SUMMARY

Valeria Villarreal M A01721147

Naomi Chavez A01721391

A nuclear accident occurred in Chernobyl, Ukraine in 1986. At 1:23 a.m. the 26th of
April. They were testing with a reactor (reactor 4) to see if the turbines could
generate enough electricity, however it failed and that is how it become the biggest
man-made disaster of all time. It was caused when a group of scientists took a series
of reckless decisions. They decided to continue running the reactor with a scarce
amount of energy. They didn’t follow the safety precautions and they lacked team
communication in the process. The 4 reactors located in the plant were really
unstable when operating on a base of low energy, these and more factors caused
the reactors to gain a lot of heat. This heat was the main reason for the leaks in the
pipelines of pressure that were filled with gasoline. These leaks caused the reactor
to explode, releasing many radioactive gases, that later led to serious
consequences.The amount of radioactive materials that were released were 500
more than the Atomic bomb thrown in Hiroshima, this event made more than
116,000 people evacuate immediately. It could take up to a 100 years for the station
to be completely decommissioned and nowadays 200 tons of radioactive materials
are still in the reactor. A lot of chemicals were sent into the air including Iodine,
Cesium, and Strontium. It is said that Chernobyl is now a ghost town and only people
who cycle in and out are its residents. This is because there is still deadly radiation in
Chernobyl. As a consequence, the number of deaths is undefined but at least there
were about 30 immediate deaths of reactor staff and emergency workers, that died
because of radiation and thermal burns. Investigations conducted by the NEI
concluded that at least 7,000 cases of thyroid cancer among children who were
under 18 at the time of the accident. It also brought as a consequence the risk of
people who were only exposed to a small dose of radiation, to get leukemia or
cataract disease. In this project there was a reactor which contained 30% of
radioactive gases, of which a 13% escaped to the atmosphere, this making it a
environmental problem as well.
This was such a big disaster that up until today lands around 10 thousand square
kilometers apart from the plant are still compromised. They can’t be used for
harvesting nor producing more products because they were contaminated by
reactivity. That’s why this is the biggest man-made disaster of all time.