Leonid Fedorovych Toptunov (Ukrainian: , Russian: ; 16 August 1960 14 May 1986) was a Soviet engineer who was the senior reactor control chief engineer at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant Reactor Unit 4 on the night of the Chernobyl disaster, 26 April 1986. "The operators were afraid of him," Mr Breus agrees. Toptunov had literally turned white.". Those who take the responsible and leading posts are usually the ones to blame for the failures. Miners were brought in to dig a tunnel under the reactor to create a space for a heat exchanger, to stop the molten core melting through the concrete pad and contaminating the groundwater, threatening millions of lives. Ultimately, though, he is happy the show has refocused attention on the disaster and the scale of damage caused. Russians and Ukrainians have watched it via the internet, and it has had a favourable rating on Russian film site Kinopoisk. 21 0 obj <> endobj These were not random people suffering these were heroes. Undeservedly condemned, professionally slandered. Pilot Alexander Petrov, who responded to the scene, recalled, It took us more than 24 hours to get things going. "They were not looking good, to put it mildly," he says. A subreddit to discuss the Chernobyl Disaster that happened on the night of April 26, 1986, and the Exclusion Zone that isolates the city of Pripyat from the rest of the world. Mr Breus worked with many of the individuals portrayed and has given his verdict of the series. Some Chernobyl leaders built their defense on their bones. Press J to jump to the feed. When the operators pushed the red button, the reactor didn't stop but exploded.". Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. Who would applaud that?". "They took off their clothes, but not like it was shown in the film, not right down to nothing," Mr Breus insists, also pointing out that their role was ultimately not significant to the story. Founder of Crime Viral community since 2015. Many of the liquidators have since suffered from severe health problemssome of which were fatal. 4 reactor, and operator Leonid Toptunov, who both feature prominently in the series. Alexander Akimov (Sam Troughton) was the night crew shift supervisor during the early . Dyatlov ordered Toptunov and Akimov to raise the power to the requisite 700 MW. This later became known as the "Bridge of Death" after reports that those who stood there allegedly died from radiation sickness. "I was surprised they even brought us there," Mr Breus says of arriving at work the morning after the explosion. Yes, i thought the same about Razim Davletbayev. On April 26, 1986, an explosion occurred at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in the northern part of Soviet Ukraine, an event which today is widely known as the Chernobyl disaster. While viewers may have difficulty grasping the scale of the war being waged inside the Exclusion Zone, its impossible to miss the human sacrifices it required. 0000012642 00000 n Fresh perspectives. "I've never heard there was a crowd of people who went to watch the fire at night," he says. I also heard that his otopsy file is closed to the public and is only accessible with specific permission. Military Wiki is a FANDOM Lifestyle Community. The precautions were not enough, as, since 1986, physicians have reported a rise in birth defects. For instance if someone's face melted off or someone's eyes changed color, the details absolutely would have showed up in the many academic articles and books written about ARS in Chernobyl victims. At 9:25 time mark, do you think it might be Khodemchuk? "If I didn't do it, they could just fire me. He said, A physician deals with life and death every day. Now, volunteers, including veterinarians and radiation experts, have formed the nonprofit charity Dogs of Chernobyl. Once more his temperature increases and then he falls into coma. Tel: +38 063 58 16 661E-mail: [emailprotected], Exciting private tours to Chernobyl and Pripyat. Withdrawing a dangerous number of control rods, the operators could only reach 200 MW due to xenon poisoning. Frantic. 0000013685 00000 n Only a Second World War survivor can imagine a similar scene.[4]. When we talk about the events that have changed the world, we always remember the Chernobyl nuclear power plant explosion. 4 to evaluate radiation levels. The explosion occurred. Press J to jump to the feed. Elk were contaminated, and the moment their bodies were thrown in a quarry after being stripped of their heads and fur was captured on camera. But while many have complimented the show's attention to detail, he believes it is also one of the downsides of the TV series. The shows creators havent managed to keep track of all the little things (even though their attention to detail is why many people fell in love with the miniseries in the first place): Valery Legasov, the character played by Jared Harris, drinks his vodka from a large glass in small sips, as if it were whiskey, and everyone in the cast keeps addressing each other as comrade in complete seriousness. Movies. ", "Possibly, Anatoly Dyatlov became the main anti-hero in the show because that was how he was perceived by the power plant's workers, his subordinates and top-management, in the beginning. The HBO miniseries includes many of the real people operating the reactor at the time of the meltdown. One of the most dramatic scenes in the miniseries shows three power plant workers volunteering to go into an underground tunnel beneath the damaged reactor to open a vital drainage valve. After the humans evacuated, wildlife grew rapidly with limited predators to hunt them downwild boar multiplied eightfold in the two years following the disaster. Although it has been more than three decades since the Chernobyl disaster, there are many still suffering the consequences today. Wrong : the poor guy who saw the skin of his leg fell off was Vyacheslav S. Brazhnik, Senior turbine operator. The original footage was probably taken at reactor 4 control room during the time our guys were on crew, that's why many of them can be seen. The work done would last until the morning hours of the 27th by trying to pump water into the exposed reactor core. That is how you advance your career and win awards. He has been a guest speaker on numerous national radio and television stations and is a five time published author. He got a mild type of acute radiation syndrome, a doctor said. But no matter how strict he was, he was still a high-level professional.". Literally says the graphite displacers were the for "lubrication. Despite the change in tone, Chernobyl still knows how to terrify its audience, and Emily Watsons performance as Ulana Khomyuk, the nuclear scientist who visits men dying of radiation poisoning, gets under your skin even more than scenes of engineer Leonid Toptunovs bloody hospital bed sheets. Firefighters sent from neighbouring Pripyat did not know of any radiation exposure and Ignatenko died of acute radiation syndrome on 13 May 1986. My body parts not covered by clothes - such as hands, face and neck - were red". I'd love to see the original footage they used from CNPP reactor #4, there are shots of Kovalenko, Akimov, Davletbayev and even Khodemchuk. Is there any other reports regarding Akimov? 3, Firefighters pictured in 1986 before cleaning debris from the roof of the No. They knew where the valves were, so they were the right men for the task. UC San Francisco's Lydia Zablotska, MD, PhD, grew up in Ukraine, trained as physician . Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. Everyone who worked to restore coolant flow would have suffered greatly from leg burns, because they were standing in the water. He was talking about another operator Brazhik. And also being under that same piece of sky, you start to feel a little closer, in a sense, to who they were. Our first priority is--PEREVOZCHENKO, 30's, bursts in. Some of the stories, however, only seem like they were cooked up in a Hollywood screenwriters room. There was no smoke or fire, just fumes coming from the damaged part. 6 in Moscow, where Alexander Akomv is suffering towards death. Sam Troughton, an English actor, performed the role of Chernobyl supervisor of the shift in the Chernobyl series by HBO in 2019. I've never seen any reliable source for anything regarding his face. All three men were sentenced to 10 years in a labour camp for their role in the disaster and series creator Craig Mazin maintains that Dyatlov in particular was a "real bully", who later made statements that were not credible. Warning: This story contains plot details from the miniseries. 0000001084 00000 n [5], In 2008, Toptunov was posthumously awarded with the 3rd degree Order For Courage by Viktor Yushchenko, then the President of Ukraine.[6]. The village of Kopachi lies 7 kilometers (4.3 mi) from the site of the Chernobyl disaster. 21 23 More than 500,000 residents in Ukraine were ultimately forced to leave their homes. "The miners are shown as tough guys who are not afraid of anything, but not the power plant workers.". Im not a religious man, but I suppose thats as religious as Ill ever feel. Creator Craig Mazin Stars Jessie Buckley Jared Harris Stellan Skarsgrd See production, box office & company info Watch on HBO Max S1 with Prime Video Channels More watch options Read about our approach to external linking. "My chances are small", he told his colleagues "But if I survive this, one thing is sure: I will never work in a power plant again. When Alexander has taken his duties, the reactor was in the state of preparation for the shutdown of the power. 0000000016 00000 n Nekhaev even had to have his leg amputated. 04:00 - Further fire fighting units arrive from Chernobyl, Polesskoe and Kiev. As we moved through it, we were aware that there were the ghosts of history around us, Mazin said. Just found this on Sky. "It was our job," says Oleksiy Ananenko, who was on shift at the time, while the others had been ordered in by their manager. "Their characters are distorted and misrepresented, as if they were villains. Who would applaud that?". "When he was present at the block, it created tension for everyone. Abagian recalled, Children were running in the streets; people were hanging laundered linen out to dry. "The Chernobyl catastrophe is depicted in a very powerful way, as a global catastrophe that absorbed huge numbers of people. This is how they decided to portray the Minister of Coal Industry Mikhail Shchadov. [. According to Sources: Akimov suffered severe Leg Burns and the high amount of radiation caused it face to slowly dissolve away. 4 reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine. "Its high rankings show that people are still interested in Chernobyl. The reactor power level had been reduced, preparing for a planned safety test. Because its so big! The puppies are believed to be descendants of the pet dogs that were left behind by their owners; residents were granted only a few hours notice before they were evacuated and advised to only take vital personal belongings and a certain amount of food. There was no smoke or fire, just fumes coming from the damaged part. .] So from that Im assuming those could be pretty true about him, especially skin being so delicate because of the radiation. Everyone stay calm. If you can find a source, Id be interested to know. He stayed behind and had his crew turn on the emergency water pumps to flood the reactor - sadly, the power source was inactive. [1], Leonid Toptunov was born on 16 August 1960 in Mykolaivka, Buryn Raion, Sumy Oblast. In July 1987, Chernobyls plant director Viktor P. Bryukhanov, chief engineer Nikolai M. Fomin, and deputy Anatoly S. Dyatlov were sentenced to two to ten years at a labor camp. Cheish Merryweather is a true crime fan and an oddities fanatic. 04:30 - Chief engineer Fomin arrived in the Block 4 control room. it's not bad, it was probably made in the past few months before February 24th. In 2008, Akimov was posthumously awarded with what they called the 3rd degree Order for Courage. 1156/2008 of 12 December 2008", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Leonid_Toptunov&oldid=1139033343, This page was last edited on 13 February 2023, at 00:49. ", By now Akimov's wife Lyuba was allowed to come to Moscow. [2] He worked as a unit control engineer and senior reactor control engineer. But while many have complimented the show's attention to detail, he believes it is also one of the downsides of the TV series. Ive never heard anything about his face, only his skin blackening and shriveling. 0000011604 00000 n And finally they said, The hell with it! At 04:00, Moscow ordered feeding of water to the reactor. moustache is a struggling, wispy version of Akimov's. TOPTUNOV No, that's not--Akimov signals Toptunov not to argue. What's the least amount of exercise we can get away with? Shift leader Borys Baranov died in 2005, while Valery Bespalov and Oleksiy Ananenko, both chief engineers of one of the reactor sections, are still alive and live in the capital, Kiev. During his first years at Chernobyl, he held positions of senior turbine management engineer and shift supervisor of the turbine hall. 0000010565 00000 n The digging only pushed radioactive material deeper into the soil and closer to the water table, so that contamination spread even further., Today, only two buildings are left standing, one of which is the former kindergarten, where children were not evacuated until 36 hours of exposure. HWKF=1Zz& TfOku]T#t4d-Ti,J$bTM7d)clC2 VFO&3 zE_6tVQjA[ri&xHG|/4^})-}IrT8bv_d O7fj8jGX a?2`/gn)/nXo]}JR'.H}k%L,CXBk>:+l(]9[F|/#O5X# Y0Gl8f,1 qCy*$ Ao6!^TqRVPyQG. Or something along those lines. Very awesome. At first, they also tried to reason with me, saying, Youre young. The communications networks were suddenly flooded with calls and information. Children are shown playing in the radioactive dust, which falls from the sky like snow. 4 reactor, Oleksiy Ananenko (then and now) with a scene from the TV series showing the three workers wearing respirators, The TV series portrays how 400 miners were involved in digging the tunnel under the damaged reactor, The TV series shows Pripyat residents watching events unfold on what was later nicknamed the "Bridge of Death", The damage caused to the facility by the biggest nuclear disaster in history, Chernobyl mini-series review: 'It stops you sleeping', Chernobyl disaster: 'I didn't know the truth', Craig Mazin maintains that Dyatlov in particular was a "real bully", The people who moved to the Chernobyl exclusion zone, US-made cheese can be called 'gruyere' - court, AOC under investigation for Met Gala dress, Canadian grandma helps police snag phone scammer, The children left behind in Cuba's exodus. And still the shift leader is ruminating if the catastrophy was his fault: "What have we done wrong? https://i.imgur.com/gfghbDQ.jpg. Unfortunately, it takes these tragic events to impress this on us.[6]. Once more his temperature increases and then he falls into coma. Why Alex Murdaugh was spared the death penalty, Why Trudeau is facing calls for a public inquiry, The shocking legacy of the Dutch 'Hunger Winter'. However, they didnt know about the faults that had been made during the construction of the reactor. The missing containment wasn't mentioned either', 'It is the morning of the 10th May. 0000003954 00000 n "It was clear they felt sick. Can either be found at house parties telling everyone Charles Manson was only 5ft 2" or at home reading true crime magazines. 0000000756 00000 n The Red Forest is now one of the most contaminated sites in the world, with more than 90 percent of the radioactivity found in the soil. However, the operation was flawed, as the scale of the disaster was like nothing ever seen before. "I've never heard there was a crowd of people who went to watch the fire at night," he says. Is it Kovalenko? I can guarantee that nothing other than necrosis of the skin took place. [4] He worked with Akimov to manually open water valves in an attempt to increase water supply to the reactor, during which time they began to experience symptoms of acute radiation syndrome. %PDF-1.6 % During his studies of the reactor documentation, he mentioned to his friend, Sasha Korol, that control rods may, in certain circumstances, accelerate rather than slow the reaction. They showed Mr. Schadov as an incompetent official who is not respected by the miners. This is an eerie and deserted location, as the homes of Kopachi were completely bulldozed and buried by the Soviet Army. "The Chernobyl catastrophe is depicted in a very powerful way, as a global catastrophe that absorbed huge numbers of people.