Chernobyl HBO Miniseries

I'm not a germaphobe, but those are words to live by!

 

Wasn't there a horror movie made there a few years ago...Some tourist get lost, blah,blah,blah...

 

Chernobyl Diaries was mainly set in Pripyat but wasn't actually filmed there. It's not a great film, but the recreation of the locations is pretty impressive.

 

I think it is the high yield of Cs-137 that's the problem. Radioactive potassium was never going to kill you, and potassium in general will kill you long before the radioactivity. Sr 90 behaves like Calcium (it's just below Ca in the periodic table), and is absorb by the bones and teeth.

 

Fat-soluble particles will accumulate in the body, including calcium, copper, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, K, selenium, and zinc. Strontium is water soluble, but chemical reactions can transform water-soluble strontium compounds into insoluble forms. So strontium can accumulate in the body, too.

 

My statement:

Strontium-90 is chemically similar to calcium...

A very small part of naturally occuring potassium, K-40 is radioactive and yes it is not harmful.

Strontium-90, due to its ability to be absorbed by bone, is an internal hazard due to its beta decay. It is active in the body due to its decay life of 29-years. In addition, it beta decays to yttrium-90, which further decays by beta decay with a half life of 64-hours.

 

Today is the 35th anniversary of Chernobyl disaster. We thank all the people who gave all they had including in many cases their health and lives to minimize the damage and protect us from the consequences.

Here's the official video from Chernobyl NPP. It's in Ukrainian but has English subtitles.

 

Interesting, thanks for that. I remember watching a TV documentary series about the building of the New Safe Confinement - fascinating, and such an impressive project.

 

For those who are interested I'll drop few videos about the actual state of reactor room (or how it is officially called, central hall) at least as far back as in 2010. First video is an interview with an engineer who was a member of crew which has first entered the central hall of block 4 back in 1988 and continued to go there over the years to recon and later to install equipment for monitoring.

 

And then here's the video on the man's personal Youtube channel where he shares photos taken inside the central hall and gives detailed comments. This one's in Russian but has English subtitles and is highly recommended to watch because it gives you the best perspective on the thing possible without actually going there.

 

Excellent videos, best shots I have seen inside the reactor building!

To provide some reference for those who may not be familiar with the radiation terms used in the video. When he speaks of "R" he is referring to the unit rem.

Back around the time of the accident, around 1986, the average person in the U.S. would receive about one milirem per-day, from all sources. So, you would receive about 1/3 of a rem a year, or about one rem every three years.

Here he talks about rems per-hour. At an exposure of 100-rems, most people will feel the physical effects of radiation sickness. Death will usually occur between 400-500 rems.

Survivors of Chernobyl, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki typically received about 45-rem of radiation exposure. Today, most radiation exposure is stated in sieverts, which is the international unit. One sievert = one hundred rems.

 

Is there an understanding of how much was released at Fukushima?

 

This was such a stunning production. Jared and Stellen? I'd watch either of those two guys in anything. Superb.

 

There were neglible amounts that the general public were exposed to. This is due to the containment building at the Fukushima reactor. Also, the nearby residents were evacuated due to the earthquake and tsunami. There were only a handful of clean-up workers who were exposed to significant amounts of radiation. One of which has since died of cancer that was attributed to his exposure.

 

One.....
wow