On a day like today, in 1986, at 1:23 am, a planned exercise to test the cooling system of the 4th reactor of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant ended in an unprecedented tragedy. In a matter of seconds, the steam tore off the roof of the reactor, release into the atmosphere and the surrounding city of a large amount of gases and fragments with a high level of radiation.
Today, 37 years after the disaster, we are considering who were the four key figures in the development of events. From the explosion of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant to the clean-up campaign that the Soviet Union and the international community had to carry out to avoid a major disaster.
Architects, politicians, engineers and families. The Chernobyl disaster shocked all members of the Soviet Union. Many of these characters have appeared in fiction about this disaster, such as Chernobyl, an adaptation of the event for a miniseries from HBO Max, so the names of more than one will surely remind you. However, don’t forget that were victims of one of the greatest human and biological tragedies in our history.
Anatoly Dyatlov, Deputy Chief Engineer for Operation of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant
Dyatlov was one of the most experienced nuclear scientists at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. Despite the fact that those around him did not consider him a good person, he was highly respected for his knowledge. Of course, for Anatoly Dyatlov, obedience was mandatory, and punishment was a method. Soon, This caused him the hatred of a significant part of those who obeyed his orders..
Where was Dyatlov on the night of the accident? Well, very, very close. The engineer was responsible for overseeing the safety of the testing of Reactor No. 4. When the process began, he was in his usual gloomy mood, and after a mistake made by young Leonid Toptunov, Dyatlov insisted on continuing to test the reactor, despite all signs to the contrary.. We already know the result.
Leonid Toptunov, senior reactor control engineer of the 5th shift of the Chernobyl reactor No. 4
Graduated from the prestigious Moscow Engineering Physics Institute, Toptunov came to the leadership of the Chernobyl nuclear center at only 25 years old.. Leonid, who wrote a dissertation on the intricacies of reactor physics, knew some procedures in case of emergency and other circumstances.
Toptunov had only two months of experience working at Reactor 4, an area notoriously difficult to manage. Somehow, the engineer missed one of the critical steps in controlling the reactor before testing began. This caused its power to drop to very low values, very close to zero. Although Leonid’s knowledge prompted him to stop the testing process, His boss Anatoly Dyatlov threatened to increase the capacity.
The test lasted only 36 seconds, during which time Toptunov pressed the button to turn off the emergency security system. The reactor was at a very unstable point, and this last process hastened his destruction.
Maria Protsenko, chief architect of the city of Pripyat
Protsenko, of Chinese-Russian origin who grew up in the Soviet Union, was expelled from the Communist Party because she was born outside the country. Nevertheless, woman managed to take an active part in the development of the region and got a job as a chief architect in the city of Pripyat. Here he was responsible for supervising each of the buildings, reprimanding all those workers who did not work well. All this while implementing plans to expand Pripyat from the 50,000 inhabitants for which it was designed, to the 200,000 inhabitants that were planned in the future.
Unfortunately, the outcome was different, but Maria Protsenko did not give up and led the evacuation of all the inhabitants of Pripyat. With a map in hand planned walks for all families in each of the apartment buildings and when the buses pulled up, she was responsible for instructing the drivers where they should go.
Protsenko remained in Pripyat, hoping that soon everyone would return to their homes and the development of the region would continue more vigorously. A few months later, a KGB officer found her in the heart of the Exclusion Zone, created in Chernobyl to avoid radiation contamination. Here Mary had only one request: to be helped build a fence to isolate the city he worked so hard to build.
Valery Legasov, First Deputy Director of the Kurchatov Institute of Atomic Energy
On the morning of Saturday, April 26, Legasov learned about the incident in Chernobyl during the next party meeting. Due to his position at the top of the Soviet scientific establishment and the prestigious awards he received during his career, he was ordered to be part of a government commission that would study what happened at the nuclear power plant..
Valery Legasov knew little about nuclear reactors. Nevertheless, the chaos and incompetence he witnessed shook his deepest political convictions.. The scientist was personally convinced of the clumsiness of socialism, trying in every possible way to contain the consequences of the Chernobyl explosion.
The amount of radiation received in those days affected Legasov’s health.. Unfortunately, his career also did not end well, all his attempts to reform the Soviet scientific establishment failed.
Source: Hiper Textual
