Chernobyl and the Aftermath

September 11, 2012 Chernobyl, near the border of Belarus and the Dnieper River, was a catastrophic nuclear accident that had occurred on April 26, 1986. This was a result of “reactor 4 at the Chernobyl Nuclear power plant exploded, triggering a graphite fire that lasted for 10 days” (Yablokov et al., 2010). As a result of the explosion and fire, weathering patterns throughout Europe and the Northern Hemisphere changed due to the large quantities of radioactive contamination that as released into the atmosphere. In Chernobyl on the day of the explosion, there was a sudden power outage and when the emergency shutdown was attempted, rather than the power turning off, there was an extreme strike in power output, which lead to explosions. The International Atomic Energy Agency calls Chernobyl to be “the foremost nuclear catastrophe in human history” (Yablokov, 2010). Also, according to the International Programme on the Heath Effects of the Cherobyl Accident (IPHECA), the radioactivity released by the explosion in Becquerel terms was 200 times that from Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs combined (Yablokov, 2010). Belarus, Ukraine, Russia, Western Europe, and other areas of the Northern Hemisphere were covered by a radioactive cloud as a result of helicopter pilots dropping over five thousand tons of boron carbide, dolomite, sand , clay, and lead as an attempt to suffocate the flames. Immediately after the explosions, the people of the nearby city of Prypiat was not evacuated and most of the habitants when about their usual business. As a result, dozens of people fell ill within a few hours. Eighteen days after the explosion, Mikhail Gorbachev, the general secretary, appeared on the Soviet television and finally acknowledged the existence of the nuclear release. In that eighteen day time frame, tens of thousands of habitants of the area around the Chernobyl were either knowingly exposed or unknowingly “exposed to radioactive iodine-131” (Petryna, 2002). With this exposure, the radioactive iodine-131 was swiftly absorbed in the thyroid and resulted in a immense onset of thyroid cancers in children and adults as quickly as four years! These thyroid tumors and cancers could be avoided if the government had handed out “nonradioactive iodine pills within the first week of the disaster” (Petryna, 2002). In March 1996, Adriana Petryna visited the neonatal unit at the city’s hospital in Kyiv, after speaking with Dr. Zoya, she informed him of the affects they have found in newborns. “One born premature, another survived the death of his twin; another born with a dysfunctional esophagus; another with signs of prenatal asphyxiation. One born to a mother who at age nine was evacuated from the Chernobyl zones; her infant has half a lung. Another was born to a Chernobyl worker: there are six fingers on his left hand. He’s missing a trachea. His gut lay on the outside of his body. His left outer ear is gnarled and deformed” (Petryna, 2010). Dr. Zoya believes that something happened internal to the gestational process as the effect of Chernobyl. In the USA Today article that was published a year ago, Gregory Hartl from the World Health Organization was quoted stating that “6,000 cases of thyroid cancer have been detected in the region affected by Chernobyl’s disaster. When Konstantin Vengerowsky interviewed Natalia Manzurova, who was a nuclear engineer called to Chernobyl nine days after the explosion, she would spend 20 days working in the zone and would go home for 10 days. She dealt with some side effects that were often reported of nose bleeds and headaches. She learned later that she had thyroid cancer and claims that it had to have been from the four and a half years that she spent studying the effect of radiation in Chernobyl, and helping liquidators, or the cleanup workers (Vengerowsky, 2011). Thankfully, even though we can’t fix what has already happened, at least there are several recovery projects that have been put in place to help. One of the few of these recovery projects is The Chernobyl Shelter Fund. The Chernobyl Shelter Fund was set up in 1997 at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development to “assist Ukraine in transforming the existing shelter over Chernobyl’s destroyed unit 4 to a stable and environmentally safe state” (ERBD, 2010). The support of the Chernobyl Shelter Fund has been lead by the G-7 governments and the European Community since 1997. The initial pledges in 1997 grossed US$ 300 million was almost doubled by 1999 (EBRD, 2010). In conclusion, it is unbelievable to me the affects that this radiation has done on so many people in the town of Prypiat, and how the Soviet Union tried so hard to cover up the situation. I would hope that in the years to come, everyone has learned from this experience as it is said to be the worst “nuclear catastrophe in human history” (Yablokov, 2010).

Works Cited
"Chernobyl Shelter Fund." European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, 28 Apr. 2010. Web. 11 Sept. 2012. .
Petryna, Adriana. "1." Life Exposed: Biological Citizens after Chernobyl. Princeton N.J.: Princeton UP, 2002. 1-6. Print.
Vengerowsky, Konstantin. "Chernobyl Impact Felt 25 Years Later." USA Today. Gannett, 26 Apr. 2011. Web. 11 Sept. 2012. .
Yablokov, Alexey V., Vassily B. Nesterenko, Alexey V. Nesterenko, and Janette D. Sherman-Nevinger. "Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment." New York Academy of Sciences (2010): 97-101. Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment. Web. 11 Sept. 2012. .