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The Reason They Fictionalize Nuclear Disasters Like Chernobyl Is Because They Kill So Few People


https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/05/09/the-reason-they-fictionalize-nuclear-disasters-like-chernobyl-is-because-they-kill-so-few-people/

In my research, I have come to see the entertainment industry as a major factor behind popular fears of nuclear.

Movies like “China Syndrome” (US - 1979), “Die Wolke” (Germany - 2006) and “Pandora” (South Korea - 2016) all contributed to the halting of nuclear plant construction, and the burning of fossil fuels instead.
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In the first episode of “Chernobyl” the nuclear reactor explodes, blows the top off the building, and catches on fire. The plant workers vomit, their faces turn red, and several appear to die.

We see a plant worker in his twenties hold open a door to the reactor hall and various parts of his body start to bleed. He rescues a comrade with a red, blistered, and bloody face, and appears to leave him for dead in a hall. Later we see the man slumped over and smoking what appears to be his last cigarette.

Later, the plant manager who was in denial about the accident becomes violently ill after he learns the true scale of the disaster. As he leaves for the hospital, we see a fireman who is carrying a body on a stretcher collapse and drop the body.

I was left thinking that dozens of workers and firefighters were immediately killed, but according to the official United Nations report (p. 66) on the accident, just two workers, not dozens, or hundreds, were killed within a few hours of the explosion.
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Chernobyl’s total death toll is small compared to other famous disasters. According to the United Nations, 28 first responders died a few weeks after the accident, and since then 19 died for ”various reasons” including tuberculosis, cirrhosis of the liver, heart attacks, and trauma. The U.N. concluded that “the assignment of radiation as the cause of death has become less clear.”

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It's not the point it "killed so few people" the fact is that it IS killing people. Slowly and over the course of a longer period of time. We're so used to shocking death tolls after each disaster like the Japan Tsunami, or the one in the Indian Ocean, or 9/11. Here we have an instance of some who were killed within hours of the disaster, to some who are still dealing with the ramifications of that meltdown. And that UN report is wrong, dead wrong.

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Nonsense. It is simply impossible to attribute deaths after 10 years to the reactor failure.

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Well recent ice core samples taken in Antarctica found residual radiation carbon dated to 1986 that can only be attributed to the Chernobyl's meltdown. So hey science backs up the fact that this disaster was injurious to the planet. Not only long term Cancers in Russia being attributed to Chernobyl from people who lived within the cloud path after the disaster. Heck they're still measuring deaths in Japan from Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I can't imagine what's going to happen there in light of the Fukushima plant melt down. And there are still sections of Love Canal that are uninhabitable due to leakage from a plant in the area. Same with the partial melt down of Three Mile Island.

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"Well recent ice core samples taken in Antarctica found residual radiation carbon dated to 1986"

Carbon dating is not and can not be used on anything that recent. It is used only on organic remains that are a minimum of a couple of centuries old.

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You are repeating Greenie conspiracy theories. No Three Mile Island deaths! Survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki die of old age.

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What we have is records and while yes, the worst case horrifying acute radiation sickness deaths were thankfully only a few, many more were sickened and required medical treatment, much of it intensive. In addition we've got statistics and they show a correlation with shortened lifespans and higher rates of diseases such as cancers.

I mean you're being pretty obtuse if you're argument is this wasn't a shit sandwich and one that wouldn't have been far worse if not for people basically maning up and putting on the big boy britches and going in. For instance those 3 that waded into the basement to open the valves really did it, and did it in the dark because the alternative couldn't be allowed to happen.

Maybe you weren't old enough to remember this happening but some of us were watching this occur. Hell, I still remember seeing video of the miners in their white disposables on the news digging under the foundation, the helicopters dropping sand, the building of the sarcophagus, the cleanup, etc.

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Ah so this fight to get 9/11 responders health care coverage should be shut down because it's been more than 10 years and you cant fathom how health can be tracked over a time greater than this random cutoff.

Go tell that to Congress, you masterful genius you.

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Radiation-related illnesses (like cancer) can take YEARS to manifest themselves. That's partly what makes it so deadly. Sadako Sasaki (of the 1000 paper cranes fame) was not diagnosed with leukemia until 1955 and wouldn't die for another ten months. From radiation she had been exposed to ten years earlier.

So while it certainly can be difficult to attribute deaths to something ten years after the fact, it's not impossible.

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The OP is too naive and ignorant to understand that.

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Well, it's not like your solar panels have the potential to kill millions quickly and hundreds of millions slowly and to render entire states or countries uninhabitable for centuries!

No, the absolute worst thing a solar panel can do is slide off the roof and hit you on the head, while the worst thing a nuclear power plant can do is sterilize a fucking continent.

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Holy shit this

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We will never know the true number of deaths due indirectly. If someone who lived in Pripyat during the accident contracted cancer 20 years later, was it due to Chernobyl? Can't definitively say. Some models place the death toll between 3 and 5 thousand, but models can be unreliable. Even if the model is accurate, the death toll is much lower than most people would guess.

Over the other major nuclear incidents, no one died from three mile island and only one person died from radiation exposure at Fukishama.

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What about injuries?

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Did you enjoy the episode about firefighters having their skin dissolve because of radiation poisoning?

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I'm enjoying the series, because it's brilliant. Obviously I did not enjoy seeing firefighters suffering. However, it's part of the truth, and therefore belongs in the series. The truth is ugly sometimes, but it's important to report the truth.

Why would you ask such an odd question?

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Because I was responding to the original troll post about nuclear power being perfectly safe and the damage done at Chernobyl being exaggerated, that's why.

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Okay. Fair enough.

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Without nuclear power, half of our superheroes wouldn't even exist and we wouldn't be able to travel about through time, so I'd say the good outweighs the bad.

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If superheroes existed, we wouldnt need nuclear power OR fossil fuels!

We could just put them on treadmills, and tell them they're really saving the world this time.

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I do not believe the UN Report. I think it's bullshit.

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Good section on the debate on the UN report and methodology here

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deaths_due_to_the_Chernobyl_disaster

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Thanks, but your link does not work.

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[deleted]

must be your computer then. i took the liberty of putting bbc code so it's clickable, but no... that's a valid url.

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What you did fixed it, thanks. But I'm still confused. Both the series and Wikipedia said there were three engineers who went under the reactor to drain the water tanks. Some body else said it was only two. Some sources say they all died shortly afterwards. Other sources say they're still alive today.

So I'm still confused.

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They're confusing 2 diff sets of people, the 2 who died were the ones who kept saying they did everything right and they were part of the flashback in ep5. The 3 guys who went in after survived and 2 are still living.

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You are correct. I saw a documentary which said the same thing.

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I watched a documentary and that figure in the op seems bs as well, more like the figures that the state sanctioned.

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I would still like to know the fate of the three brave engineers who waded into radioactive water to open the drain valves.
Some say they died in a few weeks. Others say they're still alive today.

What is the truth? Does anyone actually know?

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There were two electricians that waded through radioactive water to try and switch off the electrolyzers and tried to supply voltage to the feedwater pumps. Comrade Grigoryevich died May 7, 1986 and Comrade Ivanovich died May 17, 1986.

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According to this video, there were three electricians, and they all survived to die years later.
Can you provide me with your source?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NOSxhsEcoY

And the two names you gave are not listed in this Wikipedia article about the disaster:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deaths_due_to_the_Chernobyl_disaster

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They're in the Wikipedia article: Look for Lelechenko, Aleksandr Grigoryevich and Lopatyuk, Viktor Ivanovich.

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Okay, I think I got it straight now. There were two engineers who died shortly after the disaster:
Lelechenko who died in Kiev on May 7, 1986, and Lopatyuk who died on May 17, 1986 in Moscow.

Right?

Was there a third engineer on the mission who did not die, and is still alive today?

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These were the engineers Alexei Ananenko and Valeri Bezpalov (who knew where the valves were), accompanied by the shift supervisor Boris Baranov.[87][88][89] Upon succeeding and emerging from the water, according to many English language news articles, books and the prominent BBC docudrama Surviving Disaster – Chernobyl Nuclear, the three knew it was a suicide-mission and began suffering from radiation sickness and died soon after.[90] Some sources also incorrectly claimed that they died there in the plant.[89] However, research by Andrew Leatherbarrow, author of the 2016 book Chernobyl 01:23:40,[85] determined that the frequently recounted story is a gross exaggeration. Alexei Ananenko continues to work in the nuclear energy industry, and rebuffs the growth of the Chernobyl media sensationalism surrounding him.[91] While Valeri Bezpalov was found to still be alive by Leatherbarrow, the 65-year-old Baranov had lived until 2005 and had died of heart failure.[92]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_disaster#Steam_explosion_risk



Funny - both are wiki articles yet state different facts. What is true is that most of mainstream media stated that they all died.

A bit more info from the man who stated that they lived (apparently he has written only one book - and that book was about chernobyl. - https://www.businessinsider.com/chernobyl-volunteers-divers-nuclear-mission-2016-4
My issue with his claim, however - is lack of video evidence of them being alive. In fact, he hid one of the survivor's identity due to privacy - WTF? If you make a controversial claim (every other source states they died), you better fucking back it up.

So - yeah, I dunno how much I believe this supposed researcher who found them alive given his lack of evidence and published materials aside from this book of his. In fact, I have a suspicion that his claim that they are or were alive is bull because he wanted to sell the book where he stated the 'shocking' truth about Chernobyl.

By the way - there are plenty of videos on youtube about the effect of radiation on people immediately after the disaster struck - that shit is real, and it makes me doubt this 'researcher' even further.

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Looking into this Andrew Leatherbarrow he doesn't seem to give me any confidence of his claims whatsoever. If you're going to make a bombastic claim then you should be able to back it up.

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Yep. That's what I saw in the documentary which I watched. All three survived, and two are still alive today.

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Jane Fonda and all the other anti-nuclear Hollywood elite are just as ignorant and clueless as anyone on the right. They just bought the anti-nuclear rhetoric without question, then parroted it to the world.

So, instead of the safe, clean nuclear power we could have had since the 1970's, we got four decades of coal powering our power grid, and with it, mega-tons, if not giga-tons of carbon dioxide, coal dust, and other toxic chemicals pumped into our atmosphere.

And, for people who worry about nuclear waste: Since Nevada went back on their commitment to store the waste in Yucca Mountain, it has been sitting outside our nation's nuclear power plants all this time. But, it is encased safely in metal and concrete, permanently sealing it off.

"Chernobyl" is yet another attempt by a liberal network, in this case HBO, to scare the hell out of people. That simple.

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Well spoken, comrade! Don't let this western filth poison the mind of the glorious soviet people. Like comrade Lenin said "Communism is Soviet power plus the electrification of the whole country"

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I don't care about Russia. Too bad for you and your trolling. But, I do give a damn about God's Creation. You don't, and will see how that works out for you when your time comes.

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Soviet radiation is best radiation.

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Indeed comrade! Nothing bad about some nuclear power, it has not ever hurt anyone! Для матери России!!

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Exactly comrades! Anyways, one glass of vodka per hour for four hours will protect you. This is known.

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Always good to hear from Trump voters.

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Evidently sarcasm eludes you, brother

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Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know you guys knew humor.

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I think you are underestimating the amount of deaths that are attributable to this disaster. Didn’t the government try to hid as much damage as possible and downplay how bad it was in every regard? Im not sure how the UN investigating after the fact, into a highly secretive entity such as the USSR could manage to pull accurate numbers as to how many people actually died from this event. I’m sure any “facts” they were provided with were altered. And how could they know the cause of death for people they don’t even know existed? Relying of the Soviet Governemnt to tell them the names of all those impacted by this and their causes of death? Do you honestly believe that only 47 people died as a result of this disaster? There were increases in cancer rates among people even relatively close to the disaster site, especially among children at the time. I find it hard to believe that something like this could happen, with a delayed evacuation and continuous denial of the magnitude of the problem, and the bare minimum, if not less being done in nearly every stage, would only result in 47 deaths.

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Such an obsession you have with death. Probably why you justified and defended death threats leveled against American Judiciary officers.

Oh and according to your logic, a tiny tornado that lasts 5 minutes and kills 1 person is worse than a worldwide earthquake that injures 99% of the global population.

As you can see, as usual, you just post ignorance. Ignorance and hate are all that you ever post, basically.

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You're the one who was banned here! For reporting too many posts.

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