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About The Clackamas print. (Oregon City, Oregon) 1989-2019 | View Entire Issue (April 26, 2000)
News TM e CL ac I camas P rînt _______ l_ WEdNEsdAy, ApRil 26, 2000 Chernobyl: The effects are still being seen today Continued from page 1 smoke, and debris that traveled through Europe and across the Atlantic Ocean. Over one coun try, the radiation in the air was noted to be 20-150 counts per sec ond, when the normal range is 5-10 counts per second. The longest-lasting effect was on the reindeer and sheep in Swe den. 86,000 head of cattle were evacuated but much of the live stock was mutated. Enormous amounts of milk in Poland, Hun gary, Austria, and Sweden were contaminated with radioactive io dine and radioactive cesium. There were bans on many agri cultural goods in Eastern Europe because of contamination. The sale of milk, meat, many fruits and veg etables was banned in 1986 and 1987 in the Russian markets of Kiev, Chernigov, Minsk, and other small cities and towns. The cost of this ban in Russia totaled 11 billion rubles(about 400 million dollars). Even though the food was banned, there were still many health effects involved with those who con sumed the contaminated food. In the early phase of the Chernobyl accident, the amount of radiation from bodies of water was estimated less than 1-2 percent of the total exposure. But the radio active contamination still made its way to many rivers in the Chernobyl area, such as the River Pripyat, Uzh River, and the Dniepr River. As the rivers drained into the Kiev, the Kanev and the Kremenchug reservoirs, the con tamination of water, sediments, al gae, mollusks, and fish dropped significantly by dilution. The Chernobyl Cooling Pond was the most heavily contaminated water body. Contamination of groundwater, especially with strontium-90, could be a problem for the future in the catchment basins downstream of the Chernobyl area. Radiation on the body Ionizing radiation passes through the body and interacts with tissues that then leads to cell death and later on to organ dys function. Radiation effects were re sponsible for a majority of the early deaths in the Chernobyl accident. There were 31 deaths immediately after and into the first week after the explosion of Chernobyl. There were 237 people hospitalized for signs of acute radiation sickness. After the fire, 135,000 people evacuated the area around the re actor, and 800,000 “liquidators” were moved in to try to decontami nate the area. A recent report shows that the Chernobyl accident is still killing people. According the Ukraine Health Ministry ten times as many people are getting thyroid cancer each year. In 1996 there were an estimated 900 cases of thyroid can cer reported, all children under the age of 15. An estimated 3,576 people have died from the accident. After ten years there were 2000 extra cancer deaths per year among the work ers cleaning up the Chernobyl ac cident. There were also 4,600 deaths among the 6.8 million resi dents of the contaminated territo ries' that include Kiev, Minsk, Belarus, and many other parts of Russia. Changes in technology To date, none of the accidents at nuclear facilities were directly caused by the facilities them selves; rather they were caused by human error, usually the operators. Certainly In the case of Chernobyl, Roses 3re Red, "Lr. Violets are Blue, yx We Offer Tuition Assistance Just for you! Spring time has arrived! Do you need a Job? UPS offers up to $5,000 a year for tuition assistance. UPS offers full medical, dental and vision benefits. Earn $8.50 or $9.50 per hour. On Campus Interviews April 26th and May 25th from 10am - 2pm. Call Our Jobline @ 503-286-7298 www.upsjobs.com Contact your UPS Representative Dennis @ RAQ OQ« 7Q7/1 ovt QAQ7 8 (JOS V » EOE J ® the accident would have been far less severe had the plans included a containment vessel. There are currently 63 nuclear plants in operation in the former Soviet Union, with more under construction. According to the In ternational Atomic Energy Agency, the safety of these plants is a continu ing concern. The current energy de mand in these coun tries is such that there is little flexibil ity for clos ing even those plants that are the least safe, such as the dozen or so based on the flawed Chernobyl de sign. Assistance has been started by many groups to bring the Soviet reactors up to safety standards, or at least to effect improvements. This involves modifications, iden tification of safety deficiencies, strenuous guidelines in effect for nuclear plants, the following is in cluded. Plants need to be licensed by the NRC, produce onsite and offsite emergency response plans, which include the NRC and the Fed eral Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) working together, and adhere to strict building codes. Maintenance is also used as a pre ventative measure for safety. Building codes are set by the NRC. The buildings are to with stand winds up to 300 miles per hour, tornadoes, and direct hits by large aircraft. The containment Regula building is generally three-foot tions thick concrete lined with 3/4th inch One of the thick steel and all material must pass biggest inspection. The Chernobyl plant fears that was built using from 70% to 90% most of the defective materials. population As a result of these safety mea shares is sures there has never been an acci the possi dent in the United States involving bility of a nuclear explosion and a commercial nuclear power plant melt down. To prevent these leaking a significant amount of ra events from occurring the United dioactive materials into the environ States Nuclear Regulatory Com ment. We all can rest easy know mission (NRC) has set rules and ing that there are many scientists regulations that all nuclear facili and nuclear engineers that are work ing hard to make sure that there will ties must follow. Among the thousands of never be another Chernobyl. training of staff, and audits of the status of plant components. The United States alone has contributed 1 billion dollars for more than 700 safety related projects in the Baltic and Russian states with considerably more money earmarked for more im provements. A repetition of the 19 8 6 Chernobyl accident is now virtu ally impos sible. The following students from Sue Eggling's Integrated Science Concepts class submitted this article on Chernobyl from a class project: ♦ Crystal Edwards ♦ Sherrie Martin ♦ Kelly Misley . ♦ Emily Dayton ♦ Jose Jimenez ♦ Saida Johnston ♦ Jan Staehely ♦ David Parry ♦ Genoa Titus ♦ Pam Wheeler ♦ Alisha Davis ♦ Kimberly Hartwell ♦ Juan Lin ♦ Amy Morse ♦ Melissa Rickert ♦ Daniel Cowan ♦ Mike Nuttbrock ♦ Aaron Rudis If your class has written something and would like it considered for publication, stop by BI 04 or call campus ext. 2309.
