Kyshtym accident of 1957

The Kyshtym accident of 1957 is not an incident connected with nuclear power, because of what it is difficult to call nuclear. Kyshtymskaya it is called because the tragedy occurred in a secret city, which was a closed object. Kyshtym is a settlement that is closest to the site of the disaster.

The authorities managed to keep this global accident secret. Information about the disaster became available to the population of the country only in the late 1980s, that is, 30 years after the incident. And about the true scale of the disaster became known only in recent years.

Technical accident

Often the Kyshtym accident of 1957 is associated with a nuclear catastrophe. But in reality it is not quite so. The accident happened on September 29, 1957 in the Sverdlovsk region, in a closed city, which at that time was called Chelyabinsk-40. Today it is known as Ozersk.

It is noteworthy that in Chelyabinsk-40 there was a chemical accident, not a nuclear one. In this city the largest Soviet chemical enterprise Mayak was located. The production of this combine presupposed the presence of large volumes of radioactive waste that were stored at the plant. The accident occurred precisely with these chemical waste.

In the days of the Soviet Union, the name of this city was classified, because of which the name of the nearest settlement, which was Kyshtym, was used to designate the accident site.

Cause of the disaster

The industrial waste was stored in special steel containers placed in tanks that were dug into the ground. All containers were equipped with a cooling system, since a lot of heat was constantly generated from the radioactive elements.

On September 29, 1957, the cooling system in one of the reservoirs that served as a repository was out of order. Probably, problems in the work of this system could be detected earlier, but because of the lack of repair, the measuring instruments were in order worn out. Maintenance of such equipment has proved difficult due to the need for a long time in the high-level zone of radiation.

As a result, the pressure inside the container began to increase. And at 16:22 (local time) there was a strong explosion. Later it was found out that the container was not designed for such pressure: the explosive force in TNT equivalent was about 100 tons.

Scale of the accident

From the Mayak plant, it was a nuclear accident that was expected as a result of a failure in production, so the main preventive measures were aimed at preventing this type of emergency.

No one could imagine that the Kyshtym accident, which occurred in the radioactive waste storage, will take the palm of primary production and attract the attention of the whole USSR.

So, as a result of problems with the cooling system, a capacity of 300 cubic meters exploded. Meters, in which there were 80 cubic meters of highly radioactive nuclear waste. As a result, about 20 million curies of radioactive substances were released into the atmosphere. The strength of the explosion in the TNT equivalent exceeded 70 tons. As a result, a huge cloud of radioactive dust formed over the company.

It began its journey from the plant and within 10 hours reached Tyumen, Sverdlovsk and Chelyabinsk regions. The area of the defeat was enormous - 23,000 square meters. Km. Yet the bulk of the radioactive elements did not blow away by the wind. They settled directly on the territory of the Mayak Combine.

All transport communications and production facilities were exposed to radiation. Moreover, the radiation power for the first 24 hours after the explosion was up to 100 roentgens per hour. Radioactive elements have also fallen into the territory of the military and fire units, as well as to the camp of prisoners.

Evacuation of people

10 hours after the incident, permission was received from Moscow to evacuate. People all this time were on the contaminated territory, without having any protective means. Evacuated people in open cars, some were forced to go on foot.

After the Kyshtym accident occurred (1957), people caught under the radioactive rain were sanitized. They were given clean clothes, but as it later turned out, these measures were not enough. The skin so strongly absorbed radioactive elements that more than 5000 victims of the disaster received a single dose of radiation of about 100 roentgens. Later they were distributed to different military units.

Cleanup works

The most dangerous and difficult task of decontamination fell on the shoulders of volunteer soldiers. Military builders who were supposed to clean up radioactive waste after the accident did not want to carry out this dangerous work. The soldiers decided not to obey the orders of their superiors. In addition, the officers themselves also did not want to send their subordinates to clean radioactive debris, as they suspected of the danger of radioactive contamination.

Noteworthy is the fact that at that time there was no experience of cleaning buildings from radioactive contamination . The roads were washed with a special tool, and the contaminated soil was removed by bulldozers and taken to the burial. There also sent sawn trees, clothes, shoes and other items. Volunteers, who liquidated the consequences of the accident, were given a new set of clothes every day .

Liquidators of the accident

People involved in the liquidation of the consequences of the disaster, for a shift, should not have received radiation dose exceeding 2 roentgens. For all the time of presence in the contamination zone, this rate should not exceed 25 roentgens. Yet, as practice showed, these rules were constantly violated. According to statistics, for the entire period of liquidation work (1957-1959) approximately 30 thousand workers of Mayak received radiation irradiation exceeding 25 rem. This statistics does not take into account the people who worked in the territories adjacent to the "Mayak". For example, soldiers from surrounding military units were often involved in dangerous for life and health work. They did not know for what purpose they were brought there and what is the real degree of danger to the work that they were instructed to perform. Young soldiers constituted the overwhelming majority of the total number of liquidators of the accident.

Consequences for the workers of the plant

What did the Kyshtym accident turn out for the company's employees? Photos of the victims and medical reports once again prove the tragic nature of this terrible accident. As a result of a chemical disaster, more than 10,000 employees with symptoms of radiation sickness were withdrawn from the plant. In 2,500 people, radiation sickness was established with complete certainty. These victims received external and internal radiation because they could not protect their lungs from radioactive elements, mainly plutonium.

Assistance to local residents

It is important to know that this is not all the troubles that the Kyshtym accident of 1957 entailed. Photos and other evidence show that even local schoolchildren took part in the works. They came to the field to harvest potatoes and other vegetables. When harvesting was finished, they were informed that vegetables should be destroyed. Vegetables are put in trenches and then buried. Straw had to be burned. After that the tractors plowed the fields contaminated with radiation and buried all the wells.

Soon, residents were informed that the region had discovered the largest oil field, and they urgently need to move. The abandoned buildings were dismantled, the bricks were cleaned and sent for the construction of pigsties and cowsheds.

It is worth noting that all these works were carried out without the use of respirators and special gloves. Many people did not even realize that they were liquidating the consequences of the Kyshtym accident. Therefore, most of them did not receive confirmatory certificates, in which it would be said that their health was irreparably damaged.

Thirty years after the terrible Kyshtym tragedy occurred, the attitude of the authorities towards the security of nuclear facilities in the USSR has changed dramatically. But this did not help us avoid the most terrible in the history of the catastrophe that happened at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant on April 26, 1986 .