The Cause And Effects Of The Chernobyl Disaster In 1986

Newton’s third law of motion states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction; this law is not only applied in our studies but in our daily lives. For engineers, this is a law to live by; reminding each engineer that each of his/her actions will have an equal consequence whether it is good or bad. Engineers are trusted and respected individuals who represent not only themselves but the profession as a whole; their title gives them a great responsibility and a reputation to carry. On rare occasions do engineers make mistakes that sometimes lead to disasters that impact the lives of many. For every disaster that occurs as a result of an engineering mistake; thousands of lessons are learned. One disaster that impacted the lives of many and was labelled as the worst engineering disaster in history is the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. The chain of events that lead to this disaster where taken as lessons and used to write many of today’s engineering codes of ethics, and improve safety regulations in various industries.

Not many people fully know what happened at Chernobyl, or understand the effect it has had on today’s nuclear science. Chernobyl has been named as the largest man-made disaster ever recorded. Chernobyl is the most influential and important event during the 1980’s because it has completely changed how the world views anything nuclear by changing experimentation and usage of nuclear materials and power as a whole. It was extremely influential because it caused thousands of people to move out of their homes, while damaging nearby cities and countries and covering the surrounding area in radioactive smog, and is still a threat to surrounding cities and countries today. It also has caused the nearby area to be thriving with wildlife.

As humans we want to have a good life, have a home, maybe a family and feel safe. With the advances in industry such as energy production we can have more luxuries which include heat, lights and running water. However, as technology gets bigger and better there will always be risks that can lead to catastrophic outcomes. Luckily for the United States; we did not have a disastrous outcome with a nuclear power plant such as the 1986’s Chernobyl Nuclear Power plant catastrophe, making, ”the Chernobyl disaster the only level 7 incident on the International Nuclear Event Scales (INES) making it the biggest man-made disaster of all time” (List 25, 2014) . Three Mile Island power plants is located near Middletown Pennsylvania. On March 28, 1979, the plant had a partial meltdown. Even though the Three Mile Island power plant incident did not have any adverse health effects, Three Mile Island had an impact on the nuclear industry development and politically in the United States.

This quote, which I obtained from the newspaper The Guardian’s website, is from Sasha Yuvchenko, a former employee at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. What he didn’t know at the time of the event he was describing was that he had just experienced the worst nuclear explosion in history.

Chernobyl and Love Canal both had many negative effects on humans and the land near these places. The land in both events was impacted drastically. Neither places could grow food that could be consumed anymore. In Chernobyl people who harvested food were

People and animals were affected badly some died from the chernobyl explosion. Many died from it because it was so bad,

On April 26, 1987, unit number 4 of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant exploded, releasing mass amounts of potent radiation. A mass evacuation was conducted, moving hundreds of thousands of residents out of the area. The large amounts of radiation traveled into the atmosphere and over time made its way back to the surface, impacting the wildlife. Multiple studies have been conducted regarding specifically what impact the radiation has had on the local and international wildlife. These experiments were conducted in the CEZ as well as other countries in the Europe continent. They tested whether there is a correlation between the population of animals and the amount of radioactivity in the environment that was being tested. Some of the animal

Cs-137 results from the natural decay chain of Uranium-235. Cs-137 has a half-life of 30 years which would account for the high levels after the decrease in discharge from Sellafield and is problematic due to ease with which it spreads throughout nature due to the high solubility of Caesium salts. This ease of spreading makes it difficult to clean up radionuclides such as Cs-137 and poses dangers to both aquatic wildlife and humans as ingesting the isotope can lead to exposure to gamma and beta radiation. Small amounts of Cs-137 were also released in the Chernobyl disaster in 1986 which would also correspond to the above background levels after the discharge from Sellafield decreased and would fit the timescale identified by the Sellafield

contaminated water but have no signs of mutation, which concludes that most species just adapt to their change of environment, however they just adapt differently. To be fair, the only good thing that is possible to take out of this disaster would be that humans gave space to animals and nature to live and thrive through the absence of their enemies. That being said, it is exactly what happened in 1998, when Przewalski’s horses were going extinct, they were actually saved by being put into the Chernobyl area and the population increased dramatically.

The Chernobyl accident happened in 1986. The power surge caused an explosion and destroyed the reactor. The radiation of the explosion caused Ukraine to suffer and and killed millions of kids and adults. Radiation contaminated the air, water, and food supply as well as contaminating peoples bodies. The plant and animal life had a huge decrease after the explosion. The animals could not help disperse the plant life like pollinating plants and spreading seeds. Hundreds of thousands of people evacuated their homes to more safer environments. Long term effects caused citizens of chernobyl to develop cancer and thyroid cancer from drinking milk from cows in Chernobyl. Debris from the explosion caused fires around the cities in Ukraine. The

There have been lots of nuclear accident around the world. One of the accident that had a major impact on the world was the Chernobyl disaster. The disaster took place on 26 April 1986 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine. The disaster was caused by a reaction explosion induced by design faults and staff application errors. The accident took place in the course of scheduled tests to check the power supply mode in the event of external sources loss. Even after 10 days, explosions and ejections of radioactive substances continued. The release of radiation and radioactive substance polluted the places within 30 km of Chernobyl, and those areas have been closed for a long period of

What would you do if your child had a birth defect? Imagine if you had your child, and it had a small head, or no arm/leg. How about if your child had a heart problem. Would you have them get treatment, or would you just leave them like the so they would die? Cancer is common in Chernobyl so families have it hard. Birth defects happen and can be cured, and this is common for Chernobyl. Children were affected by the Chernobyl explosion, and the effects still go on today.

Herein lies the problem. Natural disasters often lead to thousands -- if not millions -- in donations to those affected in order to rebuild their life. New beds, textbooks, or food can be donated to those affected so that they can replace what they've lost and try to rebuild. But for Chernobyl, the first disaster of its kind at such at scale, they didn’t have that benefit. The obsessive need for secrecy made helping the affected people nearly impossible since news outlets weren’t even technically allowed to talk about it (Mulligan). The USSR’s denial of any event for 18 days, the isolated nature of the USSR during the time, and the lack of financial resources that the already-failing USSR would have had available, the people evacuated had to rebuild their lives essentially on their own. Some estimates for Belarus alone have put the cost of estimated losses at $235 billion dollars over 30 years (“What are the Social…?”). A person who may have just been able to get comfortably by suddenly may not be able after a disaster because they have to try to replace all of the essentials that they lost (Sysoyeva). Poverty is often a vicious cycle. Once someone falls into it, it can be practically impossible to escape. This leaves both them and their descendents vulnerable until they are able to gain financial security. The people of Pripyat lacked both the social and government safety nets available to people who are wealthier or from wealthier countries. This makes them especially

Abstract—The disaster at Chernobyl in 1986 is one that should not be forgotten due to its heavy impacts on society not just locally, but also globally. The incident serves as a perfect example of the importance of engineers and the government acting ethically. From the start, the engineers designing the nuclear reactors at Chernobyl failed to act with integrity by not concerning themselves with the health or welfare of the local community. Their lack of safety systems that were common place in other reactors across the world inevitably caused the death of thousands of people in the former USSR. Additionally, certain design errors committed by the engineers left the reactor unstable during simple, frequent tests and experiments. The USSR

Radiation affected the animals of Chernobyl. All of the animals were affected by radiation in some way one of the ways is they would go blind. Scientists tested some of the animals and found that there where higher levels of radiation in female animals. Scientist worry that the animals in Chernobyl will roam and contaminate other areas. We can’t help the animals in Chernobyl because they are in such high radiation there is no way to help. The dead animals bodies are also contaminated by radiation. People still hunt them but soon realize that their meat is to radioactive to eat. Scientists have tested to see if animals can handle more radiation than humans, they proved that animals can tolerate radiation better than humans. Some of the birds mutations are overgrown beaks or their wings are different sizes. One thing that scientists found out is that a spider’s web is also radioactive. Mammals and birds are more affected than other animals. Fish and insects are less affected by the radiation. Smaller animals are in more danger than bigger animals. Some animals are healthy and don’t seem to be affected at all. The streets of Chernobyl became forests. Some scientists say