20 years ... Chernobyl remembered
Twenty years since the worst nuclear disaster in the history of the world. And I feel the need to make a note here about it. I was amazed reading articles about it this morning, that Greenpeace activists all over the world were remembering it. I don't have an opinion one way or the other about Greenpeace, but I give them respect and thanks for remembering this in Germany, Russia, Spain, and everywhere else in the world. And I am seething with rage when I think about U.N.'s article that said that the Chernobyl accident was greatly overplayed, that it didn't kill nearly as many people as it did. My great grandmother died because of it. Yes, it's true she was an older woman, but she was damn healthy. She took walks in the park every single day, and didn't listen to anyone telling her not to go outside after Chernobyl happened. She died a very short time later, "of natural causes" but a healthy woman, no matter what age does NOT just drop dead because her heart simply stopped beating (no, there was no heart attack, it just stopped)!!! For all the skeptics, okay, I may be willing to concede that maybe, just maybe it was her time, but I am not willing to accept that 31 healthy firefighters dropped dead within days of putting out the Chernobyl fire. They too died mysteriously, and not of injuries associated with normal firefighting. Or the people that worked in the area of Reactor 4 (the one that exploded) whose life was snuffed out hours after they left the area. Or the photographer and the crew of the helicopter that flew there a few days after the fire was put out to take pictures. A week later and all of them were dead, and the film that was developed was mysteriously damaged on a microscopic level, as if millions of unseen particles went through it causing many tiny holes, that people at the time could not understand where they came from. Or the thousands and thousands of children and adults that are suffering from countless cancers in cities within a few mile radius of the reactor. Yes cancer can happen to anyone and everyone, but when EVERY SINGLE PERSON in all the cities is suffering from multiple cancers, that should raise a red flag. When thousands of children from the same town are trying to survive thyroid cancer, it is not a coincidence.
The only reason I am here alive today is because the divine decided to make the wind blow the other way, to Belarus, an empty desert too. To give my mom enough time to get supplies to maroon herself in the hospital with my grandmother to not have to go outside for a while, and to give my dad enough time to take me far away from the radiation, and let my body recover from the doses already received. Because I did get some, we had to throw away the pair of brand new shoes I was wearing before I was allowed on the train, because they contained alarmingly high amounts of radiation - fallout from the air gets absorved into the ground and we all have to walk ...
People's stupidity and experiments lead to this disaster. The core of the reactor that exploded was supposed to have been recycled weeks ago. But people were still conducting experiments, and kept it a few extra weeks. Irony of life, the core was supposed to get picked up for recycling the following day.
I won't forget, I can't forget, and let the world not forget either.
EDIT:
My great grandmother didn't die of heart failure as it turns out. I asked my dad, and she died of lung swelling. She never smoked or anything either.
The only reason I am here alive today is because the divine decided to make the wind blow the other way, to Belarus, an empty desert too. To give my mom enough time to get supplies to maroon herself in the hospital with my grandmother to not have to go outside for a while, and to give my dad enough time to take me far away from the radiation, and let my body recover from the doses already received. Because I did get some, we had to throw away the pair of brand new shoes I was wearing before I was allowed on the train, because they contained alarmingly high amounts of radiation - fallout from the air gets absorved into the ground and we all have to walk ...
People's stupidity and experiments lead to this disaster. The core of the reactor that exploded was supposed to have been recycled weeks ago. But people were still conducting experiments, and kept it a few extra weeks. Irony of life, the core was supposed to get picked up for recycling the following day.
I won't forget, I can't forget, and let the world not forget either.
EDIT:
My great grandmother didn't die of heart failure as it turns out. I asked my dad, and she died of lung swelling. She never smoked or anything either.