Chernobyl Episode 2 Reaction
Added 2024-06-10 00:09:21 +0000 UTCChernobyl Episode 2 - 'Please Remain Calm' | Reaction
Enjoy the edited reaction!
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Comments
The helicopter that crashed really did happen, but it had nothing to with the radiation. I believe they clipped a chain and it destroyed the propeller blades.
Jonny Dade
2025-01-26 20:09:10 +0000 UTCThe ending scene was likely even more in the dark than was portrayed here. I believe they were basically working by feel the entire time, you actually have to add light to the scene to be able to film it.
Robert
2024-07-05 03:57:11 +0000 UTCCommentary from Radiological Engineer on Episode 2: I paused and made comments, they are chronological as this episode evolves: For an FYI, the term Roentgen..I pronounce it "Rain - ken" in my Western US accent. Is actually gamma and X-ray radiation exposure in air. This can be converted to the term we would use today, I won't go into the math, but 1 Roentgen is about 0.01 Sievert of radiation dose to a person. (or 1 Roentgen ~ 1 Rem of radiation dose to a person if you are in the US) If a nuclear engineer realized that he was standing so close to pieces of reactor core without any thick shielding between it and him…He realized he was already dead. So his walk to the plume was basically just acceptance that he was already a dead man. (Takes time for radiation to kill a person, up to 30 days for lower, but lethal doses, and a few days for extraordinarily high doses.) Roentgen- (pronounced “rain- ken”) is a unit of radiation exposure in air, the unit for this is R. This is where the show fudged up. It was 3.61 R/hr not 3.61 R. When I first watched the show I was cussing. 200 R/hr is a scary dangerous level, but if their meters were saturated…as you said Spartan…it could be 2000 or 200,000 R/hr. A chest x-ray is 0.01 R or 10 mR (milli-Roentgen) as our hero said. For FYI: 100 R total exposure to a person will cause radiation sickness. We know now, thanks to Chernobyl that if a person gets radiation sickness within 3 hours of exposure, they have received a lethal dose already. Lower exposure levels it takes a few days for radiation sickness to set in…but we didn’t know this statistic until Chernobyl. 450 R total exposure to a person will lead to death within 30 days of 50% of the people exposed to this amount. 1000 R total exposure to a person will lead to death within 30 days of 100% of people exposed to this level. At 1000 R total exposure, the red bone marrow which creates white blood cells are damaged to the point they no longer can create white blood cells. Your red bone marrow replaces your white blood cells every 30 days. Even if the red bone marrow is damaged, blood still has a supply of white blood cells, but as the white blood cells naturally go away…and are then no longer replaced. Your immune system gradually weakens. After 30 days with no immune system…this is why it kills you and why it takes up to 30 days…compromised immune system. So 200 R/hr…is ‘survivable’ if one spends <2 hours in the area. If it were 2,000 R/hr and a person was in the area for 30 minutes…they are dead and they just don’t know it yet. Doesn’t matter the graphite was on the skin actually. Just standing within a few meters of it would still be lethal, but how would the show present this. (Though it would cause skin burns similar to a sunburn.) Birds falling from the sky? Bullshit…didn’t happen. The U-235 bullets…technically it is NOT the U-235, but it is complicated to explain fission products. When U-235 (which you can safely hold in your hand, no problem) but when it fissions, it turns into highly radioactive material. The ‘bullets’ are Alpha, Beta and Gamma radiation. Alpha is 100% shielded by paper, but in your lungs it is bad. (Radon gives alpha radiation). Take a look at the reactor---death sentence. Suits will not stop gamma radiation. Not one bit, the suits are to prevent contamination getting on the skin. Ulana Khomyuk was a compilation of many people. Radiation monitoring stations in Europe saw a rise in radiation levels. Nuclear folks knew this happened. Ulana was a character who was created to honor the dedication of all of these scientists who spoke out. Iodine- Yes, we have it, yes, it can be administered during an accident. Iodine is a problem because 1- Has a short half-life (8.1 days). 2- Gets absorbed into the thyroid gland. 3- If too much is taken or if children take it, it can cause permanent thyroid problems in the quantity that must be given to saturate the thyroid. Most importantly 4- It MUST be given within 4 hours of the accident or else it doesn’t do a damn thing. It doesn’t protect against any other type of contaminated particles that must be breathed in, just Iodine gas. I’ve had to explain to countless people who have seen this show that Iodine is not a magical cure-all protection against radiation. Lead shielding: 5 cm of lead will reduce gamma radiation levels to 1/10 the original value. Lead blankets such as at the hospital are generally around 0.25 mm thick lead. At nuclear power plants we have lead blankets that are 0.6 cm thick lead. One of these blankets 30cm wide x 60 cm long weighs around 30 kg. So one of our lead blankets drop the radiation dose rate by ~25% (in other words 75% still gets through, and why there is no such thing as a ‘radiation’ suit. The suits are to prevent skin contamination.) The respirator is the most important thing…you don’t want to breath the dust in because that dust will be emitting radiation in the lungs. 15,000 R/hr they meant. Even if they were able to cover the vehicle with 5 cm of lead (kind of hard to see through it…) this would still be 1500 R/hr and would be 100% fatal if a person was exposed to this level for 40 minutes. At 15,000 R/hr – fatal in 4 minutes. At nuclear power plants, our environmental monitors are so sensitive, if there is a accident at a nuclear power plant anywhere in the world. We will all know about it within days. Good job Pudgey…where do you evacuate the 49,400 residents of Pripyat? When you didn’t have an emergency plan set up beforehand to handle such an emergency because RBMK reactors will never have an accident. ‘Poisoned’ isn’t really the right word. Right now, you, me and every person on the planet has radioactive potassium-40 (K-40) in our bodies. Same radiation, but it’s the quantity that matters. (average person has 150 Becquerel of K-40 in our body emitting Beta and gamma radiation. Alexei Ananenko Valeri Bespalov Boris Baranov -Thank you. Guarantee they knew it was a 1 way trip. We obviously didn’t know what happened while they were inside. Gamma radiation specifically causes electrons to be kicked away from an atom. Extraordinarily high levels of radiation will effect electronics…batteries will not last as long, whether lights went out? We don’t know obviously. This also incidentally is how gamma radiation affects the body. Molecules are held together by covalent bonds which are electronic bonds…electrons shared between two atoms makes these bonds. Gamma radiation (X-rays and UV-C light incidentally are the same as gamma radiation, they have sufficient energy to also affect these electronic bonds), the gamma radiation knocks electrons away from atoms, if the electron was responsible for holding a molecule together, the molecule could break apart. This happens to us all the time, from the sun, from radiation in our bodies and from radiation from the ground. The difference is the rate that it is happening. Background radiation around the world on the average is 10 uR/hr (micro-Roentgen/hour) or 0.00001 R/hr.
Jared Smith
2024-06-30 17:20:51 +0000 UTCYou guys are the first non-Americans I’ve seen react to this show, thus you are also the first I’ve seen who understand the metric measurements. It honestly makes your reaction stand out even more, since you immediately comprehend the gravity of it all. I have to once again praise the director, Johan Renck, for his work on this show. In ”real world logic” there’s no reason for the heroic three men who entered the plant to be wearing dosimeters, they already know how high the radiation levels are, but from a storytelling/filmmaking perspective it’s a genius way to raise the tension. Just fade to black hearing the dosimeter crackle… In reality the three men were not volunteers, they were simply the men previously scheduled to be on duty that day and so they were ordered in, but I love that they changed it for the show. Not only does it give us Boris’ great speech but it adds to these men being portrayed as the brave heroes they deserve to be remembered as. Favourite acting moment in this episode: the look on Skarsgård’s (Boris) face when Legasov tells him they’ll be dead within half a decade. Brilliant performance by Stellan.
Tingeling
2024-06-15 20:48:48 +0000 UTCunfortunately we have no idea who he is xD I think this history was a bigger deal in the US, I dont believe Australian schools really spent any time on it
CpaSpartan Pudgey
2024-06-13 02:21:46 +0000 UTCI know you guys say you "don't know history" but y'all didn't recognize Mikhail Gorbatchev? The leader with that famous birth mark on his face? The leader of the Soviet Union, one of the most important figures in the 20th century, who eventually (and unwittingly) triggered the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the cold war? These aren't small things, guys.
Julien
2024-06-13 00:49:20 +0000 UTCThat is crazy. Oh we have reached France now we must stop (radioactive particles speaking to each other).
Lyn Hurst
2024-06-11 18:58:30 +0000 UTCI listened to that a couple of weeks ago. It was really interesting, and he explained why they chose to share certain things and not others. I appreciated that even though it is a drama they tempered some of the sensationalism such as showing more grotesque representations of the bodies.
Lyn Hurst
2024-06-11 18:55:55 +0000 UTCI've only started doing that cause your boy talks like the flash and it was my only way to get a word in 🤣 I guess I've overcompensate now hahaha
CpaSpartan Pudgey
2024-06-11 13:09:15 +0000 UTCYesssssss!!! Sorrrrry 🥲
CpaSpartan Pudgey
2024-06-11 13:07:55 +0000 UTCohh thanks for letting us know!
CpaSpartan Pudgey
2024-06-10 22:32:13 +0000 UTCbtw the Minsk reading said 8 miliroentgen, so 0.008 roentgen and their alarm still went off... insane
Teo Marian
2024-06-10 22:06:33 +0000 UTCHey I don't know if it's only on my end but the title says episode 1. Just so you know
Vhaxem
2024-06-10 17:21:15 +0000 UTCHANG ON!!!! “He’s from Outlander”…. Have y’all watched Outlander without us?!?!? 😩😩😩😩😩😩😩
Becca
2024-06-10 15:43:27 +0000 UTCI am like Pudgey with jumping in thinking someone is done talking when they are just taking a breath lol. I was reminded of this when I was in a group once and I chimed in. Someone said he was not done talking and I said he stopoed, and the person said yes to take a breath. My bad. I am a better listener now.... Took some time since my brain moves fast at times. As far as Chernobyl goes, those clothes are still in the basement of the hospital. The facts they had were not only incorrect and downplayed, but they went to great lengths to cover up the true devastation.
Lyn Hurst
2024-06-10 13:18:24 +0000 UTC@Spartan Bit of a long story here but it might answer your question. I grew up in the eastern part of Hungary and the country next door is Ukraine ( then Soviet-Union ). Pripyat from my city is just under 1000km. There was a very extensive research and documentary movie made about the catastrophe about 15 years later, to uncover some truth and estimate the after-effects to the people who lived nearby. They have found a reporter who lived in Kiyev ( the Capital of Ukraine ) about 150km from the plant. He was there when they opened the plant to take some pics for newspapers. He knew a lot of people in the plant and one of the worker called him when it happened and he drove there the next day. On day 3 one of the pilot flew him around in a helicopter ( there is actual footage of him in the chopper ) in the documentary. He said he charged his camera the night before, they went up and he was able to take 4 photos then his machine died, he thought it was broken. Later when he looked at the negatives of the photos he realized that you could barely see anything on the pictures, all four of them were really yellowish and grainy. He showed them on the movie. His machine was taken to a repairshop and the entire electronics was fried. I don't mean burnt out but the ionizing radiation damaged the circuit boards that were beyond repair. He said the entire time they were flying around he tasted a very strong metallic taste in his mouth. The clothes of the firefighters are still in the basement of the abandoned hospital and to this day are extremely radioactive. The research found that everyone who lived downwind of the plant was exposed to the negative effects of the radiation likely increased birth defects and tumous tenfold. I mean a powerplant in Sweden detected the radiation 3 or 4 days later and they were baffled that it was coming from the outside lol After the last episode I will drop some real numbers on casualties and stuff. Both Jared Harris ( Valery Legasov ) and Stellan Skarsgard ( Boris Shcherbina ) are outstanding in this show ( to be fair they're always great ). You will find that there was a lot of heroism in this story and even though the Soviet Union was a really authoritarian system there were a lot of people who showed exemplary heroism and leadership.
neutchain
2024-06-10 10:49:14 +0000 UTCThe guy in the thumbnail is Bootstrap Bill, and also the main dude from Dune (flying guy)
K
2024-06-10 07:42:20 +0000 UTCOh no History doesn't happen until a TV show tells you that it has. The simple fact is that not a single one of you cared about this event until they made a show about it and now you are all experts.
Shawn Brink
2024-06-10 06:59:38 +0000 UTCNOTE: They give additional details about the historical events in the epilogue of the series. So you can wait for some of that. But if we do share the factual information, let's try to wait until that arc in the series has closed.
Jonathanese
2024-06-10 06:46:40 +0000 UTCHBO does have a podcast for every episode with the show runner Craig Mazin ( who also ran The Last of Us show btw), where they do kind of break down what events happened and what took creative license and why. Super interesting, and free of spoilers. Highly recommend...
Ben Hairston
2024-06-10 03:36:24 +0000 UTCChernobyl was the worst nuclear disaster in history. The stakes at this point weren’t just the immediate protection of the 60 million closest people they mentioned in Ukraine and Belarus (from air & water contamination), but also the survival of the entire continent of Europe and the wider world. There were 3 other reactors right next to the broken one that could also still explode if things got more out of control. The existing leak would continue to get worse if not stopped, and the nuclear fallout was already starting to travel far away on the winds to other countries. There was a lot of pressure on those few people (like the 2 reasonable scientists) who actually understood what was going on and what was at stake. Imagine having the fate of billions of people in your hands. And you’re surrounded by idiotic bureaucrats getting in your way.
DominaZeta
2024-06-10 03:23:36 +0000 UTCahhk makes sense
CpaSpartan Pudgey
2024-06-10 03:08:35 +0000 UTCAlso, in case you are not aware and to understand how far the hierarchy goes, the guy who leads the meeting, with the birth mark on his head is Mikhaïl Gorbatchev, the leader of the Soviet Union at the time. So he is at the very top
Chris C
2024-06-10 01:59:17 +0000 UTCThe three heroes Alexei Ananenko, Valeri Bespalov and Boris Baranov are actually real! When they say that Germany is not letting kids play outside, this is more than 1000km away. How crazy. In France, the government at the time said the radioactive cloud would stop at the border. Stupid politicians everywhere.
Chris C
2024-06-10 01:52:22 +0000 UTC
