April 26, 1986: Nuclear Nightmare

They carried red carnations and candles as bells tolled and sirens sounded around them. At 1:23 AM today Ukraine marked the 20-year anniversary of the explosion of Reactor No. 4 at the Chernobyl nuclear station. For the facts, go here or here, but today I think I want to talk about the feelings.

At the time of the explosion, Mykola Malyshev was working in Reactor No. 1's control room. When the explosion happened, the lights flickered, the room shook and he and his co-workers were told to go to Reaction No. 4. When they reached the destroyed reactor, however, the workers there told them to leave:

"They told us, 'We are already dead. Go away,"'

And, for the most part, it was the truth. Konstantyn Sokolov, who now suffers from throat and lip cancer, said, "My friends were dying in front of my eyes."

Twenty years later, the victims of Chernobyl - the hundreds of thousands who lost family, friends, land, livestock....everything - are told that they need to stop considering themselves victims. They're told that they need to stop being so "fatalistic" and "radiophobic." Mothers who knowingly feed their children radioactive food are told not to give up, that they need to stop waiting to be rescued. Perhaps this is the truth, but how? When you have nothing left how do you help yourself? And does it really help if the government that told you not to worry, that you counted on to help you out is gone? And the new government is telling you that your problem isn't physical, it's psychological?

As global citizens we need to recognize that this accident could have happened anywhere. I know there are different types of reactors, different people running them and different governments who would have to deal with consequences in different ways. But the basic truth is that nuclear power has the potential to quickly make our entire planet unliveable. How can we possibly call ourselves an advanced society when we rely on such an unstable form of energy? I will leave you with a prayer from Valentyna Mashina, 55:

"Let God not allow this to be repeated. Let God not make our grandsons relive this."