the temperature of the burning graphite, which is round about 1,500C or slightly higher. 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. But how to construct the concrete plate under the reactor - this was totally unknown to us. From these telegrams, I immediately realised that no one [in the world] was prepared for this kind of accident. On the whole, this extraordinary situationnot a trivial situation, a tragic situation, a difficult situation of immense magnitudehas shown that it requires not only the mobilisation of considerable communication resources, but also a very creative and skilful use of these resources, to ensure that the population receives information in the needed sequence and quantity, who can refer to the information with complete confidence, and most importantly, be able to use this information for practical purposes; or to indicate when to worry, and conversely, when to stay calm so that it is quite regular and not sudden. He was not in Moscow at the time but in another region where he was leading a Communist party asset meeting. In fact, because of ecological reasons, and many people do not understand this, it is impossible not to develop [nuclear energy]. He is not in any way timid or sluggish at making decisions. He organized a team in one of the industrial areas of Pripyat that would prepare these solutions. But all this was done remarkably clearly and quickly. Full approval of our actions; very calmly. was a good physicist, of course, but he also got into this story. The Operative group itself however didnt show any tension at all. They also dont have containments because they are large. This is the function of the science supervisor, not creating a particular device with given properties. So they directed all their efforts towards harmonizing these speeds to make a dry channel. "[5] At one point, Antoshkin scolded Legasov for taking too many personal risks when he was key to the operation. Thats why I understood the words of our Chairman of the Council of Ministers in a larger context, that it is not a feature of the development of nuclear energy that has come to this state, but a feature of the development of the national economy that has led to this. 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. Whatever radioactive particles would escape, they would be filtered out. Heres a way to organize work on construction sites: inconsistency in different types of production, say, the production of fuel elements; the machine-building equipment, the unpreparedness of builders to accept this equipment on time; garbage on construction sites; constant, incomprehensible changes in the number of construction staff (by construction I mean at nuclear power plants), at times too many, at others too few. Direct measurements were made in Pripyat. But the growth was not qualitative but quantitative. It didnt take long for a confirmation of the correctness of my understanding of these words. But these experiments showed that the products of combustion will nevertheless carry away a large amount of radioactivity with them. And the city of Pripyat was considerably decontaminated by about the same time when the sarcophagus construction was ending. I remembered that experts from my own institute were already used to what was happening during the construction of the nuclear power plants. [7] Legasov and Anatoly Alexandrov described the meltdown scenarios, and Legasov agreed with the plan to tunnel under the reactor to provide cooling. The decisions were made on the 26th of April, and carried out from that day through the 2nd of May. The scientific part of the team, who were responsible for the correctness of decisions, made these decisions without the support of Moscow, Kiev, or Leningrad. Like scarecrows all of them were hung. A lot of work was done when comrade Pologikh Boris Grigorievich led this group. Because an attempt by a non-professional to bring some kind of insight into their work could hardly be acceptable. We didnt know this during the trip there - we were just guessing at the scale of the event. It was necessary to design a forced ventilation system for the sarcophagus so that if there was not enough natural ventilation, it would be possible to remove heat by switching on the forced one. This was the rough composition of the government commission that I remember as the initial one. There were no new areas that I was responsible for. Buried and destroyed. Measuring the surface temperature in this manner was still an exceedingly difficult task. So we have Chernobyl. Measures were taken to prevent the radionuclides from getting into the groundwater. It was used for such cases when, say, key decisions were taken like whether to make the RBMK 1500, or whether to introduce a heat exchange intensifier to this reactor. All this was readied but never went into action. The speed of introducing safety systems was, as it seemed, insufficient. Also worrying was the fact that it was an isolated Soviet line of development. I will not describe the whole thing in detail here. Ivan Stepanovich would tell him his point of view and then, when more detailed, specific, technical information was needed, he would ask, To whom should I give the phone, Velikhov or Legasov? And in the first call, he said, Give the phone to Legasov.. The head of the Government Commission was Boris Yevdokimovich Shcherbina. I fought against this project from May; an absolutely useless project. [28] He gave interviews to Novy Mir and Yunost in which he changed his public stance and expressed his concern that cultural failings and Soviet science losing its way had led inevitably to nuclear disaster. He simply retired? But this talk of the reactor smouldering, emitting radioactivity in considerable amounts, were so strong that orders were given to manufacture various types of covers for it. He regularly found proper solutions when one or the other difficult situation arose. But these are such personal things. It melts and has high volatilization [sic] of saturated vapours. And, indeed, in the hands of qualified people that did their job well, our devices seemed both reliable and safe to operate. Maybe, at a glance, to figure out a contradiction one had to do additional work. This work had only now begun. For this temperature range, lead would be the most suitable element which would additionally act as a shield against radiation. However, Baybakovs role was that he consulted Slavsky and Neporozhny as energy experts. The explosion was volumetric in nature. This increase in the number of people required new ways of organizing work because it was no longer possible to personally give specific instructions and be done with it. And I repeat that it should be based on the work we have previously done so that we refer to our own sources and not someone elses. Obviously, people thought that we are panicking and suggested a solution of such and such composition, containing nitrate, to be dropped there. In other words, our minds were entirely on the upcoming labour. There they would burst and cover a significant area; the solution would then polymerise and solidify. Indeed, even a person here is ill and I am lying down. The first because it melts at low temperatures and because it has some ability to extract radioactive elements, on top of which it can act as a protective shield against gamma rays - these facts made it a good option. Because his colleagues got bonuses from the Ministry; because the institute was part of the Ministry of Medium Machine Building. I will repeat myself that groundwater was relatively close to the surface under the station. The first design mistake was that there should be at least two emergency protection systems, as required by international standards and as common sense suggests. A lot of dams was constructed, dykes, that were meant to hold the contaminated debris, foliage and all that had contaminated the surface of the water and prevent radioactivity from spreading along the Pripyat and the Dnieper. Well there is an *abridged* transcript at which I've taken the liberty of Google-Translating (not easy due to character limits) to Valery Legasov tape recordings 7.6K views View upvotes 6 Alexander Rumiantsev B.A. Legasov: I heard them, and talked with Ryzhkov. Operators are trying to cool it, however, it was, already known that one or two people had already passed away. So this issue was somewhat resolved. Because the Pripyat river by itself formed a considerable water basin, but even more - it was flowing into the Dnieper river. There was no exact, predetermined plan of action - our Government Commission had to improvise. Our Institute was not part of the Ministry of Medium Machine Building. We tried to use robots but this generally was not very successful. So, from a strictly professional perspective, I understand the safety issues, and how to manage them, very well. 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. and a lot of attention was paid to the condition of the Pripyat river itself, the Kiev reservoir. Around 11 a.m. on the 26th of April, Boris Evdokimovich [Scherbina], after considering all our recommendations, decided to go ahead with the mandatory evacuation. More and more resources were spent on creating facilities that were not directly related to nuclear energy. [8][9][10] He also had two grandchildren, Misha and Valerik. The last time I saw him was in the Politburo meeting on the 14th of July [transcript of the Politburo meeting] when the cause of the Chernobyl accident was being discussed. Secondly, we cannot talk about the hydrogen explosion without mentioning that, in addition to the steam explosion, chemical energy related to interactions within all that molten mass was added. My responsibilities included chemical physics, and separation of isotopes and substances, as well as the use of nuclear energy in the domestic infrastructure in the form of isotopes or something else. Dollezhal Research and Development Institute of Power Engineering (NIKIET) led by comrade Egorov supplied us with most precise data on isotope composition and on the spread of radioactivity. However, my position is somewhat distinctive. The probability of [another] Chernobyl has now increased. And once containment became optional, temptation arose to build another [reactor] line that would help the country without overloading the machine building industry. And finally, the third design mistake, which is hard to explain, was that all the numerous emergency protection systems were accessible to the station staff. Because of all the metals that were there, it is the most fusible. He, knowing this, is not in a hurry to create a strong and appropriate alternate organization. Well, they didnt kick him out but made his work environment intolerable. But the main reason is not even the errors in the design of the reactorwhich of course had their place and for which probably the respective specialists will have to answerbut the main reason is the violation of the basic safety principle for such devices. 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. But also with some reliable design It requires that if you have some kind of emergency protection system which stops, say, a car, a train or something else, then you must have at least two protection systems. I tried to organize opportunities for comparing different points of view, different approaches to general problems of physics and energy. A proper management system had to be established for scientific research, design and execution of projects across all these very diverse areas of work. Nothing else bothered him. 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. But, naturally, in the warehouse of my character, for many years of well-. There was military acceptance of each piece of equipment, specially trained personnel, the highest requirements, etc. Legasov: Uranium yes, the fuel itself. Although the power plant is called Chernobyl Station, it is situated 18 kilometres away from this regional city. I repeat that I myself am not a reactor man despite being the First Deputy Director of the Institute. I must say that all physicists, especially Viktor Alekseevich Sidorenko, felt that the conditions would only change for the worse, and insisted on the mandatory evacuation. This too was a point of concern. As western experts have shown after our report at the IAEA. It only handles the operation, nothing more. In reality, all this was stored in old and used books. But they were painfully lacking in good control systems and extremely poor in diagnostic systems. The work went on as had been planned before, that is in three aspects: one, monitoring the state of reactor number 4, because the material drops had ended. However, the thing that I was able to achieve was to create an expert group that would perform an expert comparison between different types of devices, in terms of their economy, universality and safety. The operators made mistakes because they had to complete the experiment which they considered a matter of honour. And gradually, the following framework of work organization emerged. Anatoly Petrovich Aleksandrov and my student, who called me just now, Silivanov, they thought about which material to use that would generate CO2 and also conduct heat. The following piece of audio is a self-made recording in English, based on the original Russian transcripts from the recorded tapes of Valery Legasov. The show opens with Legasov's suicide, on the second anniversary of the explosion. He is now mainly remembered for his work in containment of the Chernobyl disaster and presenting the investigation findings to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna. We went in and bought ourselves some very nice shirts. He felt that the leadership would be split between the council and the USSR Academy of Sciences, saying "This will lead to disaster. He was assigned to compile a report for the International Atomic Energy Agency about the causes and aftermath of the accident. He wrote a doctoral dissertation and later published a book at approximately that time, in which he proved the impossibility of having nuclear stations without containments, no matter the type, VVER or RBMK; that it was dangerous and criminal. But not in the accident itself. Because information came out in separate blocks. With the approval of the director of the Institute, with his full support, the first deputy was working on organising system-wide research on the structure of nuclear energy, an activity that was of little interest to the Ministry and was happening solely because of the support from Anatoly Petrovich Aleksandrov. At least not at the age that I currently am, just into my fifties. Execution of the command begun immediately. I witnessed all this, but it was hard for me to intervene in the process purely professionally while general declarations on this subject were received with hostility. But then it turned out that the sidewalls of the reactor were wrecked. Various parts of fuel assemblies were visible. They did not know what to do; and if they received direct instructions, they did not demonstrate any influence, management skills or ability to remedy the situation. Something to change into. During the first flight it became clear that the entire reactor had been destroyed. 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