Wednesday, December 17, 2008

Whatever Happened to Chernobyl?

This came up at work today: whatever happened with that Chernobyl disaster? We couldn't even remember how long it had been since the explosion and irradiation of some Russian city et al. I told everyone I would look it up tonight and get the lowdown, so we could all git edjucated. Our closest guess was, everyone dead for a hundred miles and nothin left but a huge crater. Turns out we were wrong.
It happened in 1986, which is 22 years ago. That explains why I can't remember it; I had a bit of a teenage alcohol addiction, and spent most of my spare time trying to figure out ways to get beer. I just wasn't much into the news back then. I still don't pay too much no never mind, since it is all so depressing anyways. Why listen to all the disasters, horror stories and drama? Thats why we got movin' picture shows, ainit?
So the abandoned city of Pripyat is still abandoned, and I couldn't find any information on exactly how many people died because I don't think there is any way to tell exactly how many people got some of that radiation from the fallout plume that drifted over Western Europe. I read that some of it even made it to Eastern North America. I'm a little creeped out by this whole idea. This disaster was supposedly worse than Hiroshima, so far as how much radiation was released. I'm sure Hiroshima was more devastating explosion wise though.
I just don't think we should mess with all this radiation stuff. It is downright dangerous!

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