No sooner had passions subsided about the success / failure of the completion of the nine-year epic fantasy "Game of Thrones", as the American TV channel HBO, together with the British Sky, unleashed a new "bomb" on the viewer in the form of a five-part mini-series "Chernobyl", filmed on the basis of real events narrating about one of the most horrific nuclear disasters in the history of mankind - the explosion of the reactor of the fourth power unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, which occurred on the night of April 25-26, 1986. Dozens of books have been written on this topic today, a huge number of articles and reports from the words of eyewitnesses and participants in the events. Acquaintance with the first episode really leaves no doubt: the authors of the series got acquainted with a significant part of this material.
According to the creators of the series, it is based on the real stories of the liquidation participants: the Minister of Construction of Oil and Gas Enterprises of the USSR and a chemist who was investigating the causes of the accident. It is their characters that we observe in the series. Indeed, from the very beginning "Chernobyl" amazes with its realism and the way of conveying the Soviet entourage of those years. The attention to detail is literally manic. And this is taking into account the fact that it was filmed by people who were not at all close in spirit and mentality. Nevertheless, some points in it still raise questions not only from a narrative (historical), but also from a scientific point of view.
Chronology of events and not entirely adequate actions of city residents
At the beginning of the series, it is shown how the inhabitants of Pripyat at night and with their children look at the fire. The camera focuses on the radioactive dust settling on them.
In reality, most of the city's residents learned about the fire at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant only in the morning. And the families of nuclear scientists would hardly have decided to stand under the settling ash of a burning nuclear power plant.
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Chronological inaccuracy is also observed in the scene with the helicopter carrying the mixture to fill the burning reactor. No, the tragic incident itself happened in reality, but much later, a few months after the accident, and not the next day, as shown in the film. The series also hints that the helicopter crash was due to the aircraft flying too close to the reactor and receiving a huge dose of radiation that disabled its electronics. In reality, the liquidators' helicopter crashed after colliding with a crane, catching its cable.
Fire in the 4th power unit
According to the former engineer of the 4th power unit and liquidator of the accident, Alexei Breus, unlike the film, there was actually nothing to burn in the reactor. “The nuclear reaction continued in it.
When people went to the reactor and looked inside in order to understand what state it is in and what to do … The film shows that they were actually forced, they did not want to, but they left. In fact, it was enough just to understand that it needs to be done. And people themselves agreed and left. Yes, then it cost them their lives. The first, as far as I know, went to Alexander Kudryavtsev, then Anatoly Sitnikov. They died soon after."
There were no powerful dosimeters at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant
In one of the initial episodes, after the accident, the station staff are trying to measure the background radiation at the station, using weak dosimeters showing a maximum threshold of 3.6 roentgens. According to Vladimir Mikhailov, one of the liquidators of the Chernobyl accident, there really were no powerful dosimeters at the station. Simply because no one imagined that this could happen.
Later in the series, it was shown that the radiation level in the destroyed reactor is 15,000 roentgens. In reality, on the approaches to the fourth power unit, the background at that time varied from 1500 to 3000 roentgens. A monstrous excess of the norm, but still not 15 thousand, as shown in the series. Significantly higher values were noted above the reactor itself, above a breach in the roof, from where tons of radioactive substances were ejected into the atmosphere.
Exposure to radiation on the human body
The description of the collision of people with radiation by the authors of the series is largely conveyed accurately. All the symptoms that eyewitnesses spoke of are demonstrated here: nausea, metal taste in the mouth, of course, erythrema, "nuclear tan" or blush, which is a consequence of radiation damage to the upper layer of the skin. This is one of the signs of acute radiation sickness. At the same time, there was a place of inaccuracy: a fireman lifting a piece of graphite from the reactor for a few seconds, and after a while he was taken away by ambulance because of the skin peeling off his hand. The station worker holds the steel door open and rests against it with his hip, and after literally an instant his trousers are soaked in blood - so irradiated was metal. In reality, application radiation burns appear 1-3 days after injury.
However, in general, the story of a firefighter, which is given special attention and at first glance seems to be a fiction of scriptwriters who want to give the plot more drama, is actually true. You can be convinced of this by reading the book of Belarusian journalism and the writer, Nobel Prize laureate in literature, Svetlana Aleksievich “Chernobyl Prayer. Chronicle of the Future”. The story is written from the words of the fireman's wife.
Vavilov-Cherenkov effect
In one of the scenes of the series, a dialogue takes place between two characters, in which one tells the other that the air in the city is glowing, to which he replies that this is the Vavilov-Cherenkov effect.
In fact, the Vavilov-Cherenkov effect is a glow that occurs in dense transparent media when high-energy particles pass through them. It can be observed, for example, in the coolant of an operating reactor, where the liquid actually glows under the influence of the flux of neutrons bombarding it.
The explosion of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant was compared with Hiroshima
The series argued that the fire at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant releases more radiation into the atmosphere every hour than from the explosion of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. However, this comparison is not entirely correct.
The radiation exposure to the inhabitants of Hiroshima was direct. In other words, their radiation dose depended primarily on how close they were to the epicenter of the explosion. If we talk about the case of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, then the radiation had a long-term impact on the environment, due to the release of a huge amount of radioactive material into the atmosphere, which spread over a large area.
In Hiroshima, the main damaging factors were the flash from the nuclear explosion and the release of alpha-beta gamma radiation. In Chernobyl, they were completely different. That is why these two events are incomparable. The only aspect that both events have in common is the high level of radiation.
The likelihood of a second explosion and the consequences for Europe
In the vision of the authors of the series, Soviet scientists feared the possibility of a second explosion due to the contact of the corium (a molten mixture of uranium fuel cells, lead sprinkled on the reactor, graphite and other materials) with water from a bubbler located in the reactor building. One of the heroes of the series emphasized that the power of this explosion could be 2-4 megatons. Everything within a radius of 30 kilometers will be destroyed. In addition, it was said that the explosion would cause a shock wave capable of “destroying the entire population of Kiev and part of Minsk”, having generally disastrous consequences of the release of radiation for most of Ukraine, Poland, Belarus, Latvia, Lithuania, Germany, Czechoslovakia and Romania.
In reality, the hero of the series clearly overestimated the power and consequences of the second explosion. Apparently the writers did this to give their material even more dark colors and drama. Moreover, the very possibility of a second explosion is being questioned. A hypothetical explosion of molten fuel when mixed with bubbler water would also not be nuclear, but thermal. The reactor core did not exist by that time.
Nevertheless, despite the fact that the probability was hypothetical, it was decided to remove the risks. Three workers of the nuclear power plant, being no more than knee-deep in radioactive water, entered the room, found the valves, opened them without any problems, providing drainage of water, and returned successfully. In the series, their fate was a foregone conclusion. In reality, all three later participated in other tasks to eliminate the accident. One died 20 years after the accident, the other two are still alive.
How did the "Red Forest" of Chernobyl appear?
In one of the scenes of the series, it is shown how the green forest suddenly turned rusty-red. In reality, this was not entirely true. More precisely, it took several days, and not several hours from the moment of the accident.
The fact is that the pine forest adjacent to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant took over the largest share of the release of radioactive dust during the explosion of the reactor and dried up and "rusted" in just a few days. The trees, like filters, trapped the radioactive dust, rapidly flying away from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant with the wind. For two years, the pines were felled on Geiger counters and buried with leaded bulldozers.
Dead birds and shooting animals
An eerie moment of the series - dead birds fell on the heads of the pioneers. Was it real? Not. This could not happen, since Pripyat is located three kilometers from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. According to historical data, birds affected by a high dose of radiation did fall, but only in the vicinity of the destroyed reactor within a radius of 200-300 meters.
One more point. The series shows how a detachment of Soviet soldiers is shooting homeless animals in abandoned settlements. It's true. Approximately 36 hours after the explosion, residents of Pripyat were given only 50 minutes to collect their belongings and evacuate on the buses that came for them. They were not allowed to take pets with them. Residents of the city believed that they would be able to return home in a few days, but, as you know, this move turned out to be permanent.
As a result, the entire city was filled with orphaned animals. To avoid the spread of radiation contamination and rabies, the soldiers were instructed to shoot them.
Using robots to eliminate an accident
The series shows how robots sent to eliminate the accident fail one by one due to exposure to radiation. As a result, people clear the site manually.
In fact, everything was so. According to the liquidator of the accident, Vladimir Mikhailov, German and Japanese vehicles were used, which quickly broke down. Nevertheless, a way out was found for land-based types of work. And this is not a moon rover, as suggested by one of the heroes of the film. For this, radio-controlled bulldozers developed at the Sibtsvetmetavtomatika enterprise were used. Bulldozers cleared the site near the station from rubble and prepared it for the foundation for the sarcophagus. Then they, as well as other equipment, were thrown there: it was already impossible to wash these cars.
Nikolay Khizhnyak