The True Story Of The Chernobyl "Suicide Squad"

If anything illustrated the sensational success of Chernobyl , the series produced by HBO and acclaimed by both critics and the public, it is the mystical character that the cataclysm has taken on in popular memory. The fascination for everything that happened in Chernobyl that infamous spring night of 1986 has extended beyond the technical determinants of the accident, and reaches the dilapidated state of Prypiat, the resurgence of the fauna of the place and, very especially, all the catastrophic assumptions that never happened.

It is in the what ifs where the history of Chernobyl has become a totemic figure, a set of legends where interested parties from all walks of life fantasize about the end of humanity as we knew it. What would have happened if the winds of the Dnieper had decided to blow towards Kiev and not towards the barren forests of southern Belarus? What would have happened if thousands of liquidators did not cover the fissioned core? What would have happened if three men had not emptied the safety pools under the reactor?

There is something fascinating about the edge of the abyss, at the vortex of the Apocalypse, that shrouds catastrophes like Chernobyl in a halo of wicked worship. And just like in the stories captured by the sacred writings, numerous stories that occurred in the hours after the accident have been shaped and distorted by the mythological aura of our memory.

Stories that speak of men and women submerged in a radioactive mud that is difficult to accommodate in the imagination; of workers decomposed by the extraordinary radiation of the fused nucleus; of materials yet to be discovered, the result of the melting of the nucleus with the concrete, the cables and the pipes of the enclosure; of intense blue radioactive waters; of figures who risked their lives for the sake of a greater good, the salvation of half of Europe.

Naturally, there is a lot of reality in the extraordinary stories of Chernobyl ( just take a look at Voices of Chernobyl , by Svetlana Alexievich, to verify this). But there is also a lot of legend. And few epics condense both facets like that of the " Suicide Squad ", the group of three men who accessed the depths of Reactor Number 4 to empty the pools of bubbles under the decomposing core. The Chernobyl superheroes to whom Europe owes nothing more and nothing less than its future.

The water problem

Much has been debated about the direct causes of the disaster. Faced with the widespread idea that everything was due to the precarious design of the plant (and therefore to a technology inferior to that used by its Western peers, an undoubted sign of the decadence of the Soviet project), the truth is that nothing that happened in Chernobyl it would have been possible without a negligent safety test that went above all the recommendations of the nuclear regulation of the USSR.

The plant itself was recent, modern and very powerful. And therefore equipped with all kinds of security tools. One of them would cause one of the main headaches for the technicians in charge of managing the accident. These were the bubble pools ( of water ) installed several levels below the nuclear reactors. In a magnificent post from 2010 (part of a highly recommended series on Chernobyl), Yuri's Blackboard explained its function as follows:

These safety pools, known as bubble pools , were located on two lower levels and their function was to contain water in case it was necessary to cool the reactor in an emergency. They were also used to condense steam and reduce pressure in the event that a pipe in the primary circuit broke (hence its name), along with a third level that acted as conduction, immediately below the reactor. Thus, in the event of a pipe breaking, the steam would be forced to circulate through this conduit level and escape through a layer of water, which would reduce its danger.

A few days after the accident, the complex's workers discovered that the subsoil on which the pools rested had been completely flooded. The explosion and subsequent meltdown trauma (temperatures above 2,000 ºC ) had burst the internal pipes of the reactor, emptying large amounts of water from the primary circuit into the underground chambers of the plant.

It was a serious problem. The core had melted with the reactor infrastructure, forming a dense radioactive lava called corium (or " corium ", also present at Fukushima ). At over 1,600°C, corium essentially melts everything in its reach (until it cools). The technicians correctly foresaw a succession of events that could lead Chernobyl to a catastrophe greater than the one already experienced.

In essence, the weight of the core would cause the reactor structure to give way, pushing radioactive lava deeper into the plant. Or what is the same, towards the underground chambers now flooded to their foundations. If the core were to come into contact with water, a gigantic steam explosion would be produced, capable of propelling "hundreds of tons" of radioactive material into the atmosphere, very similar, although more destructive, to those generated by helicopters pouring water over the core. exposed (when its fusion was unknown).

How much was at stake? It is here that later accounts have theorized, sometimes to exaggeration. In 2011, the Anglo-Saxon journalist Stephen McGinty spoke of "a nuclear explosion" capable of "destroying Kiev", "contaminating the water supply of more than 30 million people" and "rendering the north of Ukraine uninhabitable for more than a century". . Others went further, drawing a cataclysm that would have "exterminated half of Europe", making Ukraine and part of Russia uninhabitable for "500,000 years".

According to Vassili Nesterenko , the contact of the corium with the underground pools would have generated an explosion of between 3,000 and 5,000 kilotons, between 140 and 230 times more powerful than that caused by Fat Man (the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, of 21 kilotons, and even date the most powerful used against the civilian population). The Chernobyl accident would have thus become the greatest disaster faced by human beings. An event that would question our viability as a species.

The reality is more complex. The conversation often confuses the radiation to be released by the contact of the corium with the water with the destructive character of the explosion. Certainly, Chernobyl generated 400 times more atmospheric radioactivity than Fat Man , and its effects lasted for more years in time. Its mortality, however, has been much lower : it is believed that about 4,000 people died from the accident, compared to 70,000 in Nagasaki .

The disparity is explained by the different natures of a nuclear reactor and an atomic bomb. As explained by Nuclear Operator ( @OperadorNuclear ), one of the most active atomic promoters on Twitter, "uranium enrichment" for artifacts like Fat Man "is 90%", while a plant like Chernobyl barely "used 2 %". Obtaining an atomic bomb, Iran knows, is not that simple. Its destructive effects are unmatched.

This does not mean that the risk identified by the plant's technicians was minor. Fear of the China syndrome , the possibility that a fused core could come into contact with the safety pools and emit catastrophic clouds of radiation into the atmosphere, mortgaged the decisions of the operators. There was a risk of explosion (capable of sinking the entire building containing the reactor), releasing more radiation and contaminating kyiv's water supply.

It was necessary to empty them. And it was a suicidal task.

The three volunteer men

The fable tells that three plant operators, Alexei Ananenko, Valeriy Bezpalov and Boris Baranov, volunteered to enter the flooded foundations of the pools, find the escape valves, open the locks, drain the area and save humanity. of a certain apocalypse. They would do it aware of an almost immediate death, between brightly colored waters and radiation levels incompatible with life. And they would do it for the good of millions of people.

The story contains elements of reality and fantasy, or rather, of literary license.

For one thing, Ananenko, Bezpalov and Baranov weren't the only three people to sneak into the flooded chambers under the security pools. Both firefighters and other technicians from the plant had worked during the previous days to empty part of the water. The former pumped the rooms, managing to reduce the flooding to knee height, if not ankle height. The seconds had come in to measure radiation levels.

So when the trio of heroes entered the chambers, they did so with a certain amount of information. It was not a blind act. Ananenko and Bezpalov had collaborated on the construction and installation of the security system. They knew its infrastructure, the canalization, the position of the main pipes and the exact point where they would find the valves that would open the gates and empty the water. They would do it, yes, in the dark, so they would need Baranov to illuminate them.

Did they volunteer? Most likely, yes. As explained here , the vast majority of liquidators were aware of what was at stake in dealing with the Chernobyl catastrophe, and they did so in full possession of their will . But at the same time they did it because it was their job . Ananenko has given very few interviews , but in all of them he betrays a certain routine duty in his foray into the cameras.

The fact is that all the equipment was distributed among workshops, and since the pools to be emptied were under the responsibility of the service area of ​​reactor room No. 2, it was the staff of this unit who had to carry out the task. Of course, there were cases in which the shift staff of any workshop was not enough for a task, and in that case other workers joined. But in any case, any operation that required equipment had to be carried out in the presence or under the supervision of a representative of the responsible workshop.

That is to say: Ananenko was there because it was his duty. Very literally.

The mission of the three men was relatively simple. Walk through the depths of Chernobyl dressed in diving equipment, find the valves of the floodgates and open them. Under normal conditions it would have been a task performed automatically and electronically by the plant's computer, but the explosion and subsequent flooding had knocked out the circuits. Now Ananenko and his companions had to do it manually.

As he himself says, the two valves were three meters underground, and were marked with a technical inscription to easily identify them (4GT-21 and 4GT-22). Much of his fear stemmed not so much from the dire conditions his body had to endure on the road as from the possibility that they might be blocked or rendered useless. In that case, emptying the pools and avoiding the certain explosion of steam would have been much more complex.

Much of the mythology surrounding the suicide squad excursion stems from radioactive water. Ananenko, Bezpalov and Baranov would face radioactive doses of over 5,000 roentgens/hour, capable of tanning the skin in a matter of seconds, introducing a bitter metallic taste in the mouth and puncturing the skin with the intensity of a thousand needles. The three heroes had to deal with radioactive pressure so extraordinary that their lives would probably end right there. This is how it is portrayed in Chernobyl and in countless reports.

Ananenko draws a less Homeric scenario.

The information about the radioactive situation in corridor 001 (the one they would use to access the flooded chambers) was known to me (...) When I entered my work shift, my colleague explained to me that the last radioactivity measurement had been taken directly from the corridor water level. Of course, it is impossible for me to remember what the measurement result was, but I remember my feeling at that time. The numbers didn't seem like anything out of the ordinary. The radioactive situation was typical for nuclear power plants in May 1986.

Human memory is fragile. Ananenko admits to having consulted with his colleague Bespalov about what happened in the depths of Chernobyl, clarifying the blurred memories of him. The three of them went into the corridors accompanied by a DP-5 dosimeter , a small radiation collector. Halfway across, Baranov activated the absolute range on his meter and watched the results uneasily. "The device had gone off scale in all subranges," Bespalov would explain to Ananenko. "Run!" Baranov would order.

On their way, knee-deep in water, the three of them would become familiar with the dismal metallic taste in their mouths caused by the high radiation of the polluted water. But they would reach the valves, you would open them without much trouble and they would return outside to the cheers of their companions. Upon his departure, Ananenko would speak with Tass , a Soviet information agency, and his words would be collected by the Associated Press in this article .

"I was offered to turn down the task. But how could I have done that when I was the only person on my shift who knew where the valves were located?" Ananenko would later clarify that the statements collected by Tass were partially constructed by the agency, and that much of the folk mythology that arose as a result of his feat and the accident would spring directly from that article, collected and replicated by other Russian and Western media. .

In fact, the myth became so great that most stories left them for dead either inside the corridors or a few hours after leaving the chambers, with the mission already completed. Ananenko, Bezpalov and Baranov would thus have completed the path of the hero: figures called to action for the good of humanity, aware of the incalculable risks and, ultimately, sacrificed for a just cause.

But none of the three perished. Part of Ananenko's interest in speaking to the Soviet press stemmed from the Chernobyl workers' interest in demystifying the high mortality rates associated with the liquidators and the workers who continued to work at the plant in the days that followed. He did not succeed, and the hiddenness of his figure, of the Soviet obscurantism and of his personal interest in anonymity (like that of Bezpalov and Baranov) fermented in the legend of his death.

Anglo-Saxon journalist Andrew Leather barrow would spend five years investigating the causes and consequences of the accident for his book 01:23:40 , discovering along the way that none of the three suicide heroes had perished on their mission. Ananenko and Bezpalov would be decorated a few years ago by the former President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko. According to Leather barrow , Baranov would have died of cardiac arrest in 2005. A long way from Chernobyl.

How did they survive the radiation that should have killed them? As explained in this XKCD comic , because water works as a natural shield against radiation. None of this means that none of the three suffered the consequences of their mission, or that the radiation did not deteriorate their bodies, or that their life expectancy was not drastically reduced. It means that, years after being submerged in the depths of radioactive water, two-thirds of them are still alive .

Alexei Ananenko, Valeriy Bezpalov and Boris Baranov did their job. They were heroes. They saved the people of the Ukraine and much of Europe from a catastrophe potentially greater than the one they experienced. And they lived to tell about it.