"Our emergency services are actively working to stop the fire spreading."
VERY IN-DEPTH VIDEOS AT THIS SITE, <CLICK HERE>
A FOREST FIRE NEAR THE CHERNOBYL NUCLEAR SITE IS "ALARMING" TO OFFICIALS BECAUSE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF RADIATION BEING CARRIED IN THE SMOKE PLUME FROM THE CONTAMINATED AREA.
Nuclear safety expert John Large, APRIL 29, 2015:
" I spent some time in Ukraine in 2006 and I assessed the Chernobyl situation interviewing about 30 scientists and engineers who were working on the aftercare of Chernobyl. Brush fires and forest fires were the greatest concern in terms of the means by which you can disperse a secondary radiological impact from the original dissipation that occurred in 1986... What you have in Chernobyl in the exclusion zone and the further way you have an area that has been abandoned for farming, abandoned for management.
That means you’ve got lots of brush and young wood growing out of control. Let me assess that – a big fuel load to have a fire. That means that the biological load is very high, so the radiation particles can be dispersed. Take down the chemistry as well. The chemistry is the way in which the strontium and cesium from the radioactive strontium and cesium from the reactor are bound here, and of course the elevated temperature of the fire and plus all the plume and aerial dispersion - means that could transport it hundreds of kilometers, particularly to the north, to Belarus.
So there are more problems here for communities that are long way away from the site. What I had hoped was that the Ukrainian officials would have had in place firefighting capacity greater than they normally would have at any other area of Ukraine, because it certainly needs to be protected not just now but in the longer term as well.
If there are radioactive materials on the ground now and then it’s engulfed by forest fire maybe 40-50 km away from the reactor. But that deposited radioactivity is re-suspended into gas, blown high into the atmosphere by the heat of the flames, and then of course it settles somewhere else. And it maybe those communities to the north that are not prepared to have this new radiation plume and deposition and fallout come down on their communities."
LARGE HAS VERY IMPRESSIVE CREDENTIALS, BY THE WAY.
From the mid-1960s until 1986 he was an academic in Brunel University's School of Engineering, where he undertook research for the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority.
Large led the nuclear risk assessment team for the raising of the damaged Russian nuclear submarine Kursk, which assessed the nuclear hazards and defined the limits and conditions under which the lift and recovery of the submarine in 2001 took place.
He advised the government of Gibraltar on nuclear safety aspects of the repairs being undertaken to the nuclear propulsion reactor on board HMS Tireless.
Large has been invited by the Chief Nuclear Inspector of UK Office for Nuclear Regulation to join the Technical Advisory Panel working on the ONR's assessment of the implications for the UK nuclear Industry of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear accident.
Large is frequently interviewed or quoted in the media.
PARTICULARLY TROUBLING DURING THIS LATEST EVENT IS THE FACT THAT THE "PERMANENT COVER" FOR THE OLD NUCLEAR SITE AT CHERNOBYL IS NOT COMPLETE, NOR WILL IT BE UNTIL, HOPEFULLY, 2017.
"They hastily laid over the reactor site a concrete cover dubbed "the sarcophagus", which is now cracking and must be replaced."
A FEW ACTUAL MAINSTREAM MEDIA SITES ARE BEING USED QUITE WELL TO CALM FEARS AND "SWEAR-TO-GOD" EVERYTHING IS FINE, JUST FINE, NO WORRIES, BREATHE DEEPLY.
PEOPLE IN BELARUS AREN'T BUYING IT.
THE SMOKE PLUME IS HEADED THEIR WAY...AGAIN.
Chernobyl's nuclear threat returns: Forest fires in Ukraine cause radioactive particles to be released over Europe.
THE TEA ROOM'S THOUGHTS ARE WITH ALL NEAR THIS FIRE, THOSE FIGHTING THE BLAZE, AND ALL DOWNWIND FROM IT.
MAY YOU BE KEPT IN PERFECT HEALTH.