“We owe it to the people of Ukraine, the Chernobyl liquidators, and the global community to make Chernobyl a global priority. Do not draw your attention away from Chernobyl.”
39 Years Ago Today: Links in the Chain of the Chernobyl Disaster
By Emma Buchman, Editor for The Magpie
Emma Buchman is a historical community organizer and the editor of The Magpie. She also works as a writer and researcher at Studio ATAO. Emma has studied Chernobyl for over five years, focusing on the history of the accident, its liquidators, and the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (CEZ). She also specializes in education on local histories of racism in Maryland and Western European history.
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This post will explain the immediate chain of events that caused the world’s worst nuclear accident at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant on April 26, 1986. But in reality, the devastating tragedy at Chernobyl became inevitable from the moment Soviet leadership decided to give nuclear energy a try in the civil sector.
Born out of power madness and raised in dangerous paranoia, the Soviet Union’s very real advancements in nuclear energy are overshadowed by their reckless disregard for human life. From the design of their reactors, to the construction of their nuclear power plants, to the constant pressure to overperform foisted upon the Soviet people, Chernobyl was an inevitability for decades.
My job is not to persuade you on who is to blame for the accident, or make you switch your values on nuclear energy. My job is simply to make you remember every one of our brothers, sisters, and comrades who marched to Chernobyl, and staggered out forever changed. I know it looks long, but it is really quite manageable. Please give it a chance.
Think of Leonid Toptunov, telling his mother over a telegram not to worry as he dies of acute radiation sickness in Moscow Hospital No. 6.
Think of Vasily Ignatenkto, a firefighter who left a behind devoted wife, and an unborn child neither of them ever got to know.
Think of Boris Shcherbina, who lost so much in Chernobyl’s aftermath, but whose suffering we will never fully see.
Think of Valery Legasov, who tried to bring humanity into a place where none should be found, and was brutally punished for it.
And think of Margarita Legasova, one spouse of many who knows all too well the price that Chernobyl victims had to pay, even decades after it occurred.
Our story begins and ends in Prip’yat, Ukraine – one of many countries in Asia and Europe colonized by the Soviet Union. Prip’yat was created to house workers at the continuously growing Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. Reactor 4 opened in 1983, and plans for two additional reactors were underway at the time of the accident.
The clock starts at 2:00PM Eastern European Summer Time (EEST) on April 25, 1986. We are around 11 hours away from disaster…
Friday Afternoon
It’s April 25, close to the end of the month. The air is buzzing with preparations for the May Day holiday the following week, but factories and plants still feel the pressure of the tremendous quotas they have to meet. In Ukraine’s capital of Kyiv, the only way their goals are even reachable is with the energy provided by the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant located about 100 kilometers north…
As soon as the Kyiv dispatcher called, the test should have been cancelled for the day. But there was paperwork to be completed (which really should have been done already). The plant’s chief engineer Nikolai Fomin allowed the test to continue. Plant director Viktor Bryukanov, who was also the founder of Prip’yat, was unaware that the test was taking place.
Midnight on April 26: Shift Change
The day shift leaves and the night shift arrives for duty, most of whom have no knowledge of the safety test. Reactor 4 Control Room staff look over the instructions for the test they are to perform, but notice that some of the instructions have been crossed out with new ones written above them.
Toptunov began working at Chernobyl in 1983 after graduating from the Moscow Engineering and Physics Institute. This would also be his first time shutting down the reactor as an operator – a position he had only held for around two months. Like many workers at the plant, Akimov and Toptunov were also good friends.
A Poisoned Well
A xenon well in a nuclear reactor can also be called xenon-135 poisoning. This is when xenon-135 accumulates in the reactor core, “poisoning” it and requiring a full shut down of the reactor for several days while the xenon decays away.
Control Rods… Oh, the Control Rods
One of the most frightening parts of the disaster is the huge number of control rods that were removed from the core. Out of 211 control rods, intended to be a moderator for reactivity, only 6 remained in the core.
The Positive Void Coefficient
Describing the positive void coefficient is the bane of my existence, so here’s the definition from Wikipedia:
“A positive void coefficient means that the reactivity increases as the void content inside the reactor increases due to increased boiling or loss of coolant; for example, if the coolant acts predominantly as neutron absorber.”
While difficult to understand, it’s an important concept to keep in mind: the design of the RBMK reactor made in the Soviet Union was the only one capable of creating this positive void coefficient, making it impossible to occur anywhere else.
AZ-5
Normally, pressing the AZ-5 button would shut the reactor down; but tonight is different. Tonight, the actions and reactions happening within reactor, combined with the materials in the control rods, did the exact opposite.
No one in the Control Room knows about these factors: not Akimov, not Toptunov, not even Dyatlov. Only those with enough clearance know of these conditions and the threats that they pose.
The Point of No Return
Khodemchuk died in the second explosion. His body was never recovered, and he is forever entombed in the 4th block.
The second person to die from the accident was Vladimir Shashenok, automatic systems adjuster. He was found pinned under a steel beam that broke his back. He had severe thermal and radiation burns. His last words before losing consciousness were to go get Khodemchuk. Shashenok was taken to the hospital in Pripyat where he died at around 6:00AM.
Several hours after the accident, Akimov and Toptunov would begin to suffer from Acute Radiation Syndrome (ARS) after trying to manually open the valves to pump water into the reactor core. Unfortunately, the core was nonexistent at this point and this act of bravery would be ultimately fruitless.
Akimov died in Moscow Hospital No. 6 on May 11. Toptunov died in the same hospital three days later on May 14. He was 25.
Meanwhile, in Moscow…
While Chernobyl’s plant workers and firefighters worked to douse the fire and rescue their comrades, news of the accident wound up the long chain of Soviet bureaucracy.
To be perfectly candid, I could write entire series on Valery Legasov and Boris Shcherbina (in fact, it’s a goal of mine). They are some of the most human heroes history has ever seen. They gave their all in Chernobyl, just as they gave their all in everything they did.
I regard all of the liquidators as a light in endless darkness: their actions literally saved the world, and we all owe them a huge debt.
But not everyone’s response was as prompt as theirs. General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev would only “fully” address Chernobyl with the public on May 15, after Akimov, Toptunov, and several other Chernobyl first responders had already died. He would not go to Chernobyl itself for almost three years. By that time, many liquidators, including Valery Legasov, would also die as a result of their time at Chernobyl.
Ultimately, 30 plant workers and fire fighters would die from wounds or radiation they received on the night of the accident. The true toll of Chernobyl is incalculable, but is certainly within the tens of thousands.
From Past to Present: Don’t Forget Chernobyl
Almost 36 years after the accident on February 24, 2022, Russia declared war on Ukraine. Within the first day, they invaded the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone in Ukraine via Belarus. For over a month, they treated the Zone as their personal playground:
While they weren’t busy committing nuclear terrorism at other Ukrainian plants, Russia also continued to harass Chernobyl and its staff. The most egregious instance was a drone strike against the New Safe Confinement, which replaced the sarcophagus that was originally installed.
Chernobyl remains with its proper steward; but clearly, it is no way safe from Russian aggression. It is LONG past time that the international community accept the responsibility to help protect Chernobyl from future violence and desecration. We owe it to the people of Ukraine, the Chernobyl liquidators, and the global community to make Chernobyl a global priority. Do not draw your attention away from Chernobyl.
Вічиая Пам’ять. May the spirit and memory of those impacted by the Chernobyl disaster forever be a blessing.