Newspaper Page Text
Flagpole Magazine
April 22, 1992
Page 17
Earthworks
What happened at Chernobyl:
On April 25-26th in 1985 operational
staff at the Chernobyl nuclear power
plant in the Byelorussian-Ukraiman
area carryied out a series of experi
ments to test safety and power pro
duction during a power outage. These
experiments were not done properly,
nor were they overseen properly.
At 1:23 a.m. on April 26, two thermal
explosions occurred, sending burning
pieces of material and radioactivity into
the atmosphere. This sent up a cloud of radioactive material
— more than was released at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The
burning pieces fell on surrounding roofs, lighting over thirty
fires. Nearby stores of diesel fuel and hydrogen were
threatened, presenting a tre
mendous chance of a much
larger, out-of-control fire.
This fire threat took prece
dence over radiation safety,
and twenty-eight firemen
went into the area, knowing
the great personal risk, and
put out the blazes. Six of
them died of acute radiation
poisionmg, from acute radia
tion lesions of the sk.n, intes
tines, and lungs. Of the work
ers who died, at least one,
Valeryi Khodemchuk, re
mains entombed in the
nuclear reactor, his body
having been unrecoverable.
Plant workers in the area at
tempted to ascertain the situ
ation, put out fires, and res
cue other workers
Two workers, Proskur-
yakov and Kudryavtsev, made their way to the destroyed
control room and reactor core, unaware of the total dam
age. They came upon the burning core, and looking down,
witnessed the red and blue fire They shielded their faces
from the powerful updraft of 30,000 roentgens of radiation
per hour But already they had received a lethal dose, and
both died in great pain in Moscow, along with other plant
workers who had received huge doses Their bodies had to
be treated before burial was allowed
All told, 299 individuals were diagnosed with raaiation
syndrome, and thirty-one people died as a direct result of
this accident. All these exposed people were firemen or
plantworkers. These figures do not account for the thou
sands upon thousands of individuals exposed to the radio
active fallout whose lives will be shortened as a result of
radiation-induced cancer.
Those 135,000 people who lived near the plant in the
towns of Pripyat and Chernobyl had to be evacuated and
relocated. The city of Kiev, 2.5 million, was spared from
contamination to its water supply, the river Dnieper, only by
chance. Other victims c'f Chernobyl included the last no
madic peoples of Europe, the Lapps of Finnish Lapland,
who depend upon the land for raising reindeer. Many
reindeer were severely contaminated, and had to be slaugh
tered . Now theirs is a legacy of radiation contamination in an
otherwise mostly pristine wilderness.
Remember:
Nuclear energy is dan
gerous and unworkable.
From mining and process
ing fuel, to building and run
ning plants, to dealing with
radioactive waste, nuclear
energy is not a solution.
Nuclear accidents have oc
curred in the U S. (Three
Mile Island, the Fermi plant
in Detroit). Nuclear energy
kills people, from start to
finish. The nuclear energy
industry and government
weapons programs are in
tegrally linked.
April 26 will be a day of
remembering and a day of
action, calling for an end to
nuclear madness. Previ
ously, nuclear madness
was thought to be about
nuclear war. Today, we re
alize the war has been going on all along, and it has been
waged on all citizens of the Earth. On Sunday take a
moment to consider the children of Ukraine suffering from
leukemia, and write a letter to Congress opposing nuclear
energy and nuclear weapons production.
Students for Environmental Awareness will be holding a
meeting on this issue tonight in room 205 of Memorial Hall
Part of this meeting will be for planning an action on the 26th
at the Savannah River Site For more information on the
action call SEA at 542-8102 or Keren at 354-1422 or me at
369-0090.
All Jones
...theirs is a legacy of radiation
contamination in an otherwise
mostly pristine wilderness.
A Special Column from Ort
An aftertribute-of-sorts...
There's not much left to say. I talked to Kelly for a minute
Monday night before she had to run out to help plan the
parade this weekend, but she left me with a wonderful pearl
that may firm up tne future of The Jody Grind: “Robert would
come back and kick us in the butt if we quit now,* she
admitted "So I guess we'll stick with it and keep going.’ —
Robert Hayes was someone with a lot more depth than first
glance would show: I think he can be summed up well by
saying that just as he kicked ass in
life, if musically, he certainly will do
so in death if he is forced to. He was
kind to me; I will miss him: he was a
real person, a true friend, one I wished
I'd known better.
Rob Clayton and I met only once.
“You'll like our new drummer,’ Kelly
confided as we drove down Ga. 3
heading toward Griffin. “He's got it...
bigtime r And he did: he was a suitable replacement tor tne
affable Walter Brewer. I only got to shake his hand once, to
see him play once: I wish there could be an encore...many
encores.
As for Deacon Lunchbox, I will call him Tim. He stood on
a midtown street corner selling T he Great Speckled Bird
when I lived r Atlanta in 1970: he remembered me from
then but I haa forgotten him. We drank some beers to
gether, talked about such things as our Daddies, hugged
quite a bit, had some nebulous bond. His heart, no matter
what his residence, was in the Pisgah National Forest near
Brevard, North Carolina... in Transylvania County. His brother
has come from Colorado to take his urn and sprinkle his ashes
somewnere thereabouts: home, where he'd want to be.
I think of my friend Melissa who died in January at age
29, of how much she loved both The Jody Grind and The
Deacon. “They both give the world
something new; something original;
something nobody can get anywhere
else," she opined a year or so ago. It
makes me imagine her in the Nether
world, surprised to see these friends
so soon, but taking Deacon's immense
hand in hers and saying to him: “We
have ti me. Hov^d you I i ke to I earn to do
the Hora 7 ’ It was something Tim had
always wanted to learn; perhaps now he has his chance.
So I drank a Shiner regular for Tim and a Shiner Bock for
Robert: for Rob I will do something this weekend in remem
brance. As for you, do not forget these folks and how their
creativity and honesty touched you: that would be the
greatest tribute of all: just carry it around, and know that
there’s a reason, some Reason, for it all.... (30 )
C1V9? Wiliam Often Carlton
“They both give the world
something new;
something original;
something nobody can
get anywhere else,”
ANIMAL RIGHTS
J eopl
the Ethical
Treormenr
of Animals
PCTA
PUTTING m
PEOPLE «r Putting
vs. FIRST* J People
* * Firsr
o debote hosted by
University Union's Ideas ond Issues
Tues., April 26, 7:00 p.m.
Georgia Holl / Tore Center
S3 non-students
Let your opinion be heard!
Call Your Commissioners
and let them know how you feel!
THE GOVERNMENT IS YOURS
I mMmh
TalDuM* 549-1349 Charles €&$%*&3-9755
Miriam MoOfllf$4^0329 iI imy 3aitef*%46-9013
John Barrow"*'353-&S84 *543-4873
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66
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