Chernobyl Disaster Background

Chernobyl was the first nuclear power plant in Ukraine, a peaceful atomic energy program of the USSR. Just 3 km away from the nuclear power plant Propyat was built it was used to house nuclear experts and workers that are working in the nuclear plant, it was aim to be a forward thinking town with modern planning and architecture.

Chernobyl Accident 1986

(Updated November 2015)

• The Chernobyl accident in 1986 was the result of a flawed reactor design that was operated with inadequately trained personnel.
• The resulting steam explosion and fires released at least 5% of the radioactive reactor core into the atmosphere and downwind – some 5200 PBq (I-131 eq).
• Two Chernobyl plant workers died on the night of the accident, and a further 28 people died within a few weeks as a result of acute radiation poisoning.
• UNSCEAR says that apart from increased thyroid cancers, "there is no evidence of a major public health impact attributable to radiation exposure 20 years after the accident."
• Resettlement of areas from which people were relocated is ongoing. In 2011 Chernobyl was officially declared a tourist attraction.

However, on April 26th 1986 reactor number 4 went in to melt down it was over heated, and blew up at the end.  It took an entire day to evacuate Pripyat. Which leads to all the wreak havoc to human health, almost three decades after the disaster. As this is one of the very first nuclear accident happen all over the world therefore it took some time for the government to realise how far does the damage goes and how to control the radiation that is coming out of the plant. While the reactor number 4 was The New Safe Confinement will make the old Chernobyl shelter and remnants of the damaged reactor safe and environmentally secure. Completion of the project is scheduled for the end of 2017. The total cost of the Shelter Implementation Plan, of which the New Safe Confinement is the most prominent element, is estimated to be around €2.15 billion (US$3.09 billion). The New Safe Confinement alone accounts for €1.5 billion. This sarcophagus would be used to contain the radioactive emissions of chernobyl for the next 100 years. 

This two clips shows the current situation on the Chernobyl plant how the government is planning to contain the radiation, and as well as some of the secret facilities near the plant that cost way more than the actual plants. Which is said to be used to detect missiles across Europe. This shows that attention still has to be raised on to Chernobyl, as many problems are still floating up on the horizon.

Environmental and health effects of the Chernobyl accident

Several organisations have reported on the impacts of the Chernobyl accident, but all have had problems assessing the significance of their observations because of the lack of reliable public health information before 1986.

By 2000, about 4000 cases of thyroid cancer had been diagnosed in exposed children. However, the rapid increase in thyroid cancers detected suggests that some of it at least is an artifact of the screening process. Thyroid cancer is usually not fatal if diagnosed and treated early

The disaster released at least 100 times more radiation than the atom bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

Much of the fallout was deposited close to Chernobyl, in parts of Belarus, Ukraine and Russia. More than 350,000 people resettled away from these areas, but about 5.5 million remain.

Contamination with caesium and strontium is of particular concern, as it will be present in the soil for many years.

After the accident traces of radioactive deposits were found in nearly every country in the northern hemisphere.

But wind direction and uneven rainfall left some areas more contaminated than their immediate neighbours.

Scandinavia was badly affected and there are still areas of the UK where farms face post-Chernobyl controls.

Despite the lasting contamination of the area, scientists have been surprised by the dramatic revival of its wildlife.

Wild horse, boar and wolf populations are thriving, while lynx have returned to the area and birds have nested in the reactor building without any obvious ill-effects.