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There was a steam explosion and subsequent graphite fire. Here's the short of it without going into so many details.

1) The RBMK was designed for two things, generating power, and generating Pu.
2) Typical Soviet mentality was to cut corners in order to reduce cost. For example, no containment building.
3) RBMKs are inheriently unstable. They use graphite as a moderator. They operate with positive moderator coefficients of reactivity. Moderator temperature increase = increase in reactivity = increase in power.
4) They were operating it that day in an unsafe condition in order to conduct an experiement. In other words, they turned it into a giant test reactor.
5) They were operating it with fewer control rods than were required.
6) Something went wrong, and when they tried to shut it down by scramming it, the thing blew. The tips of the RBMKs control rods are made of graphite. By scramming it, they actually inserted POSITIVE reactivity. This small amount of graphite on the tip caused it to go out of control.



In other words, you'd never find a reactor constructed like that in the Western world, or in the Far East. If only they had constructed a containment building around the reactor, a disaster could have been prevented.
 
Just read the rest of the thread. I'm going to stop now, before I get too soapboxy.

I (and wiretap) actually work for the nuclear power industry, so I am really getting a kick out of some of these replies...

/fark cliche
 
What I find astonishing is just the whole media and hollywood influence on society's view of nuclear power. Before I worked at the plant, I didn't know what to think of it either. Then when I started working there, I was like "LOL, people are so freaking stupid." I said that to my father pretty much after the first week of being there and seeing how operations work. Its a whole different world than outsiders perceive it to be.
 
Are the weird looking plants on the right actually mutated plants or is that just a photoshoped image? Because if that is I'm gonna be a little freaked out. (Ok not a little, ALOT! :eek: )
 
CptFalcon said:
Are the weird looking plants on the right actually mutated plants or is that just a photoshoped image? Because if that is I'm gonna be a little freaked out. (Ok not a little, ALOT! :eek: )
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The ... left? The things on the right look normal to me, they're just closer to the camera.
 
They look like some sort of decoration.. or decorative plant. I'd need an alternate view to confirm.
 
I don't think those are plant - -they look more like some sort of crumbling concrete thing.

And you guys still haven't figured this out. You might be 100% correct about the idea that a reactor can function totally safely - and I'll admit that while i've toured plants and gotten "inside stories" on them, I'm no nuclear engineer so I'm willing to defer to you on that.

However, you can shout that it's safe all you want - the public isn't gonna buy it. Say nuclear to the average man on the street and they think 3 mile island and chernobyl, and their thoughts then drift back to that old movie "china syndrome," and that's pretty much all she wrote. You'll have a hell of a time convincing them that it's even possible to have a safe reactor. If you manage to pull that off (and if you do, you need to quit your job and go into PR, because you'll get rich), you still have to convince them that people WILL build and operate them safely.

And on that, you haven't convinced me either. You need to convince me that you've come up with a way to overcome human greed and laziness. Regulatory commissions are great but as I mentioned before there are plenty of industries out there that break the law left and right, and they're overseen by regulatory agencies as well.

You can train people all you want - they might KNOW that they're supposed to follow certain procedures, but unless you have someone from the regulatory agency watching EVERY plant worker 100% of the time there's no way for that agency to guarantee that people are actually following them.

Sure there's the issue of personal safety - if the plant workers screw up they start glowing too - but then people still don't wear seatbelts these days even though everyone knows they should, and everyone knows they'll get hurt worse in a wreck if they don't.

Until you find a way to subvert human nature or replace all the humans with something more reliable and honest, you simply cannot guarantee that the procedures required for safety will be followed religiously.
 
Mind if I have your name to look up in the P.A.D.S. system to verifty? This had be be many years back unless you recently had permission from the governor and a thorough background check by the FBI and Homeland Security.
 
w1retap said:
Mind if I have your name to look up in the P.A.D.S. system to verifty? This had be be many years back unless you recently had permission from the governor and a thorough background check by the FBI and Homeland Security.
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Yeah, sorry, I don't give out my name over the 'net, and I don't get into pissing matches over whether or not people believe me. I choose to take you at your word that you not only work for a nuclear plant but that you do so in some capacity that would let you know what the hell you're talking about. For all i know you're a burger flipper at McDonalds, but I'm taking you at your word. Be nice if you returned the courtesy, but frankly I don't care. You're trying to ignore my arguments because you can't come up with anything to refute them. That's pretty obvious, and your clumsy attempt to redirect the thread failed.
 
195983063_e380efd610.jpg


I know, I know, like I should talk. :p
 
shadowfax said:
Yeah, sorry, I don't give out my name over the 'net, and I don't get into pissing matches over whether or not people believe me. I choose to take you at your word that you not only work for a nuclear plant but that you do so in some capacity that would let you know what the hell you're talking about. For all i know you're a burger flipper at McDonalds, but I'm taking you at your word. Be nice if you returned the courtesy, but frankly I don't care. You're trying to ignore my arguments because you can't come up with anything to refute them. That's pretty obvious, and your clumsy attempt to redirect the thread failed.
Click to expand...

Completely understood. ;)

You can find my name and location on Xoxide's winner page for the High Roller raffle case. Feel free to call the NRC or Detroit Edison to verify employment, but don't be surprised if you are blacklisted by the FBI. LOL. :p
 
Oh, I was also the 2nd place runner up of last year's MSI photo product contest.

Pic:
DSCF0409_small.jpg
 
The plant only originally needed one cooling tower since we only have one reactor on site, but the plans for the plant were to have two reactors. Right now both cooling towers are being used by the single reactor, but we can drop down to only using one if needed with no adverse effects. We are scheduled to start building another nuclear plant on site in the upcoming years, so the second cooling tower is going to be put to good use by the new reactor. :cool:

Anyhow, they do need to be that big, because you have a lot of heat to be dissipated. But, the cooling towers are very simple objects.. much more simple than people think. The only thing they do is have water falling down between the large array of pipes down at the base of the cooling towers. (the black area) It is like a giant radiator that works by air getting passed through the 'radiator' at the bottom and the water falling over the pipes makes a cooling effect because of the evaporation and wind. Evaporation then gets sucked out the top because of the negative pressure created from the wind and pressure difference. There is nothing at all inside the middle of the cooling towers.. its just a huge empty space. We used to store equipment in there. But, in person, the cooling towers are fricking huge. Much bigger than they look. When are are standing on top of the radiator base and look up, they tower back over the top of you it seems like because of the curvature. You could easily fit a full size football field inside the towers.
 
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