HBO’s falsified Chernobyl “documentary”
Imagine HBO doing a similar profit-making film about the tragic Chilean rugby team
Dr. Kelvin Kemm
Late in 1972, Uruguayan Air Force flight 571 was taking a college rugby team and family members from Montevideo, Uruguay to Santiago, Chile. It carried five crew members and 40 passengers.
As the aircraft crossed the frozen Andes, the pilot made a tragic navigation error and descended towards what he thought was Pudahuel Airport. The aircraft struck a rocky mountain ridge. Both wings were sheared off, and the aircraft fuselage raced like a toboggan down the steep snow-covered slope, coming to rest on a glacier.
Only 33 survived the crash, and five more died during the freezing night that followed. Seventeen days after the crash, an avalanche struck the wrecked remains and killed eight more. The remaining starving and half-frozen survivors were devout Catholics – highly moral and responsible, but facing certain death, while the dead lay frozen outside in the snow.
After personal agonizing and prayer, they made the dramatic decision to eat their deceased fellow passengers. One team member was a medical student, who explained that brains and certain other organs contained valuable nutrients. So they ate those as well as the human flesh. Two of the strongest survivors set off on an incredible 38-mile (60-kilometer) trek to find rescuers.
After a staggering 72 days on the glacier, the remaining survivors were rescued, two days before Christmas. Despite initially reacting in horror, people worldwide ultimately sympathized deeply with the plight and decisions of those survivors, who prayed over their dead comrades and cut pieces from the bodies only with great sorrow, reverence and respect.
A television program portrayed their agonizing saga honestly, accurately and sympathetically.
However, imagine if decades later another producer decided to make a new “dramatized” version. It begins with the aircraft crash, fractured fuselage ride down the mountain and snowy desolation. But then it descends into “artistic license,” to ensure more horror, more viewers (more profits).
Imagine the new “inspired by true events” version showing callous survivors slashing bodies with axes and using machetes to tear out livers and hammers to smash skulls for the brains. After dinner they play a wild drumming rhapsody on the fuselage, using human bones as drumsticks as they sing.
How do you think TV audiences would respond? With sympathy and understanding for the survivors – or revulsion and disgust? Would they call for forgiveness – or demand prosecution?
If this sounds absurd, it has a very real recent counterpart that took similar liberties with the facts in order to make a more “dramatic” program and attract more viewers. I watched both the Chilean rugby team television program a few years ago and the recent HBO-produced TV series “Chernobyl.”
The Chernobyl tragedy is also an undeniable part of history. People died, though fewer than 60. Things went terribly wrong, for many reasons. But today tourists visit the Chernobyl area and wildlife thrives.
So what actually happened? Did reality come anywhere close to what HBO presented in its program?
The HBO production apparently recorded record viewership figures. That was undoubtedly good for the network’s bottom line. But was it honest income, to be proud of?
As a nuclear scientist, I can tell you the fundamental story of the sequence of events of the 1986 Chernobyl accident as portrayed by HBO was correct. Issues around governance and procedure as portrayed by HBO were essentially correct. But other important aspects were false or falsified.
The blood and skin peeling scenes, for example. Sadly, the producers lied – intentionally or incompetently, it seems, to gain box office income. They succeeded in that goal. But they insulted us nuclear scientists and insulted the intelligence of viewers who knew a bit more science than most of HBO’s audience. The HBO producers also led many viewers down a twisted path to further ignorance and confusion, which certainly should not be the objective of any honest history documentary.
The series tended to show the Soviet authorities of the day as uncaring and unskilled. That was not true. Yes, Chernobyl happened during the formality and rigidity of the Soviet communist system of the era. And yes, the military-type hierarchy of the time did play a role.
However Russian nuclear scientists had actually and for some time worried greatly about that particular Chernobyl reactor design and had voiced their concerns to senior authorities. Albeit slowly, those authorities were responding. Tests of failure systems were being conducted.
Chernobyl had been ordered to carry out one such test, to assess the speed of response to a failure. A test had been set up. Chernobyl staffers were instructed to create a deliberate failure mode situation, to see how the reactor responded. This was arranged and was supposed to have been done in the daytime, when the main skilled team was on duty.
However, high demands for electricity in the district caused them to delay the test until around midnight, when the lower calibre night shift team was on duty. In addition, the more senior decision makers in the line-of-command had gone home.
To clip all the technicalities very short: when the intentional test procedure started to go wrong, worried and inexperienced Chernobyl technicians made some wrong moves and rapidly compounded the unfolding drama. As the reactor spun out of control, the rapid communications line via local headquarters to Moscow did not function properly; the seniors had gone home and could not help.
Moreover, that reactor type had been built to an out-of-date design that contained a large amount of highly combustible graphite. It caught fire. Someone correctly called the fire brigade – which responded quickly, but mistakenly attacked the fire as if it were a burning woodworking factory.
The firemen bravely attacked the flames – without fully realizing that the smoke carried radioactive dust and other harmful material. Lumps of burning graphite that lay scattered around contained radioactive debris from the initial gas blast that blew the reactor to pieces.
Other first responders were also brought in: police, military, helicopter pilots. All did their duty, as they would have in any other major fire. But radioactive dust and smoke were swirling around.
Human bodies do not become radioactive in a situation like that. What can happen is that someone, like a fireman, leaves the scene with radioactive dust on his clothes and maybe in his hair. Any radiation protection officer present would then make him take all his clothes off and take a good shower, before going home.
Firemen were not radioactively contagious, as HBO portrayed. A fireman could not have irradiated his pregnant wife at home, as HBO claimed. Her baby could not have died of heart and liver disease as a result; that too is pure HBO bunk. Something like playing music on the aircraft fuselage in the Andes, using human bones as drumsticks. Very good for viewer horror, but very far from the truth.
A very large dose of nuclear radiation will undoubtedly kill a person. But skin will not peel off one’s face. In fact a human can pick up a fatal dose of radiation in under an hour and not even know it. The person would go home in apparently perfect condition, but then start to feel as if he had eaten rotten fish for lunch. Vomiting would result and flu-like symptoms would set in. Over a couple of hours this would lead to shaky hands and wobbly legs, bad vision and a general breakdown of body functions. Death would come quite quickly, within days. But in reality no viewer-riveting skin peeling off the face, or blood dripping from anywhere would occur.
After the real Chernobyl incident, 29 fire-fighters died – from what medics call “synchronous injuries.” In other words “a combination of factors.” Undoubtedly radiation exposure played a major role. But those brave men also attacked high-temperature flames, breathed in dense toxic smoke and physically exerted themselves under terrible conditions. There were numerous other errors, as well.
It seems HBO producers did not consult any nuclear physics specialists, or medical people knowledgeable in the field. They relied on more dramatic emotional advice.
HBO must have made a lot of money with the series. Their shareholders are no doubt very pleased. But HBO has not done any service to the truth or to the education and enlightenment of viewers.
The series was “fiction inspired by real events” – not a “documentary.” HBO should issue apologies.
Dr Kelvin Kemm is a nuclear physicist and CEO of Nuclear Africa Ltd, a project management company based in Pretoria, South Africa. He does international consultancy work in strategic development.
Thunderf00t did a video titled: “HBOs Chernobyl: BUSTED!” on this too …
Did HBO get it wrong, or did some of the scientists at the time?
It seems to me that it has pretty much been acknowledged that the tank draining and the mining underneath the reactor turned-out to be unnecessary…but they did happen, and they weren’t undertaken out of fun.
re: “Did HBO get it wrong, or did some of the scientists at the time?”
That would seem to be the next layer ‘down’ in the onion … the first steps in this process involves “gathering statements” and facts and comparing notes, and evaluating the ‘facts’ ascertained up to that point. If something seems to be “Rotten in Denmark” then further investigation would seem to be called for. Everyone is going to have a different ‘pain’ (validity of the evidence) threshold in this process, and until certain minimum criteria or evidence for one case or another is met, doubt will outweigh certainty on any/for any given stated or in-mind conclusion.
I studied radiation effects on humans as part of my first physics degree. At that time the only data we had available was from Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The doses from those weapons were very high. We had no data for low dose radiation so we extrapolated to zero.
It turns out, following Chernobyl, we wer wrong. Low dose radiation shows no statistically significant effects. However, the data from chernobyl should enhance our knowledge , or fill the gaps, for lower dose radiation.
The one positive side-effect of Chernobyl was it so shook the confidence of the Soviet government, the people for the bureaucrats, the centralized system itself and its ability to deal with an unfolding crisis it quickened its downfall and the break up of the USSR into the various separate governments.
Also to be clear, most historians now contrary to Gorbachev’s claim see Chernobyl as the “trigger and not the cause of the collapse of the USSR.
Could we have such a gargantuan failure of government (policy) to bring about a Chernobyl-style collapse of the US government? A Big One Earth quake on the West Coast is about the only disaster scenario that could be conceivable.
But loss of faith in government is how revolutions happen, how governments fall. The people lose trust in their government, the system, and demand to tear it down. That is the Marxist revolutionary credo.
We see the tendency of Left in US doing that with daily political attacks on border control and immigration authorities, on the police (the BLM movement). But the US federal government is seemingly resilient to such because so much government control and police powers are actually in the hands of each state. Even though the Democrats like to blame FEMA for the slow response to the Katrina Hurricane disaster and flooding in New Orleans (mainly because Bush was the President), much of the real problem was the slow response of the state of Louisiana to request FEMA help. So it was Obama who was the real benefactor of the major Hurricane land-fall drought during his tenure, he didn’t get his Katrina, but he did get the disaster of T/S Sandy flooding on Long Island, Manhattan, and the Jersey shore. But election year politics meant everyone was determined to not let Sandy response be compared to the Katrina response. Indeed, we saw NJ GOP Governor Christy and President Obama in a political Bro-mance during the Sandy FEMA response.
And in many ways, it’s the Left that needs and wants the public to have confidence in the government so that the Left can take over healthcare, all energy sectors, and expand Big Government in general. But then everyone saw how devastating it was for the botched roll-out of ObamaCare in 2013. So it is surprising that now today every Democrat Presidential contender is calling for nationalized healthcare in the US. They must think people have forgotten the botched roll-out for just a few 6-8 million people, and now they want to do it for 170 million mostly satisfied people on their employer’s private insurance.
Sadly as we’ve often seen, Democrats rarely learn from their policy mistakes. And when they are forced to confront them, they blame shift. A Big One earthquake on a populated West Coast city though could be a game changer.
100%
Chernobyl obviously was one of the major factors that accelerated the disintegration of the Soviet power. The other one was the catastrophic failure of the Afghan war. The third one was Gorbachev’s hapless handling of the anti-alcoholism campaign in Russia, where alcoholism was the way of life, the only possible escape for 9 out of 10 people. The whole country was abuzz about these things. I’ve been there, I remember.
We should have a hope to know the whole truth only when Putin’s regime, steeped in lies and blood, will be out.
Things might have turned out differently if not for Gorbachev. The combinaton of Gorbachev and Reagan was the key to the demise of the totalitarian Soviet Union. Gorbachev was willing to travel down a new path. That’s what it took. And I don’t doubt that the Chernobyl disaster had something to do with taking a new path.
Too bad Russia is reverting to its totalitarian past with Putin at the helm. Perhaps when Puting is no longer in power things will improve.
Perestroika and Glasnost, Solidarity , Boris Yeltsin, Lech Walesa, Pope John Paul II. A few more keys to that era too …
The author describes why the test happened at night as if the HBO series didn’t portray it that way.
It did.
He’s just noting that the crew that was supposed to perform the test could not. He seems to be trying to argue that Soviet authorities were caring enough to assign the test to a skilled crew but ended-up in the hands of a less-skilled and inexperienced crew while senior staff had left for the night. Somehow this is supposed to be defending against suggestions that the Soviets were “uncaring and unskilled.”
About 180** people a day, from mid-June to mid-July each year, seek treatment for fireworks-related injuries;
so I’ve read in the Wash. Post.
**or 280 from another source
often there will be 5 to 10 deaths per season
Deaths via motorcycle are about 5,000 per year; injuries about 90,000.
Stair accident falls: deaths ~ 12,000; injuries => 1 million
Of the various ways for getting hurt or killed — what is more likely going to happen to you?
Where does HBO call it a “documentary”?
https://www.hbo.com/chernobyl
In fact, HBO makes it very clear it’s not a “documentary”:
” reimagines ”
Is that a word?
Will I find it in a 1970’s dictionary?
HBO aired it … Sky (Atlantic) produced it – what does Sky call it? (Hint: I posted on it above.)
HBO begs to differ! They say it was “an HBO/Sky co-production.” My inclination is to take their word over yours, “_Jim”.
https://www.hbo.com/content/hboweb/en/chernobyl/about.html
From that HBO webpage “about Chernobyl”:
P.S. I have no idea what “reimagines” means, but I doubt anyone who was trying to produce a documentary would say that the documentary “reimagines” the historical event. Rather, I assume “reimagines” is similar to what “A Night to Remember” and “Titanic” did with the actual historical event of the Titanic’s sinking. Or what the movie “Lincoln” (starring Daniel Day-Lewis) did with the historical event of the 14th amendment.
In other words, it’s completely false to claim that the HBO co-production “Chernobyl” was a “documentary.” To my knowledge, they never made that claim. In fact, it’s very clear that they were not claiming it was a documentary.
re: “In other words, it’s completely false to claim that the HBO co-production “Chernobyl” was a “documentary.” ”
Not my dog. Not your dog. Why are you barking then?
re: ” My inclination is to take their word over yours, “_Jim”.”
You go your way, I’ll go mine; If HBO was fully capable of this production alone, why did they involve Sky Atlantic? Any answer on that one?
Perhaps you missed this too (I think you did) from above: Jared Harris and Emily Watson star in this hard-hitting Sky Original exploring the truth surrounding Chernobyl
Hmmm … ” hard-hitting Sky Original ” – what does that mean, “Sky Original”? Any idea? Note, too, no mention of HBO in that statement.
I always care about what’s true and what isn’t. Kelvin Kemm claimed it was a “documentary.” HBO made it clear that it wasn’t.
I have no knowledge of TV production. But it appears that Sky is a British company, whereas HBO is American. So perhaps it was an HBO/Sky co-production to address a bigger market.
The HBO statement seems very thorough to me:
Absent better evidence to the contrary, I’m guessing that the HBO characterization is accurate. As you yourself note, the Sky version both ignores HBO completely (which, since it was a major HBO hit, is clearly not the complete truth)…and Sky’s version also contains the silly “exploring the truth” claim.
In this case, there is insufficient info provided to make a decisive conclusion either way; this does not, however, seem to deter you in the least, which leads one (such as myself) to conclude that defects likely exist in the “process” by which you ascertain “a truth”.
The statement “I always care about what’s true and what isn’t.” in light of the fast and loose handling of technical facts in this “docu-drama” is also striking; apparently, you only care about specific ”truths’, and not all ‘truths’, or only when said “truth” is in your favor? Selectivity of this order, of this nature, smacks of a disingenuous of sorts, inspired perhaps by mild character disorder perhaps? IDK … this is between you and whomever you have determined is your “god” at this point, and, to use a phrase attributable to Mark Cuban on Shark Tank: “I’m out.”
“In this case, there is insufficient info provided to make a decisive conclusion either way;…”
I think the evidence is overwhelming that HBO never claimed it was a “documentary.” (I notice Kelvin Kemm never provide the source of the quotation marks for the word “documentary.”)
You provided evidence that Sky misrepresented the mini-series, but the headline is:
“HBO’s falsified Chernobyl ‘documentary'”
…so what Sky wrote is not directly relevant.
As far as my interest in the truth, versus your interest…or Kelvin Kemm’s for that matter: I’m guessing that, after questions about the accuracy of the HBO miniseries came out, between Kelvin Kemm, you, and me, only one of us went and ordered books about the accident and aftermath. And I know that I ordered both “Midnight at Chernobyl” and “Voices of Chernobyl.” And I read “Midnight at Chernobyl” cover-to-cover. (I’m still waiting to receive “Voices of Chernobyl.”)
How about you?
Oh, and another thing. You wrote:
Let’s look at who is selective, disingenuous, and possibly has a character disorder:
1) I quoted Kelvin Kemm:
…and asked him (not you!) where HBO called it a “documentary”.
2) You injected yourself, even though my question wasn’t directed at you. I have no knowledge of the subject, but that seems like a touch of “narcissistic personality disorder” to me.
3) You brought in Sky, which was entirely selective, since Kelvin Kemm’s comment and my question were both completely about HBO. And again a bit narcissistic, since you responded to a question that wasn’t even directed towards you.
4) When I pointed out that HBO clearly disputes your assertion that it was Sky alone who produced the show (HBO wrote that it was an “HBO/Sky co-production”) you never acknowledged your error.
5) And then you have the gall to say that I have engaged in “selectivity”, have been “disingenuous”, and may have a “mild character disorder perhaps”!
P.S. Your phrase “smacks of a disingenuous of sorts” shows that you could also use a few more classes in English.
For Fukushima, the deaths due to radiation exposure is exceeded by the “stress” related deaths due to fear.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nuclear_and_radiation_accidents_by_death_toll
From first hand memory, there were no deaths or injuries at Three Mile Island of 1979, but some accidents and heart attacks from the evacuation stress.
Except for the two large Soviet accidents in 1957 and 1986, very few direct fatalities in the global history of nuclear power. Probably fewer than golfers struck by lightning.
Compare with the fatality statistics for coal mining in the US only.
https://arlweb.msha.gov/stats/centurystats/coalstats.asp
18?
re: “Except for the two large Soviet accidents in 1957 and 1986, very few direct fatalities in the global history of nuclear power.”
The SL-1, or Stationary Low-Power Reactor Number One, was a United States Army experimental nuclear power reactor in the United States that underwent a steam explosion and meltdown on January 3, 1961, killing its three operators. The direct cause was the improper withdrawal of the central control rod, [BIG OOPS -_Jim] responsible for absorbing neutrons in the reactor core. The event is the only reactor accident in the U.S. that resulted in immediate fatalities.
During a maintenance shutdown, the SL-1 experimental nuclear reactor underwent a prompt critical reaction causing core materials to explosively vaporize. Water hammer estimated at 10,000 pounds per square inch (69,000 kPa) struck the top of the reactor vessel propelling the entire reactor vessel upwards over 9 feet (2.7 m) in the air.
One operator who had been standing on top of the vessel was killed when a shield plug impaled him and lodged in the ceiling. Two other military personnel were also killed from the trauma of the explosion, one of which had removed the central control rod too far. The plant had to be dismantled and the contamination was buried permanently nearby. Most of the release of radioactive materials was concentrated within the reactor building.
List of military nuclear accidents
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_military_nuclear_accidents
A repeat of a former comment plus a bit extra. The design of the rods was bad/flawed. The whole plant was built in an area with rampant corruption. Weakened plant parts and system flaws are to be expected. A large number of workers were summarily monitored/measured past their period of heroic efforts and all got the same no problem/no danger medical examination stamp before they were systematically scattered. To encourage people to come and work with the clean-up, higher post-job pensions and other forms of post events economical benefits were promised, much was never paid. A scientist I know, was part of a group who got a part of the reactor for examination. It was shipped as normal surface package by normal snail mail. Many in the group rushed to examine the part, my contact was strictly ordered to stay away. Those examining the part have suffered premature deaths. My contact is still alive – despite a couple of cancer operations. Nuclear theory and the human factor doesn’t comply in a convincing manner to me.
re: “Many in the group rushed to examine the part,”
No one had an area-monitoring (facilities) radiation detector/Geiger counter functioning?
While I agree with some of this (nuclear when all said and done is a very good option) I am nervous of taking the word of a nuclear physicist over those of health professionals about the consequences of this accident. I’m particularly sceptical (as we all should be) about a man who is writing an article about misrepresentation of facts and then starts with a school boy error. The rugby team were from Uruguay not Chile. And while I’m sure that was a mistake, it doesn’t fill one with confidence reading forward.
And….The skin peeling thing is in fact very real. From a fact sheet for physicians published in 2019 describing the effect on skin from a high dose of radiation……
“Then, a latent phase may occur and last from a few days up to several weeks, when intense reddening, blistering, and ulceration of the irradiated site is visible. In most cases, healing occurs by regenerative means; however, very large skin doses can cause permanent hair loss, damaged sebaceous and sweat glands, atrophy, fibrosis (mostly keloids), decreased or increased skin pigmentation, and ulceration or necrosis of the exposed tissue.”
I’d say skin blistering and dying would cause peeling. Maybe (or maybe not) as shown in the series, but in the big picture it is a minor thing. Those guys died horrific painful deaths and that needed to be told.
I would urge people to listen to the pod cast interviews with the executive producer Craig Mazin. He explains in detail where they portrayed the facts and where they took licence and more importantly why they did. https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/pineapple-street-media/the-chernobyl-podcast
I’m sure the author knows about the technicalities of a nuclear reactor, but I’m not convinced he should be telling us about the effect short and long term on the health of human beings. Particularly from an accident where the authorities covered so much up and when the affects (without the cover ups)are so difficult to measure accurately. Call me skeptical but I think I will leave that to the experts in the field.
Skin peeling and blistering like Steven-Johnson Syndrome and TENS, or like the radiation burns from cancer treatments???? There is a HUGE difference in what people mean by “skin peeling and blistering”. In extreme cases, radiation damage may be equal to TENS, but I doubt that is common in any way.
When we talk skin damage, there needs to be some kind of comparison. What about third degree burns all over the body? Is it like that? Without something to compare to, this is all very meaningless. (No, I did not watch the HBO special, which is why I am asking this. All this discussion is irrelevant if there’s no standard to compare to.)
Responding to the ‘a little radiation is good for you’ comment, I remind everyone of the Taiwan apartment experience. Ask Google.
That had some good calm research without immediate panic.
The benefits of long term low level radiation were significant at a population level (comparison with a similar population of people living in a nearby apartment measured over the same long time period.
Radiation, give me small amounts and often.
I ate two bananas for breakfast today, so I got my daily dosage.
Here’s a link to the Taiwanese apartment experience. Those living there had a cancer rate 4% of the surrounding city:
https://www.jpands.org/vol18no3/robinson.pdf
Yes, HBO falsified this event, big time!
In all, 237 workers suffered painful, acute radiation syndrome (ARS). 134 of these workers actually received medical treatments. 28 of them died within weeks, but 106 of the 134 recovered during the first year.
The 106 workers who recovered have been studied to learn about the long-term effects of their high radiation exposures. We know that 22 of these 106 workers died during the next 19 years—a mortality rate of about 1.1 % per year. The average mortality for other workers in this age group, in Russia, is higher at about 1.4% per year.
About 25% of these 22 deaths were from cancer. This cancer rate is about the same as for non-exposed workers in Europe. So there was no evidence of an increase in overall mortality or cancer mortality after 19 years.
Now let’s look at the evidence after 30 years. In a conference in Russia on May 17-19, 2016, we learned that 26 (just 4 more) of these 106 workers died. This corresponds to a mortality rate of about 0.8% per year.
Of these 26 deaths, 10 died of heart attack, 3 of liver cirrhosis, 5 of blood cancers, 2 of other cancer and 6 of other causes. There is no evidence of any long-term adverse effects that were caused by the high radiation doses that the workers received. Their deaths were like normal non-nuclear workers—even fewer than expected.
So there were just 28 workers who were killed by the high radiation exposures. The other 106 workers who received medical treatment—they received very high doses, but they recovered.
The elevated thyroid cancer incidence was due to the screening process, which leads to overdiagnosis (of naturally-occurring occult thyroid cancer).
HBO’s Chernobyl isn’t a documentary, it’s a mini-series. In no way shape or form has HBO or the makers of the show ever claimed it was a documentary. They even have a complimentary podcast for the show I’m which they discuss, very openly, some of the things that were fictionalized in the show and why.
Just because something is based on a real event, doesn’t mean it’s a documentary. You don’t think Amadeus and Bohemian Rhapsody are documentaries because they’re about actual people, do you? Cuz if so, I have some bad, bad news for you.
And further, the comparison of this TV show, which has never in any way claimed to be anything other than a TV show, to what happened to that rugby team and what it would be like if these same people made a TV show about them, is extremely hyperbolic and completely undercuts the research that went in to creating this show and making it as accurate as possible, while still dramatizing certain aspects to make it a more interesting show, which you even acknowledge at the very beginning of this essay, because that’s what it is, a TV show. It’s not a documentary
It does not matter what it s, the USA “”Liberals”” i.e. your equivalent of
the Labour Party , will be against it.
Remember that the original politics of the USA before the war of
Independence were identical with that of the UK. The Wigs and Tories.
With no equivalent of the present day UK Labour Party, the Wigs were the
nearest thing to a political party which was concerned with the less well off
in society.
So the USA has today the remains of the old Tories, who are the
UK Conservatives,, are today the Republican Party, and the old Wigs,
which became he UK Liberal Party are the USA Democrats .
Going on the way of thinking within the US Democrats I consider that they
are close to the Australian Labour Party.
A comparison with the UK Labour Party is not possible, its in a bit of a
mess. A better comparison would be the post war UK Labour Party
under Clement Atlee, ex Major WW1, and deputy PM under Churchill.
A very sensible man who was well aware e of the danger from the near
Communist left wing of the Party. He brought in safeguards against any
attempt by the Communists to take over, sadly thy were later removed.
I hope that will help people to understand how politics can and do change
over the years. The US Democrats in the 1950 tees at the height of the
anti Communist feelings ,were I think very different to today’s party.
MJR VK5ELL
Dr Kemm is simply wrong to say that acute radiation doses can not cause one’s skin to peel. If he did a simple web search as I just did, he would find a gallery of photos showing blistering and peeling skin in the extreme from high medical doses. Some of the Chernobyl workers received absurdly massive doses to their whole body of a hundred, a thousand, or even more times the minimum fatal dose. They were crisped. Did they suffer like the characters in the HBO drama? I don’t know for sure, but I would not at all be surprised to learn from a source more reliable than an HBO script writer, that the drama’s portrait was sadly accurate.
“…The blood and skin peeling scenes, for example. Sadly, the producers lied – intentionally or incompetently, it seems, to gain box office income. They succeeded in that goal. But they insulted us nuclear scientists and insulted the intelligence of viewers who knew a bit more science than most of HBO’s audience…”
On the other hand, an article that says the series took some artistic liberties noted that they got the radiation effects right:
“…Oleksiy Breus, who was an engineer at the ill-fated plant, said some of the events surrounding the explosion and the effects of radiation on the body were depicted realistically…”
https://www.newsweek.com/blatant-lie-chernobyl-engineer-says-hbo-show-full-russian-vodka-kgb-stereotypes-1443547
But why believe someone who was actually there?
Because he’s in Newsweek?
I had no opinion on nuclear rectors until I saw the hbo series and read a couple books on Chernobyl. But my opinion really hardened after reading the comments in this blog. I do not want nuclear power plants nor trust the opinions of nuclear physicists. To me it looks like they are self serving.
The best book on Chernobyl is “Legacy of Chernobyl” by Zhorzhes Medvedev. A straightforward factual and lucid account of what happened by someone close to the situation. And a Russian/Ukrainian, not an alien from an alien culture parachuting in and snatching at illusions.
Much of it was based on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voices_from_Chernobyl
I have heard that people, who were at Hiroshima or Nagasaki when the bombs fell, and who lived more than twenty years afterwards, lived longer than their contemporaries who had not been exposed to radiation.
What struck me as ironic was all the smoking in the series. I kept thinking the smoking will kill more people of cancer than the radiation.
I appreciate the reprint here. I had not seen the series and now have saved all that time.
A good representation of radiation poisoning may be K19 – the Widowmaker. At least it sounds like it from this articles description.
I was stationed at Flint Kassern in Bad Tolz Germany at the time. When that event happened my wife and two children were there. I was with my team up in the area of Arlon, Belgium at the time and daily driving around the area from Neufchateau, Belgium.
When an SF team deploys for training team and individual equipment not being taken is pulled from the lockers and packed in plywood boxes to be ready to be palatized and sent by air to wherever the team may be deployed on short notice for a real world situation. Our team room was one floor below ground level in a quadrangle of the typical Bavarian style architecture of block with heavy stucco and tile roof. Above us were three above ground floors all of concrete. There was a single well window that was always closed. The boxes were laid out on the floor of that room.
Included in the team equipment was our radiological kit. Part of that kit included two dosimeters. Devices about the size of a large fountain pen that read dosage in rads. The team commo men who were responsible for maintaining the equipment swore they had, as per SOP, zeroed the dosimeters before we departed for our training exercise. The components of the kit were packed in their individual rubberized canvas bags that were stowed in a small metal air tight case and that case in turn was stowed in a team box constructed to heavy plywood and locked.
When we returned about a week after the event, the dosimeters read almost 5 rads. When I found that out, as Sr. Medic the next thing I checked was a roll of photographic film in the teams KS-99 camera kit that was packed in exactly the same fashion as radiological kit. Developing the negatives (Yes we were trained to do that and had what was needed to do so) of a roll of black and white film revealed it had not been exposed and I was relieved.
However, shipments of all European dairy products to our small commissary at the Kassern ceased for a time. The local hunting guides (Yagermeisters) refused the meat of kills as payment which they had always taken before. And word was, though I can’t verify this, some whole dairy herds were shipped out.
Your comment is utter nonsense.
“Part of that kit included two dosimeters. Devices about the size of a large fountain pen that read dosage in rads.”
No they don’t they read in mR… that’s millirem. That’s a dose 1000 lower.
They are very unreliable because they depend on charging them with a high static voltage charge.
You probably don’t know what you are on about.
They probably read 5 or 50 mR.
A level of 5R would have exposed your film and made it unuseable, adding to that, clearly you had no idea what you are doing, because in the Nuclear research industry all people are issued routinely with film badges, with a number of different metal shields in the plastic to be able to analyse the kind of ionising radiation you are exposed to, alpha, beta, gamma or plain Xrays.
Anyone that knows anything would tell you that, but I can’t believe the level of ignorance on here.
I understand another reactor in the same complex continued generating power for many years and was shutdown maybe 10 years ago.
From the reference: “Four Chernobyl RBMK-1000 reactors, plus two almost-completed ones, are being decommissioned. Unit 4, which was destroyed in the 1986 accident, is enclosed in a large shelter and a new, more durable containment structure was completed in 2016. The last of the other three shut down in December 2000. In mid-2001 a new enterprise, SSE ChNPP was set up to take over management of the site and decommissioning from Energoatom. Its remit includes eventual decommissioning of all Ukraine nuclear plants.”
Reference is Nuclear Power in the Ukraine: http://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-profiles/countries-t-z/ukraine.aspx
Oh, BTW, I watched a program just today that described the construction of the huge arched stainless steel containment building that they fabricated/constructed and then moved over the emergency concrete containment of the reactor that Russians had constructed. Quite an expensive an amazing engineering project. There has been a real fear the massive concrete containment the Russians hastily built would structurally fail. This new building that goes over all of that and seals it off will allow them to deconstruct and rebuild that original hastily constructed containment without the potential of an accident that would result in Europe reliving that nightmare. They say the new structure is constructed to last a century and that it needed to last that long because it could well take that amount of time before a permanent replacement of the Russian containment can be completed.
I already dropped HBO from my pay channel list; knowing they are into willingly distorting history won’t get me back – contrary. Way to go HBO!
I recently watched a documentary about tourism at Chenoblyl. The guide pointed out that in the hospital, for instance, all the radiators were gone, illegally, collected and sold for scrap. In addition much of he unidentifiable steel had disappeared, several thousand tons, apparently. I suspect irradiated re-bars has a connection. If the steel had been reprocessed who would think to check if it was radioactive. I wonder how many ships were built out of this steel.
“for instance, all the radiators were gone, illegally, collected and sold for scrap.”
Save your agonising for another agony website like the Guardian maybe.
The same thing happened ALL OVER the ex USSR. Get over it!
There were mafia wars about scrap metals, the money and the recycling.
Stop repeating bollox, it affects the credibility of WUWT.