Writing Randomness

Short Story - The Chernobyl Disaster

     The year is 1991. It has now been 5 years since the reactor was over-pressured and melted down and the radiation settled across the land, contaminating millions of acres of forest and having to evacuate 30,000 people. I’ve been part of the cleanup crew for four years now, after it was safe to come back and help in the cleanup process. It’s been a long time, but the radiation spread to Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine in the whole 10 days that it wasn’t contained. There were thousands of us, maybe tens of thousands. We all wanted to come back and be allowed to live where we evacuated from, but the radiated glow that was given off by the trees and buildings said otherwise.

     When the accident did happen 5 years ago, I was one of the first workers to escape. I left shortly after the meltdown, realizing what was happening before a lot of people noticed the same thing, but it was only because I was near the reactor at the first warning sign. That moment of panic…

~~~~~~~~~~

     The sound of my feet stepping against the stone floor echoed off the walls of the facility. I made my daily rounds of storage before I would head to the reactors. The Uranium was stored in concrete and steel, but today one of the containers corroded, so we had to move it. I was always nervous when doing this because I didn’t know the efficient way on how to move it, and nobody else did either.

     There were many of us working here, but we didn’t know most of what we were doing. Most of us chose to work here because it was cleaner than dealing with the pollution from the coal power plants, and we didn’t have to deal with mining, purifying, or transporting the Uranium. I didn’t know much on that kind of thing, but I knew it was more dangerous than this.

     When it was safely moved (or we thought it was,) I traveled to the other side of the facility, checking temperatures and radiation levels, and making sure the Uranium was at a safe level. There were multiple reactors, and my partner and I checked the first three, and they were fine. It wasn’t until the fourth one where we were getting uneasy.

    “What’s this reactor doing?” I asked Alek, who was also gazing at the reactor that was releasing some sort of steam.

     “I don’t know.” He replied, and we both read through the lists of options on our clipboards, but none of them had the option in a checkbox. “I’ll see what our boss thinks.”

     “Alright.” I looked up again to see him heading back. I tapped my pencil against my chin, head cocked, just staring at it. What was it doing?

     I gave up trying to figure it out and got over my uneasy feeling, reading the temperature level and radiation level. Both were tremendously higher than normal. The uneasy feeling came back and grew worse than before. And then a churning noise rumbled from inside.

     Something wasn’t right.

     “Get back!” I ordered everyone as I ran to the nearest alarm, yanking the lever down.

     Two people were near the reactor when the explosion sounded, and I saw both of them crumble under the debris. The water for cooling had now been brought it, being dumped over the reactor to cool it down, but the radiation was already spewing over the top of the reactor. Nothing could stop it.

     I dropped everything and ran. I knew I had to stay, but the reactor had already started to spew off radiation. Only the workers who thought their lives were more important were running out with me. As I climbed in my car and started driving out, I hoped and prayed they would have the reactor under control as soon as possible. The longer it’s not contained the worse for everyone it becomes.

~~~~~~~~~~

     Ten days later, I’m on the east side of Russia, staring at the TV screen with the news on, outside of a store and huddled with other people wanting to watch the news about the Chernobyl explosion. The newscasters weren’t at the factory, but I could picture everything they were saying.

     “The explosion was caused by a flawed reactor design operated by inadequately trained personnel.” The woman on the right said, and I didn’t care if she was right, I was offended.

     “The explosion itself killed two people that day, and it’s expected more in the next few months due to highly exposed radiation.” The man on the left said, looking at a predicted chart for the accident. I worried about Alek, I didn’t see him leave, but I’m sure he was fine. He’s smarter than that.

     “The reactor spewed 50 tons of radioactive material all over Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus, making it the most widespread and deadly radioactive disaster in history.” The woman said, and that fact horrified me. I was right by that reactor when it exploded.

     “The area is not safe to be around now, for the radiation can penetrate deep in the human body, damaging cells and triggering cancer, so we advise to stay more than 125 miles away from the area.” The man said, and then it cut to some pictures that were taken by helicopter. There was an eerie green glow that was so bright, and it spread for miles.

     “That area will never be safe again.” I stated as the news switched to something else.

~~~~~~~~~~

     We were back to 1991. The place became safe again to roam around in special thick suits, but still not safe to live. Everyone was relocated, and it’s still not safe after 5 years.

     “What’s the half life of Uranium?” I asked Alek, who was now next to me and somehow knew everything about Uranium.

     “Millions of years.” He replied with a groan. “But did you know that 11 percent of the world relies on Nuclear Power?”

     “11 percent?” I sounded more shocked than I should’ve been, but looking around at the fear, pain and death it caused, I didn’t understand why. This was extremely dangerous and life threatening. “Why would anyone want Nuclear power after seeing this…”