One of the main secrets of Chernobyl was the truth

37 years ago, on April 26, 1986, the fourth block of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded. More than 800 thousand people from all the republics of the Soviet Union participated in the liquidation of the accident.

Initially, they were conscripts. Then they began to massively call up soldiers and reserve officers, send civilian specialists.

Much is now known about those events. And the fact that at first the liquidators did not know what a terrible scourge they were dealing with. During the first extinguishment, a shift of firefighters poured water on the reactor and did not suspect that the rising steam was deadly. They lived thereafter for two weeks. And the fact that the explosion threw 200-300 tons of highly radioactive materials onto the roof of the station, the background next to them was 10 thousand roentgens per hour. They were thrown off by hand, with shovels.

And what protective armor did: sheathed with sheets of lead 2.5 mm thick, which covered the torso. And lead “pants” in the form of a strip attached to the belt. The back of the head was protected with a lead plate. The soldier ran out onto the roof, dropped one shovel into the crater of the 4th exploded power unit. And immediately returned. At the same time, it was not allowed to write in documents that a person received more than 25 x-rays of exposure. Roof cleaning continued from September to October 1986. During this time, about five thousand soldiers visited there.

According to the Ministry of Defense, from 1986 to 1990, over 800 thousand people from all the republics of the Soviet Union were involved in work in the Chernobyl zone. (https://function.mil.ru/news_page/country/[email protected])

7 years ago, in 2016, Yulia Veprintseva, a member of the Federation Council Committee on Social Policy, reported: “240 thousand people were called from the Russian Federation to eliminate the disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. To date, for various reasons, 90 thousand Russian liquidators have passed away. Of these, 10 thousand have a causal relationship … with the consequences of the accident. About five thousand people died before 1991, when the Interdepartmental Expert Council, which establishes a causal relationship, did not yet exist. There are currently 150,000 liquidators registered in the country. Of these, 50,000 have disability associated with participation in the liquidation of the Chernobyl disaster.” (https://www.pnp.ru/social/chernobylcy-30-let-spustya.html)

This is general data for Russia for 2016. There are no aggregate data available to date. There is separate information on regions, republics. As of April 1, 2022, half of the five thousand liquidators lived in the Nizhny Novgorod region. As of April 2020, in the city of Volsk, Saratov Region, out of 880 participants in those events, 230 people remained alive. In the Kemerovo region, out of 3 thousand – 980 people. In Khakassia, as of April 26, 2023, out of 500 liquidators, 160 people are alive, 60 of them are disabled.

Citizens of the USSR did not know anything about the disaster for 36 hours. Subsequent information was scarce. One of the main mysteries of the Chernobyl disaster was the truth.

In December 1991, in the general confusion after the GKChP coup, the ban on the CPSU and the last days of the Soviet Union, USSR People’s Deputy Alla Yaroshinskaya secretly took secret documents about Chernobyl and made photocopies: “Putting the originals back in the safe, I thought: everything is so unsteady in the country , and if the communists are back in power tomorrow, what will happen to my family after I publish an article about these protocols? They will say that there was nothing like that, that I came up with all this. And I will find myself where the putschists are sitting. I opened the safe again, took out the first protocol – the original – and put a copy in its place.

“Secret. From the working record of the meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU of April 29, 1986

Gromyko A.A. It is necessary to give the fraternal countries more information, and give certain information to Washington and London.

Aliyev G.A. Maybe give information to our people?

Ligachev E.K. Maybe you shouldn’t do a press conference.

Yakovlev A.N. Foreign correspondents will be looking for rumors…”

“Secret. Protocol No. 3. May 1, 1986

Send a group of Soviet correspondents to the areas adjacent to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in order to prepare materials for the press and television, indicating the normal life of these areas..

After that, the Pravda newspaper published essays entitled “Nightingales over Pripyat” and “Souvenirs from under the reactor.”

“Secret. June 4, 1986 Annex to Protocol No. 21.

Directives for coverage at the press conference of the main issues related to the causes and course of liquidation of the consequences of the accident at the fourth unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.

When covering the course of liquidation of the consequences of the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant: to show the successful implementation of large-scale technical and organizational measures aimed at eliminating the consequences of the accident.

Point out the inconsistency of the claims and assessments of both individual officials and the press from a number of Western countries, declaring allegedly significant environmental and material damage caused by the spread of small amounts of radioactive substances with air masses from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant zone.

“Secret. Protocol No. 5. May 4, 1986

Message from Comrade Shchepin (First Deputy Minister of Health of the USSR). Take note that as of May 4, a total of 1,882 people were hospitalized.”

Every day the number of those exposed increased. And then…

“Secret. Protocol No. 9. On May 8, 1986, the USSR Ministry of Health approved new norms for permissible levels of exposure of the population to radioactive radiation, exceeding the previous ones by 10 times. In special cases, it is possible to increase these norms to levels exceeding the previous ones by 50 times.

That is, a person with a tenfold or even 50-fold dose of radiation, in comparison with the previous norms, will not be considered sick.

And further…

From the Order of the Third Main Directorate of the Ministry of Health of the USSR of June 27, 1986: “To classify information about the accident. To classify information about the results of treatment. Classify information about the degree of radioactive damage to personnel involved in the liquidation of the consequences of the Chernobyl accident.

It is clear that the country lived in an atmosphere of rumors. Including the most incredible ones. Including mystical interpretations. But, however, there was also mysticism quite real.

7 years ago I received a letter from my friend, journalist Vitaly Chelyshev: “Train Moscow – Zaporozhye, 25-26.04.86. I went from the first session of the screenwriting department of VGIK. There was a couple in the compartment. And a woman knitting something on knitting needles from beige woolen threads. At midnight they started packing. The knitted woman suddenly began to sob. At the beginning of the second night, she suddenly began to sob and ask everyone: “Are we going to Kyiv soon? Is Kyiv coming soon? There my son works at a nuclear power plant. fireman. (We repeat: during the first extinguishment, the shift of firefighters poured water on the reactor and did not suspect that the rising steam was fatal. They lived after that for two weeks. – S. B.) At two in the morning she sobbed out loud. And she kept asking about Kyiv and about her son. They explained to her that the train was going to Zaporozhye. She calmed down for a while. And then everything repeated. The guides brought her some kind of sedative. But she started crying again.

I restlessly fell asleep on the top bunk. Woke up early. The woman was knitting and crying, quietly, doomed. They met her in Zaporozhye. And she came out as a very ordinary passenger, merging with the crowd.

Only a few days later, the disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and the nightly inconsolable crying of the mother of a firefighter suddenly merged into one.

I swear! I swear it was. Soviet radio and TV were silent. And the mother, with her moans and lamentations, heralded a catastrophe. Lord have mercy! And rest, O Lord, those who perished then. And give earthly peace and help to the survivors of the liquidators.

And another coincidence. After 3 years, Vitaly Chelyshev was elected a People’s Deputy of the USSR, he was a member of the Chernobyl Commission:

“I got a vote from the Congress of People’s Deputies: only people of non-reproductive age can be sent to work in the zone. Accepted … The next day, Izvestia comes out with a resolution of the congress. The item has disappeared. Basically, a crime has been committed. Because there was a clause in the official resolution, and then it also disappeared …

Behind the GKChP. Behind the resignation of Mikhail Sergeevich Gorbachev. Behind the Soviet Union. It was January 1992. We were in a hurry. They photocopied the documents of the Chernobyl archive in triplicate. Then, using my pass, they took them out… The original went to the parliament of the RSFSR, copies went to the parliaments of Ukraine and Belarus… I was told that most of the Chernobyl archive burned down in the White House in October 1993. But in Belarus and Ukraine everything remained intact.”

Sergei Baimukhametov.

Moskovskaya Pravda collage