Chernobyl Accident 1986

• The Chernobyl accident in 1986 was the result of a flawed

reactor design that was operated with inadequately trained
personnel resulting in a nuclear accident that occurred on 26
April 1986

• at the No. 4 reactor in the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant,

near the city of Pripyat in the north of the Ukraine in
the Soviet Union. Some 70% of fallout landed in Belarus.
• It is one of only two nuclear energy accidents
rated at seven—the maximum severity—on
the International Nuclear Event Scale, the
other being the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi
nuclear disaster in Japan.
• The accident occurred during a safety test on the steam
turbine of an RBMK-type nuclear reactor. The core melted
down and two explosions ruptured the reactor core and
destroyed the reactor building. This was immediately
followed by an open-air reactor core fire. It released
considerable airborne radioactive contamination for about
9 days.

• Technicians at reactor Unit 4 attempted a poorly designed

experiment. Workers shut down the reactor’s power-
regulating system and its emergency safety systems, and
they withdrew most of the control rods from its core while
allowing the reactor to continue running at 7 percent
power.
• These mistakes were compounded by others,
the chain reaction in the core went out of control.
Several explosions triggered a large fireball and
blew off the heavy steel and concrete lid of the
reactor. This and the ensuing fire in
the graphite reactor core released large amounts
of radioactive material into the atmosphere,
where it was carried great distances
by air currents. A partial meltdown of the core
also occurred.
• A result of rising ambient radiation levels off-site,
a 10-kilometre (6.2 mi) radius exclusion zone was
created 36 hours after the accident. About
49,000 people were evacuated from the area,
primarily from Pripyat.

• The exclusion zone was later increased to 30

kilometres when a further 68,000 people were
evacuated from the wider area, and later it
became the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone covering
an area of approximately 2,600 km2.
• During the immediate emergency response 134
station staff and firemen were hospitalized
with acute radiation syndrome due to absorbing
high doses of ionizing radiation. Of these 134
people, 28 died in the days to months afterward
and approximately 14 suspected radiation-
induced cancer deaths followed within the next
10 years.

• The most robust studies predict 4,000 fatalities

when solely assessing the three most
contaminated former Soviet states, to about
9,000 to 16,000 fatalities when assessing the
whole of Europe
• The USSR built the protective Chernobyl
Nuclear Power Plant sarcophagus by
December 1986. It reduced the spread
of radioactive contamination from the
wreckage and protected it from weathering.
Three Mile Island Accident
• The Three Mile Island power station is near
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania in USA. It had two
pressurized water reactors.
• The accident to unit 2 happened at 4 am on
28 March 1979 when the reactor was
operating at 97% power. It involved a
relatively minor malfunction in the secondary
cooling circuit which caused the temperature
in the primary coolant to rise. This in turn
caused the reactor to shut down
automatically. Shut down took about one
second.
• At this point a relief valve failed to close, but
instrumentation did not reveal the fact, and so
much of the primary coolant drained away that
the residual decay heat in the reactor core was
not removed. The core suffered severe damage
as a result. The operators were unable to
diagnose or respond properly to the unplanned
automatic shutdown of the reactor. Deficient
control room instrumentation and inadequate
emergency response training proved to be root
causes of the accident
• There were no injuries or adverse health
effects from the Three Mile Island accident.
The Fukushima Disaster
• Fukushima accident, also called Fukushima
nuclear accident or Fukushima Daiichi nuclear
accident, accident in 2011 at the Fukushima
Daiichi (“Number One”) plant in northern Japan,
the second worst nuclear accident in the history
of nuclear power generation.

• The site is on Japan’s Pacific coast, in

northeastern Fukushima prefecture about 100
km (60 miles) south of Sendai.

• The facility, operated by the Tokyo Electric and

Power Company (TEPCO).
• It comprised of six boiling-
water reactors constructed between 1971 and
1979.

• At the time of the accident, only reactors 1–3

were operational, and reactor 4 served as
temporary storage for spent fuel rods.

• On March 11th 2011 a huge earthquake (14h46

local time) and the following tsunami (15h35
local time) caused the cooling of the reactors and
the cooling of the spent fuel pools of the
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plants to fail.
• A non-stoppable nuclear disaster unveiled. Although all
three of the reactors that were operating were
successfully shut down, the loss of power caused
cooling systems to fail in each of them within the first
few days of the disaster.

• Rising residual heat within each reactor’s core caused

the fuel rods in reactors 1, 2, and 3 to overheat and
partially melt down, leading at times to the release
of radiation. Melted material fell to the bottom of the
containment vessels in reactors 1 and 2 and bored
sizable holes in the floor of each vessel—a fact that
emerged in late May. Those holes partially exposed the
nuclear material in the cores.
• Explosions resulting from the buildup of
pressurized hydrogen gas occurred in the outer
containment buildings enclosing reactors 1 and 3 on
March 12 and March 14, respectively. Workers sought
to cool and stabilize the three cores by
pumping seawater and boric acid into them.

• Because of concerns over possible radiation exposure,

government officials established a 30-km (18-mile) no-
fly zone around the facility, and a land area of 20-km
(12.5-mile) radius around the plant—which covered
nearly 600 square km (approximately 232 square
miles)—was evacuated.
• In the days that followed, some 47,000
residents left their homes, many people in
areas adjacent to the 20-km evacuation
warning zone also prepared to leave,

• and workers at the plant made several

attempts to cool the reactors using truck-
mounted water cannons and water dropped
from helicopters. Those efforts met with some
success, which temporarily slowed the release
of radiation.
• As workers continued their attempts to cool the
reactors, the appearance of increased levels of
radiation in some local food and water supplies
prompted Japanese and international officials to
issue warnings about their consumption.

• At the end of March, the evacuation zone was

expanded to 30 km around the plant, and ocean
water near the plant was discovered to have been
contaminated with high levels of iodine-131.
• Measurements by the Japanese government
show that in the first six weeks of the disaster
42% of the total amount of caesium that was
released at the Chernobyl disaster – is spread,
together with the highest ever release of the
radioactive noble gas xenon. After the
explosions also radioactive strontium (up to
250 kilometres from the plants) and
plutonium (up to 45 kilometres from the
plants) are measured, in addition to iodine
and caesium.
• During the explosion at reactor 1 four workers
were injured, and at the explosion at reactor 3
eleven workers. One clean-up worker died of
circulatory failure.
The Love Canal Disaster
• One of the most famous and important examples
of groundwater pollution in the U.S. is the Love
Canal tragedy in Niagara Falls, New York.

• In 1890, William T. Love, an ambitious railroad

entrepreneur, prepared plans to construct a
preplanned urban community of parks and
residences on the shore of Lake Ontario, believing
it would serve the area's burgeoning industries
with much-needed hydroelectricity. He named
the project Model City, New York.
• After 1892, Love's plan incorporated a
shipping lane that would bypass Niagara Falls.
Love Canal is a neighborhood in Niagara Falls
named after a large ditch that was dug in the
1890s for hydroelectric power. The ditch was
abandoned before it actually generated any
power and went mostly.

• The Love Canal incident became a symbol of

improperly stored chemical waste and
groundwater pollution in the U.S.
• In the 1920s Niagara Falls began dumping urban
waste into Love Canal, and in the 1940s the U.S.
Army dumped waste from World War II there,
including waste from the frantic effort to build a
nuclear bomb.

• Hooker Chemical purchased the land in 1942 and

lined it with clay. Then, the company put into
Love Canal an estimated 21,000 tons of
hazardous chemical waste, including the
carcinogens benzene, dioxin, and PCBs in large
metal barrels and covered them with more clay.
• In 1953, Hooker sold the land to the Niagara
Falls school board for $1.
• The school board promptly built a public
school on the site and sold the surrounding
land for a housing project that built 200 or so
homes along the canal banks and another
1,000 in the neighborhood.
• During construction, the canal’s clay cap and
walls were breached, damaging some of the
metal barrels.
• Numerous contaminants dumped in the landfill
included chlorinated hydrocarbon residues, processed
sludge, fly ash, and other materials, including
residential municipal garbage.

• Data showed unacceptable levels of toxic vapors

associated with more than 80 compounds were
emanating from the basements of numerous homes in
the first ring directly adjacent to the Love Canal. Ten of
the most prevalent and most toxic compounds -
including benzene, a known human carcinogen - were
selected for evaluation purposes and as indicators of
the presence of other chemical constituents.
• Clean up of Love Canal, which was funded by
Superfund and completely finished in 2004,
involved removing contaminated soil,
installing drainage pipes to capture
contaminated groundwater for treatment, and
covering it with clay and plastic.
• In 1995, Occidental Chemical (the modern
name for Hooker Chemical) paid $102 million
to Superfund for cleanup and $27 million to
Federal Emergency Management Association
for the relocation of more than 1,000 families.

• New York State paid $98 million to EPA and

the US government paid $8 million for
pollution by the Army. The total cleanup cost
was estimated to be $275 million.
Bhopal Gas Tragedy
• Bhopal disaster, chemical leak in 1984 in the city of Bhopal,
Madhya Pradesh was the worst industrial accident in history.

• On December 3, 1984, about 45 tons of the dangerous gas

methyl isocyanate escaped from an insecticide plant that was
owned by the Indian subsidiary of the American firm Union
Carbide Corporation.

• The gas drifted over the densely populated neighbourhoods

around the plant, killing thousands of people immediately
and creating a panic as tens of thousands of others attempted
to flee Bhopal.
• Within hours, a large number of humans and
animals died due to inhaling the poisonous
gas.
• The final death toll was estimated to be
between 15,000 and 20,000; affecting a
population of 520,000.
• In 1984, the plant was manufacturing Sevin at
one-quarter of its capacity due to decreased
demand of the pesticide
• The Bhopal Act gave the Central government the exclusive
right to represent and act (in India or overseas) on the behalf
of the persons entitled to make claims in relation to the
Bhopal gas leak. This action of the government was criticised
as a way to evade responsibility by stopping the victims to
initiate action against the state.

• The central government filed a complaint against UCC before

Southern District Court of New York, USA, where it argued the
inability of the Indian Courts to deal effectively with the
situation and that the matter should be dealt with in US
courts. The company, however, pushed for the matter to be
dealt with in Indian Courts, knowing that the compensation is
likely to be higher in the US courts.
• In September 1986, the Union of India filed a complaint in
a district court of Bhopal seeking interim compensation of
3.5 billion rupees which the Madhya Pradesh High Court
reduced to 2.5 billion rupees.
• UCC appealed to the Supreme Court. The court ordered
UCC to pay 470 million dollars (approximately 750 crore
rupees) ‘in full settlement of all claims, rights and liabilities
related to and arising out of the Bhopal gas disaster.’
• the central government sanctioned a 258 crore rupees
fund for medical, economic, social and environmental
rehabilitation of the victims.
• In June 2010, seven former employees, including the
former UCIL chairman, were convicted in Bhopal of causing
death by negligence and sentenced to two years
imprisonment and fine of 2000 USD.
ENDOSULFAN Disaster
• Endosulfan is a pesticide developed in 1954.
• For over 20 years, cashew plantations in Padre village
Kasargod district in Kerala used Endosulfan as a pesticide.
• Tea plantations, paddy and fruit orchards in other areas of
Kerala also used this pesticide administered via aerial
spraying or manual pumps.
• People extensively used it in farming with high
consumption in the 1980s and 1990s.
• The Endosulfan tragedy also caused many ailments. These
ailments included skin irritations, destruction of nerve
tissues and reproductive and developmental damage in
human beings and animals.
• Local health practitioners had documented increased
incidences of congenital anomalies, delayed puberty,
mental retardation, abortions and cancer during the years
of endosulfan spraying.
• Endosulfan use in the cashew plantations began as
early as 1976.
• A few years later, there were reports of calves being
born with deformed limbs. Frogs, fishes, bee colonies,
fireflies and jackals vanished from these areas.
• Many local children and a large number of people
below the age of 25 were suffering from severe
disorders The enormity of the health problems in the
area was brought to the notice of the government by
the local people as well as various organizations like
Thanal, Endosulfan Spray Protest Action Committee
(ESPAC) etc.
• This moved the government to start an Endosulfan
Relief and Remediation Cell in the year 2007
• The Kerala Government banned the use of Endosulfan in
2005.

• In 2011, the seventh meeting of the Stockholm Convention

on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POP’s) placed a global
ban on the manufacture and use of Endosulfan. In the same
year, the Supreme Court of India banned the use,
manufacture and distribution of the pesticide.

• Furthermore, in 2017, the Supreme Court of India directed

the Kerala Government to pay Rupees 500 Crores to over
5,000 victims of the Endosulfan tragedy. It also directed it
to set up a medical facility to treat ailments resulting from
exposure to Endosulfan. Relief and remediation plans focus
on health, socio-economic welfare, rehabilitation and
empowerment as well as a periodic assessment of
environmental effects.
Flint water crisis
• The Flint water crisis is an ongoing public
health crisis that began in 2014 when the City
of Flint in Michigan–which has a population of
roughly 100,000–changed its water supply
from Lake Huron to the Flint river.
• This switch caused the water distribution
pipes to corrode, as a result of which lead and
other contaminants were leached into the
municipal drinking water.
• This led to an outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease, a
serious type of pneumonia caused by the Legionella
bacteria and other health complications in thousands
of its residents.

• According to the US Centers for Disease Control and

Prevention (CDC), people can get sick from this if they
breathe in mist or accidentally swallow bacteria-
containing water into the lungs.

• In January 2016, the state of Michigan declared a state

of emergency and in October the same year, residents
of the city were advised not to drink the municipal tap
water unless it was filtered.
Deepwater Horizon oil spill or Gulf of
Mexico oil spill, April 20, 2010
• largest marine oil spill in history, caused by an
explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig—
located in the Gulf of Mexico, approximately 66
km off the coast of Louisiana—and its
subsequent sinking on April 22.

• The Deepwater Horizon rig, owned and operated

by offshore-oil-drilling company Transocean and
leased by oil company BP,

• was situated in the Macondo oil prospect in the

Mississippi Canyon, a valley in the continental
shelf.
• The oil well over which it was positioned was located on
the seabed 4,993 feet (1,522 metres) below the surface and
extended approximately 18,000 feet (5,486 metres) into
the rock.

• On the night of April 20 a surge of natural gas blasted

through a concrete core.

• Once released by the fracture of the core, the natural

gas traveled up the Deepwater rig’s riser to the platform,
where it ignited, killing 11 workers and injuring 17. The rig
capsized and sank on the morning of April 22.

• The volume of oil escaping the damaged well—originally

estimated by BP to be about 1,000 barrels per day—was
thought by U.S. government officials to have peaked at
more than 60,000 barrels per day.
• The spill area hosts 8,332 species, including more than 1,270 fish,
604 polychaetes, 218 birds, 1,456 mollusks, 1,503 crustaceans,
4 sea turtles and 29 marine mammals. Between May and June
2010, the spill waters contained 40 times more polycyclic aromatic
hydrocarbons (PAHs) than before the spill.

• Estimates of lost tourism dollars were projected to cost the Gulf

coastal economy up to 22.7 billion through 2013. In addition,
Louisiana reported that lost visitor spending losses through 2013
were expected to total $153 million in this state alone.

• The Gulf of Mexico commercial fishing industry was estimated to

have lost $247 million as a result of post spill fisheries closures. One
study projects that the overall impact of lost or degraded
commercial, recreational, and mariculture fisheries in the Gulf
could be $8.7 billion by 2020, with a potential loss of 22,000 jobs
over the same time frame.
• On 16 June 2010, after BP executives met with
President Obama, BP announced and
established the Gulf Coast Claims Facility
(GCCF), a $20 billion fund to settle claims
arising from the Deepwater Horizon spill.

• The oil dispersant Corexit, previously only

used as a surface application, was released
underwater in unprecedented amounts, with
the intent of making it more easily
biodegraded by naturally occurring microbes.
Exon Valdez oil spill
• Exxon Valdez oil spill, massive oil spill that
occurred on March 24, 1989, in Prince William
Sound, an inlet in the Gulf of Alaska, Alaska, U.S.

• The incident happened after an Exxon

Corporation tanker, the Exxon Valdez, ran
aground on Bligh Reef during a voyage
from Valdez, Alaska, to California.

• The tanker was loaded with roughly 54 million

gallons oil of which 10.8 million gallons were
released into the waters of Prince William Sound.
• Delayed efforts to contain the spill and naturally strong
winds and waves dispersed nearly 11,000,000 gallons
(41,640 kilolitres) of North Slope crude oil across the
sound.

• The spill eventually polluted 1,300 miles (2,092 kilometres)

of indented shoreline, as well as adjacent waters, as far
south as the southern end of Shelikof Strait
between Kodiak Island and the Alaska Peninsula.

• Thousands of workers and volunteers helped to clean up

after the oil spill, and Exxon provided $2.1 billion in
funding. Despite these cleanup efforts, the spill
exterminated much native wildlife,
including salmon, herring, sea otters, bald eagles, and killer
whales.
• Over 11,000 personnel, 58 air crafts and 1,400 vessels were
used to clear the affected area and it involved complex
operations like relocating several marine creatures in order
to safeguard their life till the clean-up operations were
completed successfully.
• The entire course of the clean-up operation took around
three years from 1989 to 1992 and even now, monitoring is
being carried out in the entire length of the coastline to
observe any late-emerging effects of the oil spill.
• According to reports, the shipping company spent more
than $3.8 billion for the cleanup operations and also
compensated 11,000 fishermen and others affected by the
disaster.
• In 1994, Exxon was asked by an Alaskan court to pay $5
billion in punitive damages. However, after a number of
appeals, the U.S. Supreme Court reduced the amount to
$507.5 million.
Cyclone Fani
• The severe cyclonic storm of the 2019 North Indian Ocean
cyclone season, Fani originated from a tropical depression
that formed west of Sumatra in the Indian Ocean on 26
April. Fani hit the Odisha coast in Puri with a wind speed or
around 175 kmph. The name of the Cyclone 'Fani',
pronounced as 'Foni' was suggested by Bangladesh. It
means 'Snake' or 'hood of snake'.

• the cyclone has severely affected lives and livelihoods of

more than 28 million people across 3 States in India. 24
districts have been affected across the states of Andhra
Pradesh, Orissa and West Bengal. Severely impacted areas
are all in Odisha, mainly the districts of Puri (where the
cyclone made landfall), Khurdha, Cuttack, Nayagarh and
Jagatsinghpur. In Puri district, more than 189,000 houses
were damaged. Summer crops, orchards, plantations
devastated in a large scale.
• As of 8 July 2019, Cyclone Fani has killed at least 89 people
in eastern India and Bangladesh. Cyclone Fani caused about
US$1.81 billion in damages in both India and Bangladesh,
mostly in Odisha state in India.
• The India Meteorological Department tracked the storm
and issued numerous yellow warnings for much of the
south-eastern portion of India when the cyclone started to
intensify.In preparation for the storm's impact, the state
government of Odisha and its agency OSDMA evacuated
over 1.2 million residents from vulnerable coastal areas and
moved them to higher ground and into cyclone shelters
built a few kilometres inland.

• The authorities deployed around a thousand emergency

workers and 43,000 volunteers in these efforts. It sent out
2.6 million text messages to warn of the storm in addition
to using television, sirens and public-address systems to
communicate the message. About 7,000 kitchens were
operated to feed evacuees in 9,000 storm shelters.
• The Indian Navy readied naval ships and aircraft
at Arakkonam and Visakhapatnam air-bases to
prepare for the storm's aftermath and aid in
reconnaissance, rescue and relief operations. The
Odisha government staged "300 power boats,
two helicopters and many chain saws, to cut
downed trees" for the purpose.

• Total damage in Odisha were estimated at ₹120

billion mostly in property damage and the relief.
After the cyclone, Odisha required ₹170 billion
for rebuilding the infrastructure.Indian Prime
Minister announced that the government had
released over ₹10 billion (US$145 million) for the
states affected by Fani.