Human-beings have witnessed myriads of dates that shook the world and continued, decades and centuries later, to astonish throughout history. The name “Chernobyl” has become a synonym for one of the worst technological disasters and nuclear accidents of all time, and hence this incident is a remarkable tragedy in human history to delve into. This research paper is an attempt to provide some insights into and seek to understand the Chernobyl nuclear accident at the material along with psychological level in respect to symbolism/representation of the time, scope of the tragedy, and material remainders along with how those remainders obscure the meaning of the catastrophe.
On 26 April 1986, during the testing of a new safety procedure, there were two massive steam explosions that completely destroyed the core of the Reactor Four at the Chernobyl nuclear power facility in Pripyat, Ukraine (part of the Soviet Union at the time). Those blasts which came in contact with the oxygen in the atmosphere turned into catastrophic nuclear fires and led to a bigger explosion of the facility. Following the explosion, firefighters were sent to the location to extinguish the flames. Many of the fires were extinguished later that day, yet the fires in the reactor No. 4 continued to burn for almost ten more days.
The day after the explosion, on 27 April, the Soviet authorities launched an evacuation of the 350,000 residents in the town of Chernobyl and city of Pripyat. Later that day, European scientists estimated approximately 50 million curies of radioactive innards– the equivalent of 500 Hiroshima bombs (Plokhy)– in the explosion and ensuing fire spread over parts of Ukraine and across the landscapes of Europe. On 28 April, the Soviet news agency publicized that a disastrous nuclear accident had occurred in Chernobyl.
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On the surface, the nuclear disaster in Chernobyl appeared as an explosion at one of the largest nuclear power plants in the world. Drozdenko, in his article, added that a number of witnesses reported the first explosion was associated with a red blaze, and few seconds later the second explosion was followed by a light-blue blaze. Then, a mushroom cloud emerged above the reactor No. 4. The Chernobyl nuclear accident was significant not only as an example of dangers of a nuclear holocaust, the aftermaths of this incident also remained haunting over 30 years since the explosion. Although the disaster caused thousands of deaths, including direct and indirect exposure to the radioactive materials, long-term health impacts amongst residents in Chernobyl and the nearby Europe and many other negative environmental and ecological consequences were incalculable. Given these continuing effects and dangers, this once-little-known Chernobyl became one of the infamous tragedies of humanity and the world psyche.
Scientists proclaimed the defects in the design of the No.4 reactor coupled with the inexperienced and careless night-shift plant operators at Chernobyl resulted in the worst nuclear accident the world has ever witnessed (Kortov and Yu 13). However, beneath the meltdown itself at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the symbolism and representation of this catastrophe is a worthwhile research topic. The Chernobyl nuclear power plant was a metaphor for a desire for technological supremacy in the nuclear arms race between the Soviet Union and the United States during the Cold War from 1947 to 1991. For both the U.S. President Harry Truman and the Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev, an atomic knowledge was perceived as important for great-power status, and hence which nation had the best nuclear technology would control the most power (Jaworowski 150-152). Therefore, the Chernobyl nuclear power station was an integral part of energy production in the development of nuclear capability in the Soviet Union of the time.
Under the Soviet communism, pursuing high productivity was the primary goal of the society, and hence a completion of projects in the shortest possible period of time was considered as the true measurement of success (Shlyakhter and Richard 257). By its nature, a system that tied to arbitrary deadlines regardless of the specific circumstances affecting a given project along with offering incentives only to people who thrived on meeting due dates would invite a sacrifice of quality and even safety.
The implication of that structure of the Soviet system was the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in which the safety test procedures were not conducted in accord with standard safety regulations, and the plant operators rushed the testing to an extent that further violated the safety standards to meet the operating schedule (Dobbs). As a result, these operator’s errors because of the communist philosophy triggered potential problems, and that the explosion of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant actually occurred. Subsequently, the Chernobyl disaster was a symbol of the Soviet failure.
Despite the first catastrophe of the accident was the meltdown of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant itself, the process that the Soviet government dealt with the Chernobyl crisis remained a classic Soviet cover-up (Plokhy). The firefighters were never informed of a nuclear fire and the possibility of nuclear radiation poisoning. Accordingly, those firemen used water and standard fire-retardant chemicals to extinguish the fire, but high temperature of the radioactive fire vaporized the substances, erupting a massive cloud of contaminants into the atmosphere. Due to lacking information, most of those firefighters did not wear their radiation suits and hence died within few months because of exposing to high doses of radiation (Backgrounder on Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant Accident).
In addition, in order to perpetuate and justify the Communist party principles, as well as to protect the image of communism as the ideal and perfect system, the officials and institutes were required to only publicize what the Party chose to announce. Under the leadership of Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet government neither announced the residents nor informed the international community of the nuclear accident (Shlyakhter and Richard 252-253). In particular, Chernobyl’s intercity phone was cut off, and the workers and engineers at the nuclear plant were prohibited from sharing news of what was happening with their friends or relatives.
During the time, state authorities wore respirators, whereas residents only heard misinformation. As a result, this cover-up was tragic itself that led to thousands of deaths and millions of affected victims of radioactive exposure. Until the Swedish nuclear plant operators in Forsmark noticed erratically high levels of radioactivity and determined the source’s origin from the Ukraine, the Soviet authorities had to admit the accident and began an evacuation program.
The scientific consensus on the effects of the Chernobyl disaster identified 2 workers died immediately after the explosion as a result of non-radiological causes and 30 other plant operators as well as firefighters died because of acute radiation sickness within months of the explosion (Havenaar et al. 1535). However, the total numbers of deaths, including future deaths of the affected population, is highly controversial. Jaworowski, in his study Observations on the Chernobyl Disaster and LNT, documented an estimate of 4,000 people were subjects to premature deaths from radiation-induced cancers and leukemia over the lifetime. In particular, the most recently published figures by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) indicated the Chernobyl accident resulted in a death toll of additional 200,000 casualties in Belarus, Ukraine, and Russia collectively from 1990 to 2004. In addition, an estimate of up to 8 million victims from indirect exposure to the Chernobyl’s radioactive pollution and contaminated areas was documented (Barringer), and thus their long-term health impacts would continue to be experienced for decades to come.
Aside from the immeasurable human health effects, the environmental devastation because of the disaster also reached enormous proportions by the time the reactor No. 4 burned itself for ten days following the April 26 explosion. The radioactive fall-outs from the Chernobyl explosion contaminated large territories of Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus. Radionuclides resulting from the Chernobyl explosion deposited mostly on open surfaces, including parks, streets, building roofs, and walls, of more than 200,000 square kilometers of Europe. Wind, rain, and human activities reduced surface contamination of radioactive materials, yet led to secondary contamination of sludge and sewage systems (Kortov and Yu).
The associated risks involved in this cyclical nuclear pollution to the environmental and ecological system posed concerns to many of those living in that affected areas. Furthermore, animals and plants living in contaminated zones in and around Chernobyl suffered from a variety of side effects as a result of radioactive materials. Ecosystems in the forests and water bodies were also contaminated by the particulate and gaseous radioisotopes, and hence the biological populations in those environments dramatically reduced during the first few years after the accident (Drozdenko).
After the evacuation, the Soviet military established an official Exclusion Zone that covered an approximately 1,600 square mile area surrounding the nuclear power plant, forming a desolate landscape of abandoned towns and villages. Right after the evacuation of Chernobyl’s residents, the town became a “ghost town” in which every glimpsing sign of lives stopped in time. In 2011, 25 years later, some of material remainders today consist of fractured floorboards of a kindergarten that are strewn with books and dirt-blackened dolls alongside the small bunk beds which are empty of bodies in the village of Kopachi, Chernobyl. Furthermore, the city of
Pripyat now sits suspended in time; its once-proud buildings is crumbling and devouring by nature. If the shocking and sudden occurrence of local Chernobyl disaster and scope of deaths can be considered the first trauma of Chernobyl, emergent psychological and physical disorders suffered by Chernobyl survivors and their successive generations constitute the second trauma of the Chernobyl catastrophe until today. This trauma-as-gradual-process represents the second remainder of the Chernobyl nuclear accident.
Shlyakhter and Richard (257) postulated that the survivors as suffering from a kind of “death imprint, survivor guilt, psychic numbing, and struggle for meaning”, and those memories of Chernobyl explosion have still haunted them for almost 30 years after the accident. Those psychological traumas might also implicate their descendants through possible influences on developmental processes between parents and children. Furthermore, the next-generation descendants of Chernobyl survivors might experience prejudice and social discrimination due to their physical abnormalities. Taken together, those scars have always reminded of a Chernobyl disaster.
Today, the real danger conceals in the invisibility of the danger. No one is capable of constantly being aware of this invisibility, and such an attempt to understand seems to be beyond our psychological capacity. If we want to survive, we must try to comprehend the invisible as if we had it right in front of us, and educate our fellows with regard to this philosophy as well as in the fear that the invisibility implies. When looking at the Chernobyl remainder – the Exclusion Zone, we might try to come up with a feasible explanation for the causes of such devastating tragedy.
However, the Exclusion Zone does not tell us much of the complete story behind the Chernobyl explosion. In fact, we only understand the surfaces of the tragedy, but there is also an iceberg underneath. Therefore, to satisfy our desire to understand the Chernobyl, we need some underlying layers of information and background. In other words, the true meanings of this tragedy obscure its remaining objects.
