Another Catastrophe Possible at Chernobyl Power Plant?

[Nottingham]

Another Catastrophe Possible at Chernobyl Power Plant?
07/14/2003 12:13
News agencies have been reporting contradictory information on the issue

The administration of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant has repeatedly rejected rumors about an alleged state of emergency that had occurred at the plant. Ukrainian news agencies UNIAN and Obozrevatel reported with reference to an informed source (and the source referred to the information from the plant's administration), a state of emergency took place at the Chernobyl plant on July 8th. During the visit of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development's delegation, the personnel of the nuclear plant had to activate the system to stop the nuclear chain reaction in the destroyed reactor. The activation of the emergency system was allegedly caused with the data displayed on one of the devices of the neutron flux control in the destroyed reactor, which might have testified to the strengthening of the chain reaction.

It was also reported, the emergency system was activated for about 30 minutes, "six cubic meters of liquid neutron absorber were poured in the reactor during that time." It seems, the administration of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant does not reject the fact of the incident, but explains it with the need to perform certain procedures according to the displayed data. However, the administration also said, the chain reaction had not been strengthened - it was a malfunction of a controlling device.

News agencies have been providing rather contradictory information about the incident. Interfax-Ukraine reported, there had been no incidents registered at the power station, and all sensors did not register any increase of the radiation background." The information about a state of emergency at the Chernobyl nuclear plant was called "a complete technical nonsense," because "after the breakdown in April of 1986, the fuel in the destroyed reactor was mixed with sand and lead, and became a fritted mass, in which a chain reaction was not possible to occur." Russian experts stick to the same opinion. RIA Novosti news agency reported, director of the International Center for the Ecological Security of the Russian Ministry for Nuclear Power, Albert Vasilyev rejected an opportunity of an explosion at the plant. After the tragedy of 1986, the reactor of the fourth power generating unit was flooded, and "the correlation of water and fuel excludes a possibility of an explosion." Yet, Vasilyev said, the administration of the nuclear plant had made a hasty decision to shut down the third unit.


more.....


http://english.pravda.ru/world/20/92/370/10480_chernobyl.html


The Sarcophagus has to be rebuilt it has been 17 years and its only good for 20. What a disaster Chernobyl was! :nuke:

[skip2mylou]

1. That is called being progressive

if you have to rebuild it, the workers will be employeed and paid!

[hatrack]

2. There's a fantastic NOVA special on Chernobyl

It came out about ten years ago and is called (I think) "Suicide Mission To Chernobyl". It follows the work of scientists and technicians who were the first to enter the structure after the explosion in search of the melted fuel.

If nothing else, it give you an idea of the handicaps under which these teams operated. At one point, none of the robotic probes the survey teams were using were operative. So they mounted a camera on a battery-operated toy tank purchased at a Moscow department to reach into areas that were too lethally hot (i.e. 10,000 roentgens) for humans to enter.

It also has a lot of information about the sarcophagus and its structural problems. Fascinating show.