True they built the sarcophagus to prevent leakage but have you read about what is happening inside, below the remains of the reactor4?The nuclear reaction ended decades ago. They built that structure to prevent leaching
Also did you know that they had to build a new floor from below to prevent the melting core ( which is still today occurring and will for centuries to come) from continuing it's journey downwards further into the earths surface?
1986-2019
The Elephants foot:
Is It Still Hot?
- The nature of radioisotopes is that they decay into more stable isotopes over time. However, the decay scheme for some elements might be slow, plus the "daughter," or product, of decay might also be radioactive.
- The corium of the Elephant's Foot was considerably lower 10 years after the accident but still insanely dangerous. At the 10-year point, radiation from the corium was down to 1/10th its initial value, but the mass remained physically hot enough and emitted enough radiation that 500 seconds of exposure would produce radiation sickness and about an hour was lethal.
- The intention was to contain the Elephant's Foot by 2015 in an effort to diminish its environmental threat level.
- However, such containment doesn't make it safe. The corium of the Elephant's Foot might not be as active as it was, but it's still generating heat and still melting down into the base of Chernobyl. Should it manage to find water, another explosion could result. Even if no explosion occurred, the reaction would contaminate the water. The Elephant's Foot will cool over time, but it will remain radioactive and (if you were able to touch it) warm for centuries to come.
So the nuclear accident is far from over...no solid public information is available about the containment floor that was built to prevent downward journeying of the melt, we can assume that it failed by what the above quote states.
Every piece of media has been edited, altered, removed and otherwise obfuscated since 1986. And it still is even today. The political fall out seems to be a higher problem than the remains of reactor#4
Even with all the science and technology we have available to us we still have no idea how to stop this ongoing reaction and prevent an explosion that would involve some 30 tons of uranium and Plutonium that are in there with it. We are playing Russian roulette at Chernobyl, hoping and doing the best we can.
Recall also that at the time over 10 similar power plants were in operation in the Soviet Union at the time.
All of them had the same inbuilt inadequate safety provisions.
Shortly with in 4 years, after Chernobyl accident the Cold War was over and those 10 other power stations were upgraded or closed down. I doubt the USSR had the technology nor economic resources to perform the upgrades necessary whilst in a hostile position with the West ( in particular the USA) so ending the hostilities would have been necessary IMO.
This monster, they called the Elephants foot and the 30 tons of U and Pu , still has the potential to do some serious damage and containment is all we have at the moment to minimize but not remove the risk.
So far we have been lucky...
The potential at Fukushima was far worse, not only was the powers station an older model to Chernobyl the fuel rods being used were considerably more potent in reactive capacity and potential fallout. ( according to my sources) and it was only the brave suicidal actions of certain engineers that stayed behind that prevented a massive nuclear catastrophe. The disaster there is still being contained. (apparently)
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