Celebrated April 26th. On this day in 1986, the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant (ChNPP) occurred - the largest man-made disaster of the twentieth century in terms of the scale of damage and consequences.
The radioactivity brought by the contaminated clouds from Chernobyl has been recorded not only in northern and southern Europe, but also in Canada, Japan and the United States. Only the southern hemisphere of the Earth remained uncontaminated.
The accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant affected the lives of millions of people in one way or another. Most of the population of the northern hemisphere was exposed to varying degrees of radiation as a result of the Chernobyl accident. People living outside the territory of the former Soviet Union received relatively small doses, and quite unevenly across countries, mainly depending on whether it rained during the passage of the radioactive trail.
The risk group included personnel of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, participants in the liquidation of the consequences of the accident, evacuated people and the population of the affected territories. Almost 8.4 million people in Belarus, Russia, Ukraine were exposed to radiation, hundreds of thousands of them were evacuated from contaminated areas.
Directly during the accident, more than 300 people from the NPP personnel and firefighters were exposed to acute radiation exposure. Of these, 237 were initially diagnosed with acute radiation sickness (ARS), later this diagnosis was confirmed in 134 people. 28 people died from ARS in the first months after the accident.
Three more people died at the time of the explosion at the fourth power unit (one person died at the time of the explosion under the rubble, another died a few hours later from injuries and burns, and the third of them died of heart failure).
After the accident, 600 thousand citizens of the USSR were involved in the work to eliminate its consequences (according to some estimates, up to 800 thousand people, including a large number of military men), including 200 thousand from Russia. They directly participated in the creation of "Shelter" over the destroyed fourth unit, in the decontamination of the Chernobyl site and other units, in the work in the Chernobyl exclusion and temporary resettlement zone, in the construction of the city of Slavutich, etc.
The largest group of liquidators participated in clean-up operations for various periods of time after the accident. Although they no longer worked in an emergency situation, were monitored, and the doses they received were constantly taken into account, they nevertheless received significant radiation doses.
The participants in the liquidation of the consequences of the accident, risking their lives and health, fulfilled their duty and prevented the spread of destructive radioactive emissions.
Paying tribute to the memory of the dead, the heads of states of the Commonwealth of Independent States at the summit in June 2001 decided to appeal to the member states of the United Nations (UN) to declare April 26 the International Day of Remembrance for Victims of Radiation Accidents and Catastrophes.
On December 17, 2003, the UN General Assembly supported the decision of the Council of CIS Heads of State to proclaim April 26 as the International Day of Remembrance for the Victims of Radiation Accidents and Catastrophes, and also called on all UN member states to celebrate this International Day and hold relevant events within its framework.
In Russia, in memory of all citizens of the country who died in radiation accidents and catastrophes, in 1993, by a decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the Russian Federation, the Day of Remembrance for those killed in radiation accidents and catastrophes was established, which was celebrated on April 26.
According to the Federal Law of April 1, 2012, signed by the President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev, the name was changed to "The Day of Participants in the Elimination of the Consequences of Radiation Accidents and Catastrophes and the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of These Accidents and Catastrophes."
The changes made made it possible to perpetuate the memory of the dead and pay tribute to the living participants in the liquidation of the consequences of radiation accidents and disasters.
The material was prepared on the basis of information from RIA Novosti and open sources
Tell students about the Chernobyl tragedy; about the people who took part in the liquidation of this accident, to promote the formation of environmental knowledge and their use in educational and practical activities.
Develop a positive active life position;
Cultivate a sense of compassion and respect.
April 26 - International Day of Remembrance for Victims of Radiation Accidents and Catastrophes; proclaimed by the UN General Assembly in December 2003 (the countries-members of the Commonwealth of Independent States took the initiative to adopt the corresponding resolution).
April 26, 2011 marked the 30th anniversary of the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.
30 years ago, on the night of April 25-26, 1986, one of the world's largest industrial accidents occurred at a nuclear power plant located near the city of Chernobyl, 130 km from the capital of Ukraine, Kyiv. The nuclear reactor of the fourth power unit of the nuclear power plant went out of control, exploded and caught fire. Eyewitnesses said that at about 1 hour 24 minutes on the night of April 26, two explosions were heard.
Over the roof of the fourth power unit, burning pieces of graphite and sparks flew up. Some of them fell on the roof of the engine room and caused a fire in the building. As a result of the fire, a huge amount of deadly radioactive substances that were in the reactor got into the environment. They were blown away by the winds for many hundreds of thousands of kilometers from Chernobyl. Where radioactive substances fell on the surface of the earth, zones of radioactive contamination were formed.
The Times wrote in April 1987:
“No event after the Second World War touched so many people in Europe as the explosion of the 4th reactor of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.”
What radioactive substances are released into the environment?
Thousands of tons of cesium, iodine, lead, zirconium, cadmium, beryllium, boron, an unknown amount of plutonium were already lying on our earth - a total of four hundred and fifty types of radionuclides. Their number was equal to three hundred and fifty bombs dropped on Hiroshima.
According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation in Europe, the following radioactive substances entered the environment as a result of the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant: isotopes of iodine, cesium and strontium.
Radioactive isotopes can be very dangerous to humans. Even in small quantities, radioactive elements pose a danger to life. Radiation can damage the genetic structure.
What radioactive elements pose the greatest danger to humans 30 years after the disaster?
For 30 years, radioactive isotopes of cesium and strontium with a half-life of about 30 years have been of particular danger. Currently, more than 60% of the original amount of these elements is still in the environment.
Extremely long-lived plutonium poses a particular danger. During the fire of the reactor, plutonium and soot formed “hot particles” that are easily carried by the wind and, when they enter the human body, settle in the lungs, causing serious internal exposure. To one degree or another, radiation affects all inhabitants of the Earth. About 600,000 people passed directly through the work in the "zone" to eliminate the consequences of the accident and through the contaminated territories.
Large doses of radiation lead to death. It was such a painful death from radiation that many participants in the liquidation of the consequences of the Chernobyl disaster took. The first of these were firefighter heroes who extinguished a burning reactor immediately after the explosion. Most of them died within the next 14 days.
Small doses of radiation do not immediately lead to visible consequences, but can cause damage to individual organs, disorders of the immune system, and cancer. Radiation often causes blood cancer and thyroid cancer.
Ultra-low (“allowed”) doses of radiation can cause damage to the genetic structure, which, being inherited, can cause irreversible damage to the health of children and grandchildren of the exposed person.
A tragic consequence of the Chernobyl pollution was a sharp number of spontaneous abortions and stillbirths. The body of pregnant women rejects the fetus after exposure to small doses.
Chernobyl pollution has caused and continues to cause an increase in mortality among the population of all ages.
The huge collective radiation dose from the Chernobyl disaster could not but lead to changes at the genetic level. Thus, in West Berlin, there was a 2.5-fold increase in the number of newborns with Down syndrome among those conceived in May 1986. This disease is associated with genomic mutations (changes in the normal number of chromosomes).
In contaminated areas, there is an increase in the number of children with congenital malformations, such as bifurcation of the lips and palate, doubling of the kidneys, ureters, the appearance of additional fingers, anomalies in the development of the nervous and circulatory systems, infection of the esophagus.
Cancer is one of the typical manifestations of the consequences of radiation exposure. Selective studies in Poland, which lasted 11 years and covered 21 thousand people, showed that every second woman and every tenth child living in the affected areas have an enlarged thyroid gland.
Conducted studies in Yekaterinburg showed that by 1998 every third child had abnormalities in the development of the thyroid gland. Of the 119,178 children who were under 10 at the time of the disaster, 45,873 cases of other pathologies of this gland were found for 62 cases of cancer.
Radiation violates all known types of immunity. One of the causes of impaired immunity is a deficiency or excess of vital trace elements.
45% of children living in the Chernobyl-contaminated territory of Ukraine have a reduced immune status. As a result, an increase in the frequency and severity of acute and chronic diseases.
In children born in the affected areas, there is a delay in the development of the central nervous system, a delay in speech development, neurotic disorders, and impaired mental development. There have been recorded cases of the birth of children irradiated in the womb, with underdevelopment of the brain and skull.
Exposure to radiation entails a marked increase in the general morbidity of the population. An increase in the number of diseases of the respiratory system, disorders of the visual apparatus, allergies, and incurable skin diseases was noted.
Let's summarize the above. The accident at the nuclear power plant negatively affected human health and resulted in: decline in fertility; increased mortality; genetic disorders; an increase in the number of children with congenital malformations; an increase in the incidence of cancer; change in hormonal status; impaired immunity; impaired mental development, diseases of the circulatory system.
As a result of the Chernobyl accident, more than 53.5 thousand square kilometers of Ukrainian territory were contaminated. People do not live on the territory of 2598 square kilometers - they were forcibly resettled. 162 thousand people were evacuated and resettled from their places of permanent residence, including the city of Pripyat. Firefighters from the city of Pripyat were the first to arrive at the burning nuclear power plant. Many of them received terrible doses of radiation and died a painful death.
Echo of Chernobyl! Kirill Voloshin
CHERNOBYL - one word is enough.
And the heart, like a painful lump,
Starts shrinking, waiting
Hot blizzard with an atom inside.
There the sunsets flared up alo,
Burning through the field, steppe, forest.
The future is level with the sky
With buildings of light nuclear power plants.
Woe not to drink, but to drink in one gulp! ..
Don't touch anything here with your hand:
Dead city over the river Pripyat,
This city is a ghost town
Emits a dead sign
Opening the hem over Hell,
He lost the fight in the war...
And children irradiated with uranium,
Caught in the winds of change
We have traveled to different countries for a long time ...
I think you are sane today
And alive even this year
But many died in agony,
And many people are still suffering...
And it's not a sign, not a miracle,
In a small mistake...
And the city is empty. Actually people
Just left it for a day.
And then they thought that not for long
They didn't close the houses tightly.
And they carelessly took something valuable
Didn't know it was forever! forever!
Who remained alive - turned gray,
Having accepted so universal misfortune.
Terrible sentence: irradiated
Each "peaceful" atom is stitched.
It would be better - the life of the steppe, nomadic,
In the face - the wind hops and the sun copper,
Why is such a disease - radiation,
Slowly painful death.
It's easier to break everything up and fall asleep,
Transformed into today's mound.
... Dead city over the Pripyat River,
Dead city Pripyat over the river.
The city was named Pripyat after the full-flowing beauty of the river, which, fancifully meandering with a blue ribbon, connects the Belarusian and Ukrainian Polissya and carries its waters to the gray Dnieper. And the city owes its appearance to the construction here of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant named after V. I. Lenin. February 4, 1970 is considered the beginning of the construction of the city.
In the mid-1980s, about 48,000 people lived in prosperous Pripyat, and it was designed for 75-78 thousand inhabitants. Such a rapid population growth (annually the number of Pripyat residents increased by more than one and a half thousand people, of which almost half were newborns) was also facilitated by the fact that, in addition to the nuclear power plant, residents began to serve a convenient transport hub of the entire Polesie - not far from the city there is a large railway station Yanov, in Pripyat itself built a bus station and a large river pier, more like a small river port. So this garden city grew and lived until April 26, 1986.
Currently, the city of Pripyat is a dead city, it is also called a ghost town. There are organized guided tours. The purpose of visiting the city is to study the state of natural objects, but most often people come to Pripyat to look at the city, in which for 30 years you have not heard the hum of cars, children's laughter, in which lonely houses are still waiting for their owners to leave their cozy homes so quickly. Houses:
This accident forced mankind to take a new approach to nuclear energy and the safe operation of nuclear power plants. The explosion affected not only the republics of the former USSR - Ukraine, Belarus and Russia, but also a number of countries bordering the Soviet Union.
In Ukraine, there are 2 million 600 thousand victims of the Chernobyl disaster, 255 thousand liquidators, 106 thousand disabled people.
Today, 30 years later, we are talking about the lessons of the Chernobyl disaster.
Firstly, “The Chernobyl disaster is undoubtedly the most terrible event in the history of civilization. As a result, all of humanity suffered.” The consequences of the accident are global and terrible. Global, because the radioactive substances from the exploded reactor were spread all over the planet. Terrible, because a huge number of people were exposed to radiation.
Secondly,
Thirdly, unfortunately, many long-lived radioactive elements thrown out 30 years ago from an exploded reactor are still in the environment, carried by air and water currents and pose a danger to the health of the inhabitants of the Earth.
The very first major radiation accidents in history occurred during the development of nuclear materials for the first atomic bombs.
September 1, 1944 in the USA , Tennessee, at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, while trying to clean a pipe in a laboratory uranium enrichment facility, uranium hexafluoride exploded, which led to the formation of the dangerous substance hydrofluoric acid. Five people who were in the laboratory at that time suffered from acid burns and inhalation of a mixture of radioactive and acid fumes. Two of them died and the rest were seriously injured.
In the USSR, the first serious radiation accident occurred on June 19, 1948 , the very next day after the release of the nuclear reactor for the production of weapons-grade plutonium (object "A" of the Mayak plant in the Chelyabinsk region) at design capacity. As a result of insufficient cooling of several uranium blocks, their local fusion with the surrounding graphite occurred. For nine days, the canal was cleared by manual reaming. During the liquidation of the accident, all the male personnel of the reactor, as well as the soldiers of the construction battalions involved in the liquidation of the accident, were exposed to radiation.
March 3, 1949 in the Chelyabinsk region As a result of the massive discharge of high-level liquid radioactive waste by the Mayak plant into the Techa River, about 124 thousand people in 41 settlements were exposed to radiation. The highest radiation dose was received by 28,100 people living in coastal settlements along the Techa River; many irradiated cases of chronic radiation sickness were registered.
December 12, 1952 in Canada the world's first serious accident at a nuclear power plant. A technical error of the personnel led to overheating and partial melting of the reactor core.
September 29, 1957 there was an accident, called "Kyshtym". A container containing radioactive substances exploded in the Mayak radioactive waste storage facility in the Chelyabinsk region. Experts estimated the power of the explosion at 70-100 tons of TNT. The radioactive cloud from the explosion passed over the Chelyabinsk, Sverdlovsk and Tyumen regions, forming the so-called East Ural radioactive trace with an area of over 20 thousand square kilometers. According to experts, from the moment of the explosion to the evacuation from the industrial site of the plant, more than five thousand people were exposed to single exposures of up to 100 roentgens. Between 1957 and 1959, 25,000 to 30,000 servicemen took part in the elimination of the consequences of the accident. In Soviet times, information about the disaster was classified.
October 10, 1957 in the UK in the town of Windscale there was a major accident at one of the two reactors for the production of weapons-grade plutonium. Due to an error made during operation, the temperature of the fuel in the reactor rose sharply, and a fire broke out in the core, which lasted about four days. As a result, 11 tons of uranium were burned, and radioactive substances entered the atmosphere. Fallout has contaminated large areas of England and Ireland; the radioactive cloud reached Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Norway.
April 1967 there was another radiation incident in the Mayak Production Association. Lake Karachay, which Mayak used to dump liquid radioactive waste, became very shallow; at the same time, the coastal strip and the bottom of the lake were partially exposed. Radioactive dust from dried bottom sediments was carried by the wind far beyond the lake: an area of 1,800 square kilometers, where about 40,000 people lived, was contaminated.
The most serious incident in the US nuclear industry was the accident at the Tree Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania, which occurred March 28, 1979 . As a result of a series of failures in the operation of equipment and gross errors of operators at the second power unit of the nuclear power plant, 53% of the reactor core melted. Inert radioactive gases were released into the atmosphere. In addition, 185 cubic meters of weakly radioactive water were dumped into the Sukuahana River. 200 thousand people were evacuated from the area exposed to radiation.
On the night of April 25-26, 1986 at the fourth block of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant (Ukraine) the largest nuclear accident in the world occurred - with partial destruction of the reactor core and the release of fission fragments outside the zone. According to experts, the accident occurred due to an attempt to carry out an experiment to remove additional energy during the operation of the main nuclear reactor. 190 tons of radioactive substances were released into the atmosphere. Eight of the 140 tons of radioactive fuel from the reactor ended up in the air. Other hazardous substances were released into the atmosphere as a result of a fire that lasted almost two weeks. People in Chernobyl were exposed to 90 times more radiation than when the bomb fell on Hiroshima. As a result of the accident, radioactive contamination occurred within a radius of 30 kilometers. An area of 160,000 square kilometers was contaminated. The northern part of Ukraine, Belarus and the west of Russia were affected. 19 Russian regions with a territory of almost 60 thousand square kilometers and a population of 2.6 million people were subjected to radiation contamination.
September 30, 1999 the largest accident in the history of Japan's nuclear power industry. At the plant for the manufacture of fuel for nuclear power plants in the scientific city of Tokaimura (Ibaraki Prefecture), due to a mistake by the personnel, an uncontrolled chain reaction began, which lasted for 17 hours. 439 people were exposed to radiation, 119 of them received a dose exceeding the annual allowable level. Three workers received critical radiation doses. Two of them have died.
On August 9, 2004, an accident occurred at the Mihama nuclear power plant, located 320 kilometers west of Tokyo on the island of Honshu.. In the turbine of the third reactor, there was a powerful release of steam at a temperature of about 200 degrees Celsius. Nearby employees of the nuclear power plant received serious burns. No leakage of radioactive materials from the accident was found. At the time of the accident, there were about 200 people in the building where the third reactor is located. Four of them died, 18 were seriously injured.
Today, 30 years later, we are talking about the lessons of the Chernobyl disaster.
Firstly, “The Chernobyl disaster is undoubtedly the most terrible event in the history of civilization. As a result, all of humanity suffered.”
The consequences of the accident are global and terrible. Global, because the radioactive substances from the exploded reactor were spread all over the planet. Terrible, because a huge number of people were exposed to radiation.
Secondly, you can’t rely on technology, no matter how reliable it may seem
Thirdly, Unfortunately, many long-lived radioactive elements thrown out 20 years ago from an exploded reactor are still in the environment, carried by air and water currents and pose a danger to the health of the inhabitants of the Earth.
Therefore, people should remember Chernobyl for the sake of the future, be aware of the danger of radiation and do everything so that such disasters never happen again.
REQUIEM. Vladimir Lahutin
The bell of trouble sounds over the world,
Disturbing memory, remembering grief,
The face of the gray war is cruel and terrible,
Like a raging sea in a storm.
Japan has been mourning for many years
Known to the people of Hiroshima, Nagasaki,
But there is no ban on tragedy,
There are nuclear blocks everywhere.
Doesn't want to understand humanity
That life is the most sacred thing in the world,
It can be cut instantly
In the crucible of an explosion or the thick of battle.
We cannot count all the victims and trials,
But the arsenals, ranges are intact,
Chernobyl deadly news
A warning to new generations.
The millennium has started counting down
The twenty-first century walks the earth,
May his children have better luck
And the sun ray meets them every day.
Appendix
Day of the Chernobyl tragedy
International Day of Remembrance for Victims of Radiation Accidents and Catastrophes
font-size:14.0pt; font-family:" times new roman> April 26, 1986… This date has become special not only for the citizens of Ukraine, Belarus, Russia, but also for the whole world. All civilized mankind on this day remembers the events on Chernobyl nuclear power plant , about those who, not sparing life and health, stood up to fight against the radiation element. This year marks the 27th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster...
font-size:14.0pt;font-family:" times new roman>Chernobyl NPP - the first-born of the nuclear energy of Ukraine - has become a symbol of the largest in the history of mankind man-made disaster. She was the first operating nuclear power plant to be shut down ahead of schedule26 April1986.
As a result of an accident at Chernobylradioactive contamination of the territory within a radius of 30 kilometers. Total area of radiation contamination Ukraine amounted to 50 thousand square kilometers 12 areas, were subjected to radiation contamination 19 Russian regions with an area of almost 60 thousand square kilometers and with a population 2,6 million people were contaminated 46,5 thousand square kilometers of territory Belarus, where lived about 20 percent of the country's population.
History reference
Chernobyl nuclear power plant (Ukraine),26 April1986.Planned shutdown of the reactor, which lasted 20 seconds seemed like a routine electrical check. However, a few seconds later, as a result of a sharp power surge, a chemical explosion occurred. About 520 dangerous radionuclides.
The explosion was so powerful that pollution spread over large areas Soviet Union, which are currently part of Belarus, Ukraine and Russia, only about 155 thousand square kilometers.
According to official reports, immediately after the disaster 31 people died but 600 thousand liquidators, who took part in firefighting and clearing, received high doses of radiation. According to official data, radiation exposure almost 8 and a half million inhabitants of Belarus, Ukraine and Russia.
Agricultural land with an area of almost 52 thousand sq. km contaminated cesium-137 And strontium-90 with a half-life of 30 And 28 years, respectively. More 400 thousand people have been resettled, however, millions still live in conditions where the remaining residual impact creates a range of dangerous consequences for their lives and health.
Liquidators of the consequences of the Chernobyl accident nuclear plantthat saved Europe from exposure, Ukraine and Belarus from destruction.
IN September 2003 at the CIS summit, the President of Ukraine Leonid Kuchma invited the member countries of the Commonwealth to declare April 26 is the International Day of Remembrance for Victims of Radiation Accidents and Catastrophes. The Council of CIS Heads of State supported this proposal.
TO 25th anniversary from the day of the Chernobyl disaster inRussian-Belarusian information center on the problems of the consequences of the disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant created a single fund of materials, accumulated over 25 years -"Chernobyl: 25 years of overcoming". According to director of the branch of the Belarusian branch Russian-Belarusian Information Center on the Problems of the Consequences of the Chernobyl DisasterZoya Trofimchik, "positive feedback on the development of this unique mini-library comes from around the world."“We believe and hope that the creation of a fund based on the center will allow us to promote the idea at all levels that Belarus not only suffered more than other countries from the consequences of the Chernobyl disaster, but also that our republic has a unique experience of long-term overcoming these consequences” , - noted Zoya Trofimchik. In her opinion, now a specialaccentin informing the public it is necessary to dofor youth: “It is necessary to develop bright and interesting projects for young people to involve them in the work on the revival of their native land.” An international online campaign was held on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster"Light the Candle of Remembrance" initiated by the center with the supportDepartment for Elimination of the Consequences of the Catastrophe at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of the Republic of Belarus. As a result, the Action "lit a candle of memory" more than50 thousand Internet users.
The day of the Chernobyl tragedy is the day of memory of those who, not sparing their health and life, selflessly rushed to fight the fire from the explosion, who tried at such a price to mitigate the consequences of this tragedy.
It is thanks to their actions that many of us can live healthy and happy lives in ecologically clean areas.
It was proclaimed by a resolution of the United Nations General Assembly on December 8, 2016. In it, the General Assembly noted "the severe and long-term consequences of the Chernobyl disaster still being felt, three decades later, and the continuing needs of affected communities and territories" and invited "all Member States, relevant agencies of the United Nations system and other international organizations as well as civil society to commemorate this day."
On April 26, 1986, the largest man-made disaster in terms of damage and consequences of the 20th century occurred at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant (ChNPP), located in Ukraine, 15 kilometers from the city of Chernobyl, Kiev region.
On April 26, at 01:23:40 Moscow time, an explosion occurred at the fourth power unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant during design tests of one of the safety systems. As a result of it, the core and the entire upper part of the reactor building were completely destroyed, the deaerator stack and turbine hall were badly damaged, and all barriers and safety systems were destroyed. Explosions and the resulting fire were accompanied by the release of huge radioactivity. Every day, millions of Curies fell into the environment, and this process continued until May 6, 1986, after which the emission dropped sharply (by a factor of thousands) and continued to decrease in the future.
As a result of the accident, the territories of many countries were exposed to radioactive contamination. The specifics of the release led to the wide spread of radioactivity in the Northern Hemisphere, mainly through the European continent. The radioactivity brought by the contaminated clouds from Chernobyl has been recorded not only in northern and southern Europe, but also in Canada, Japan and the United States. Only the southern hemisphere remained uncontaminated.
In Europe, a territory with a total area of 207.5 thousand square kilometers has undergone significant pollution, of which about 60 thousand square kilometers were located outside the former USSR. The territories of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus were most polluted, to a lesser extent - other European countries - Sweden, Finland, Austria, Norway, Italy, Greece, Romania, Switzerland, Poland, Great Britain, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, etc.
In Russia, more than 59,000 square kilometers of territory of 14 subjects were exposed to radioactive contamination, including more than 2.3 million hectares of agricultural land and more than 1.5 million hectares of forest areas.
The accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant affected the lives of millions of people in one way or another. The risk group included personnel of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, participants in the liquidation of the consequences of the accident, evacuated people and the population of the affected territories. Almost 8.4 million people in Belarus, Russia, Ukraine were exposed to radiation, hundreds of thousands of them from contaminated areas. 134 people (technical personnel of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and firefighters involved in extinguishing the fire) had acute radiation sickness. Of these, 28 people died in the first months after the incident. Three more died at the time of the explosion at the fourth power unit.
Paying tribute to the memory of the dead, the heads of state of the Commonwealth of Independent States at the summit in June 2001 decided to appeal to the member states of the United Nations (UN) to declare April 26 the International Day of Remembrance for Victims of Radiation Accidents and Catastrophes.
On December 17, 2003, the UN General Assembly supported the decision of the CIS Council of Heads of State to proclaim April 26 as the International Day of Remembrance for Victims of Radiation Accidents and Catastrophes in the Commonwealth Member States.
The catastrophe at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant caused serious long-term radioecological, medical, demographic and socio-psychological consequences, and had a negative impact on the socio-economic development of the territories.
Organizations of the United Nations system and major non-governmental organizations and foundations are helping to rebuild the affected areas. They have carried out over 230 different projects in areas such as health, nuclear safety, psychosocial rehabilitation, economic recovery, environment and clean food production and information.
Despite large-scale emergency measures to eliminate and mitigate the consequences of the disaster, taken both immediately after it and in subsequent years, the Chernobyl nuclear power plant continues to be a potential source of danger.
The material was prepared on the basis of information from RIA Novosti and open sources
Over the past century, humanity has made tremendous progress in technological development. A huge number of industrial facilities were built, including those using nuclear energy. Unfortunately, sometimes accidents occur on them, leading to serious damage and loss of life. To honor their memory, a special date has been set during which annual themed events are held.
When celebrate
The International Day of Remembrance for Victims of Radiation Accidents and Catastrophes is celebrated on April 26 all over the world. It was installed at the CIS summit in September 2003 on the initiative of former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma. The idea was supported by the UN, calling for its resolution to celebrate it in all member countries of the organization. In 2020, the event is celebrated for the 17th time at the international level.
In Russia, it has been celebrated since 1993 as the Day of Remembrance for those killed in radiation accidents and disasters. On April 4, 2012, the government of the Russian Federation adopted a resolution that changed the name of the date to the Day of participants in the liquidation of the consequences of radiation accidents and disasters and the memory of the victims of these accidents and disasters.
Who is celebrating
The day of the Chernobyl tragedy is a tribute to all veterans and liquidators of man-made accidents who, at the risk of their own lives and health, eliminated the threats and consequences of disasters: firefighters, the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the police and other services.
history of the holiday
The date was not chosen by chance. It was on this day that a terrible catastrophe happened that claimed many lives and left its mark on the fate of millions of people - the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. It especially affected Ukraine, where the power plant was directly located, as well as the nearby territories of Russia and Belarus.
As a result of the destruction of one of the reactors, a large amount of radioactive elements got into the air, which were carried by the wind over a distance of more than 160 thousand square kilometers. The territories of the cities of Pripyat and Chernobyl suffered the most damage, as a result of which a decision was made to completely evacuate the population living in a 30-kilometer zone from the damaged reactor. The nuclear power plant employees received the highest dose of radiation, more than 30 of them died from radiation sickness within a few months.
The fire that arose after the explosion was extinguished by local firefighters, as well as auxiliary brigades from Kyiv and neighboring areas. The work was carried out without special protective suits, people received gigantic doses of radiation, practically sacrificing their lives. The consequences of the accident are being eliminated to this day: a concrete sarcophagus was built over the destroyed reactor, work was carried out to clean up the territories from dangerous radioactive elements. All these events were carried out jointly by several ministries - the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the army, the police. In the most polluted 30-kilometer zone (exclusion zone), more than 600 thousand people worked for several years. Subsequently, all of them received the status of an accident liquidator, certain benefits, but the mortality among them exceeded the norm by dozens of times.
Many residents of villages and villages from the exclusion zone, despite the prohibitions, returned to their homes after a while. The high radiation background did not have a detrimental effect on them, some continue to live there to this day.
