Land of the dead: Voices from Chernobyl

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K

Sun, 24 Apr 2005 22:18:00 -0700 (PDT)

Land of the dead: Voices from Chernobyl

 

 

 

Zepp <zepp wrote:

 

 

<http://www.guardian.co.uk/ukraine/story/0,15569,1469597,00.html>

 

Land of the dead

 

On April 26 1986, the No 4 reactor at the Chernobyl power station

blew apart. Facing nuclear disaster on an unprecedented scale, Soviet

authorities tried to contain the situation by sending thousands of

ill-equipped men into a radioactive maelstrom. In an extract from a

new book by Russian journalist Svetlana Alexievich, eyewitnesses

recall the terrible human cost of a catastrophe still unfolding today

 

Monday April 25, 2005

The Guardian

 

When a routine test went catastrophically wrong, a chain reaction

went out of control in No 4 reactor of Chernobyl nuclear power station

in Ukraine, creating a fireball that blew off the reactor's

1,000-tonne steel-and-concrete lid. Burning graphite and hot

reactor-core material ejected by the explosions started numerous other

fires, including some on the combustible tar roof of the adjacent

reactor unit. There were 31 fatalities as an immediate result of the

explosion and acute radiation exposure in fighting the fires, and more

than 200 cases of severe radiation sickness in the days that followed.

 

Evacuation of residents under the plume was delayed by the Soviet

authorities' unwillingness to admit the gravity of the incident.

Eventually, more than 100,000 people were evacuated from the

surrounding area in Ukraine and Belarus.

 

In the week after the accident the Soviets poured thousands of

untrained, inadequately protected men into the breach. Bags of sand

were dropped on to the reactor fire from the open doors of helicopters

(analysts now think this did more harm than good). When the fire

finally stopped, men climbed on to the roof to clear the radioactive

debris. The machines brought in broke down because of the radiation.

The men barely lasted more than a few weeks, suffering lingering,

painful deaths.

 

But had this effort not been made, the disaster might have been

much worse. The sarcophagus, designed by engineers from Leningrad, was

manufactured in absentia - the plates assembled with the aid of robots

and helicopters - and as a result there are fissures. Now known as the

Cover, reactor No 4 still holds approximately 20 tonnes of nuclear

fuel in its lead-and-metal core. No one knows what is happening with it.

 

For neighbouring Belarus, with a population of just 10 million,

the nuclear explosion was a national disaster: 70% of the

radionucleides released in the accident fell on Belarus. During the

second world war, the Nazis destroyed 619 Belarussian villages, along

with their inhabitants. As a result of fallout from Chernobyl, the

country lost 485

villages and settlements. Of these, 70 have been buried

underground by clean-up teams known as " liquidators " .

 

Today, one out of every five Belarussians lives on contaminated

land. That is 2.1 million people, of whom 700,000 are children.

Because of the virtually permanent presence of small doses of

radiation around the " Zone " , the number of people with cancer,

neurological disorders and genetic mutations increases with each year.

 

Lyudmilla Ignatenko

Wife of fireman Vasily Ignatenko:

 

We were newlyweds. We still walked around holding hands, even if

we were just going to the store. I would say to him, " I love you. " But

I didn't know then how much. I had no idea.

 

We lived in the dormitory of the fire station where he worked.

There were three other young couples; we all shared a kitchen. On the

ground floor they kept the trucks, the red fire trucks. That was his job.

 

One night I heard a noise. I looked out the window. He saw me.

" Close the window and go back to sleep. There's a fire at the reactor.

I'll be back soon. "

 

I didn't see the explosion itself. Just the flames. Everything was

radiant. The whole sky. A tall flame. And smoke. The heat was awful.

And he's still not back. The smoke was from the burning bitumen, which

had covered the roof. He said later it was like walking on tar.

 

They tried to beat down the flames. They kicked at the burning

graphite with their feet ... They weren't wearing their canvas gear.

They went off just as they were, in their shirt sleeves. No one told them.

 

At seven in the morning I was told he was in the hospital. I ran

there but the police had already encircled it, and they weren't

letting anyone through, only ambulances. The policemen shouted: " The

ambulances are radioactive stay away! "

 

I saw him. He was all swollen and puffed up. You could barely see

his eyes.

 

" He needs milk. Lots of milk, " my friend said. " They should drink

at least three litres each. "

 

" But he doesn't like milk. "

 

" He'll drink it now. "

 

Many of the doctors and nurses in that hospital and especially the

orderlies, would get sick themselves and die. But we didn't know that

then.

 

I couldn't get into the hospital that evening. The doctor came out

and said, yes, they were flying to Moscow, but we needed to bring them

their clothes. The clothes they'd worn at the station had been burned.

The buses had stopped running already and we ran across the city. We

came running back with their bags, but the plane was already gone.

They tricked us.

 

It was a special hospital, for radiology, and you couldn't get in

without a pass. I gave some money to the woman at the door, and she

said, " Go ahead. " Then I had to ask someone else, beg. Finally I'm

sitting in the office of the head radiologist. Right away she asked:

" Do you have kids? " What should I tell her? I can see already that I

need to hide that I'm pregnant. They won't let me see him! It's good

I'm thin, you can't really tell anything.

 

" Yes, " I say.

 

" How many? " I'm thinking, I need to tell her two. If it's just

one, she won't let me in.

 

" A boy and a girl. "

 

" So you don't need to have any more. All right, listen: his

central nervous system is completely compromised, his skull is

completely compromised. "

 

OK, I'm thinking, so he'll be a little fidgety.

 

" And listen: if you start crying, I'll kick you out right away. No

hugging or kissing. Don't even get near him. You have half an hour. "

 

He looks so funny, he's got pyjamas on for a size 48, and he's a

size 52. The sleeves are too short, the trousers are too short. But

his face isn't swollen any more. They were given some sort of fluid. I

say, " Where'd you run off to? " He wants to hug me. The doctor won't

let him. " Sit, sit, " she says. " No hugging in here. "

 

On the very first day in the dormitory they measured me with a

dosimeter. My clothes, bag, purse, shoes - they were all " hot " . And

they took that all away from me right there. Even my underwear. The

only thing they left was my money.

 

He started to change; every day I met a brand-new person. The

burns started to come to the surface. In his mouth, on his tongue, his

cheeks - at first there were little lesions, and then they grew. It

came off in layers - as white film ... the colour of his face ... his

body ... blue, red , grey-brown. And it's all so very mine!

 

The only thing that saved me was it happened so fast; there wasn't

any time to think, there wasn't any time to cry. It was a hospital for

people with serious radiation poisoning. Fourteen days. In 14 days a

person dies.

 

He was producing stools 25 to 30 times a day, with blood and

mucous. His skin started cracking on his arms and legs. He became

covered with boils. When he turned his head, there'd be a clump of

hair left on the pillow. I tried joking: " It's convenient, you don't

need a comb. " Soon they cut all their hair.

 

I tell the nurse: " He's dying. " And she says to me: " What did you

expect? He got 1,600 roentgen. Four hundred is a lethal dose. You're

sitting next to a nuclear reactor. "

 

When they all died, they refurbished the hospital. They scraped

down the walls and dug up the parquet. When he died, they dressed him

up in formal wear, with his service cap. They couldn't get shoes on

him because his feet had swollen up. They buried him barefoot. My love.

 

Sergei Vasilyevich Sobolev

Deputy head of the executive committee of the Shield of Chernobyl

Association:

 

There was a moment when there was the danger of a nuclear

explosion, and they had to get the water out from under the reactor,

so that a mixture of uranium and graphite wouldn't get into it - with

the water, they would have formed a critical mass. The explosion would

have been between three and five megatons. This would have meant that

not only Kiev and

Minsk, but a large part of Europe would have been uninhabitable.

Can you imagine it? A European catastrophe.

 

So here was the task: who would dive in there and open the bolt on

the safety valve? They promised them a car, an apartment, a dacha, aid

for their families until the end of time. They searched for

volunteers. And they found them! The boys dived, many times, and they

opened that bolt, and the unit was given 7,000 roubles. They forgot

about the cars and

apartments they promised - that's not why they dived. These are

people who came from a certain culture, the culture of the great

achievement. They were a sacrifice.

 

And what about the soldiers who worked on the roof of the reactor?

Two hundred and ten military units were thrown at the liquidation of

the fallout of the catastrophe, which equals about 340,000 military

personnel. The ones cleaning the roof got it the worst. They had lead

vests, but the radiation was coming from below, and they weren't

protected there. They were wearing ordinary, cheap imitation-leather

boots. They spent about a minute and a half, two minutes on the roof

each day, and then they were discharged, given a certificate and an

award - 100 roubles. And then they disappeared to the vast

peripheries of our motherland. On the roof they gathered fuel and

graphite from the reactor, shards of concrete and metal.

 

It took about 20-30 seconds to fill a wheelbarrow, and then

another 30 seconds to throw the " garbage " off the roof. These special

wheelbarrows weighed 40 kilos just by themselves. So you can picture

it: a lead vest, masks, the wheelbarrows, and insane speed.

 

In the museum in Kiev they have a mould of graphite the size of a

soldier's cap; they say that if it were real it would weigh 16 kilos,

that's how dense and heavy graphite is. The radio-controlled machines

they used often failed to carry out commands or did the opposite of

what they were supposed to do, because their electronics were

disrupted by the high radiation. The most reliable " robots " were the

soldiers. They

were christened the " green robots " [from the colour of their

uniforms]. Some 3,600 soldiers worked on the roof of the ruined

reactor. They slept on the ground in tents. They were young guys.

 

These people don't exist any more, just the documents in our

museum, with their names.

 

Eduard Borisovich Korotkov

Helicopter pilot:

 

I was scared before I went there. But then when I got there the

fear went away. It was all orders, work, tasks. I wanted to see the

reactor from above, from a helicopter - to see what had really

happened in there. But that was forbidden. On my medical card they

wrote that I got 21 roentgen, but I'm not sure that's right. Some days

there'd be 80 roentgen, some days 120. Sometimes at night I'd circle

over the reactor for two hours.

 

I talked to some scientists. One told me: " I could lick your

helicopter with my tongue and nothing would happen to me. " Another

said: " You're flying without protection? You don't want to live too

long? Big mistake! Cover yourselves! " We lined the helicopter seats

with lead, made ourselves some lead vests, but it turns out those

protect you from one set of rays, but not from another. We flew from

morning to night. There was nothing spectacular in it. Just work, hard

work. At night we watched television - the World Cup was on, so we

talked a lot about football.

 

I guess it must have been three years later. One of the guys got

sick, then another. Someone died. Another went insane and killed

himself. That's when we started thinking.

 

I didn't tell my parents I'd been sent to Chernobyl. My brother

happened to be reading Izvestia one day and saw my picture. He brought

it to our mum. " Look, " he said, " he's a hero! " My mother started crying.

 

Aleksandr Kudryagin

Liquidator:

 

We had good jokes. Here's one: an American robot is on the roof

for five minutes, and then it breaks down. The Japanese robot is on

the roof for five minutes, and then breaks down.

 

The Russian robot is up there two hours! Then a command comes in

over the loudspeaker: " Private Ivanov! In two hours, you're welcome to

come down and have a cigarette break. "

 

Ha-ha!

 

Nikolai Fomich Kalugin

Father:

 

We didn't just lose a town, we lost our whole lives. We left on

the third day. The reactor was on fire. I remember one of my friends

saying, " It smells of reactor. " It was an indescribable smell.

 

They announced over the radio that you couldn't take your

belongings! All right, I won't take all my belongings, I'll take just

one belonging. I need to take my door off the apartment and take it

with me. I can't leave the door. It's our talisman, it's a family

relic. My father lay on this door. I don't know whose tradition this

is, but my mother told me

that the deceased must be placed to lie on the door of his home.

 

I took it with me, that door - at night, on a motorcycle, through

the woods. It was two years later, when our apartment had already been

looted and emptied. The police were chasing me. " We'll shoot! We'll

shoot! " They thought I was a thief. That's how I stole the door from

my own home.

 

I took my daughter and my wife to the hospital. They had black

spots all over their bodies. These spots would appear, then disappear.

They were about the size of a five-kopek coin. But nothing hurt. They

did some tests on them. My daughter was six-years-old. I'm putting her

to bed, and she whispers in my ear: " Daddy, I want to live, I'm still

little. " And I had thought she didn't understand anything.

 

Can you picture seven little girls shaved bald in one room? There

were seven of them in the hospital room ... My wife couldn't take it.

" It'd be better for her to die than to suffer like this. Or for me to

die, so that I don't have to watch any more. "

 

We put her on the door ... on the door that my father lay on.

Until they brought a little coffin. It was small, like the box for a

large doll.

 

I want to bear witness: my daughter died from Chernobyl. And they

want us to forget about it.

 

Arkady Filin

Liquidator:

 

You immediately found yourself in this fantastic world, where the

apocalypse met the stone age. We lived in the forest, in tents, 200km

from the reactor, like partisans.

 

We were between 25 and 40; some of us had university degrees or

diplomas. I'm a history teacher, for example. Instead of machine guns

they gave us shovels. We buried trash heaps and gardens. The women in

the villages watched us and crossed themselves. We had gloves,

respirators and surgical robes. The sun beat down on us. We showed up

in their yards like demons. They didn't understand why we had to bury

their gardens, rip up their garlic and cabbage when it looked like

ordinary

garlic and ordinary cabbage. The old women would cross themselves

and say, " Boys, what is this - is it the end of the world? "

 

In the house the stove's on, the lard is frying. You put a

dosimeter to it, and you find it's not a stove, it's a little nuclear

reactor.

 

I saw a man who watched his house get buried. We buried houses,

wells, trees. We buried the earth. We'd cut things down, roll them up

into big plastic sheets. We buried the forest. We sawed the trees into

1.5m pieces and packed them in Cellophane and threw them into graves.

 

I couldn't sleep at night. I'd close my eyes and see something

black moving, turning over - as if it were alive - live tracts of

land, with insects, spiders, worms. I didn't know any of them, their

names, just insects, spiders, ants. And they were small and big,

yellow and black, all different colours.

 

One of the poets says somewhere that animals are a different

people. I killed them by the ten, by the hundred, thousand, not even

knowing what they were called. I destroyed their houses, their

secrets. And buried them. Buried them.

 

Vanya Kovarov, 12:

 

I'm 12 years old and I'm an invalid. The mailman brings two

pension cheques to our house - for me and my grandad.

 

When the girls in my class found out that I had cancer of the

blood, they were afraid to sit next to me. They didn't want to touch me.

 

The doctors said that I got sick because my father worked at

Chernobyl. And after that I was born. I love my father.

 

Ivan Nikolaevich Zhykhov, Chemical engineer:

 

We dug up the diseased top layer of soil, loaded it into cars and

took it to waste burial sites. I hought that a waste burial site was a

complex, engineered construction, but it turned out to be an ordinary

pit. We picked up the earth and rolled it, like big rugs. We'd pick up

the whole green mass of it, with grass, flowers, roots. It was work

for madmen.

 

If we weren't drinking like crazy every night, I doubt we'd have

been able to take it. Our psyches would have broken down. We created

hundreds of kilometres of torn-up, fallow earth.

 

There was an emphasis on our being heroes. Once a week someone who

was digging really well would receive a certificate of merit before

all the other men. The Soviet Union's best grave digger. It was crazy.

 

· These are edited excerpts from Voices From Chernobyl, by

Svetlana Alexievich, published by Dalkey Archive Press at £13.99

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