Chernobyl on HBO
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Anonymous
| I was in the uk and remember the Nordic countries picking up the radiation, and the fear even in the UK as the prevailing winds started heading across the North Sea. Initially no one knew how bad it would be or how far it would spread, even in the west. |
Anonymous
Yes, it's scary that the nuclear technology is out of control and scary that the government encouraged such a level of denial that some of the people are pretending everything's fine. |
Anonymous
I think it was because of rains bringing the radiation down, Sweden ended up bringing the raindeer herds to the South of the country. That was quite a job. They had the audacity to ask Master Soviet Union, the great and mighty, for compensation |
Anonymous
You mean old nuclear technology |
Anonymous
or Communist nuclear technology built without a containment structure and a no nuclear safety culture or ability to question direction. |
Anonymous
Communist nuclear technology? I did not know there was such a thing. One is philosophy, other science Tell me more. Did Karl Marx mention that in his writings |
Anonymous
Ooh thanks for this- I really enjoyed Secondhand Time (as much as one can enjoy a depressing book). |
Anonymous
have you read The Unwomanly Face of War? It's amazing. |
Anonymous
"The nuclear technology" at Chernobyl was out of control. Yes, it wasn't as safe as other reactors. Tell that to the Japanese who had nice modern nuclear reactors at Fukushima where the nuclear technology was ALSO out of control because no one had anticipated the damage a tsunami could do. And this is part of the overall problem. People keep expecting that things could never happen and then they do. A valve failed to close on the Davis-Besse nuclear reactor back in the 70s and the safety systems kicked in pouring water on the core. The operator turned off the safety systems while the water poured OUT of the containment vessel. Luckily the operator figured out what he did wrong in about 20 minutes and turned the safety system back on. An NRC inspector and a Babcock & Wilcox engineer realized that operators needed to be retrained. The B & W engineer told his company and the company did nothing. The NRC inspector told his superiors and they did nothing. He finally made an appointment with an NRC commissioner (they had a policy where you could go straight to the top) to urge him to get operators retrained. The appointment was scheduled for after the day the valve on the Three Mile Island Unit 2 (a Babcock and Wilcox plant) failed to close. The operator turns off the safety system but doesn't realize until over an hour later his mistake. By that time it was too late. The core was partially uncovered. Okay, where have we recently heard about the issue of retraining when there's an incident? Boeing, right? There's an accident and people see that there's a technical problem requiring retraining but certain forces don't want to listen - whether out of self interest, greed, or merely the belief that it's not possible for something to go wrong. This is normal human behavior. And it's something we need to take into account with technology. And yes the vast majority of nuclear plants have functioned well enough without major incidents. But don't watch this show on Chernobyl and blithely assume that all the problems with nuclear power have been solved. Like I said, tell that to the Japanese! |
Anonymous
No! I will check it out. |
Anonymous
I was in Ukraine with Peace Corps in the mid-90s. Although this is anecdotal, I can tell you that I met far more people with thyroid issues and thyroid cancer than I have anywhere else I've ever been. I know at least 10 people who died of thyroid cancer before they were 35. All of them had been children when the Chernobyl accident happened. To a family, they attribute it to radiation exposure from Chernobyl. I believe them. |
Anonymous
| Wow! I had an unexpected evening to myself when DH took kids to their events and I stayed home, so after reading this thread at lunch, I decided to check it out. My only regret is not waiting until all episodes were available so I could binge. I was captivated, and now I have to wait a week for the next one?? |
Anonymous
| The final scene of episode 2 was terrifying. |
Anonymous
+1 Just watched it. |
Anonymous
+2 SPOILER ALERT I assume those guys are toast and they have to send more men in when they don’t come out? I don’t see how anything is possible for them in the dark. On another topic, I don’t trust any casualty figures at all. This whole thing was one big denial/cover-up. The after effect related deaths have to be way higher than they state. I haven’t read up on it, and I don’t want to until I finish the series. But I’m dying to dig into the facts of this. It was heartbreaking when the professor told the official in the hotel room that they would be dead in 5 years. It snapped him right out of that communist allegiance denial. |