* Silence for three days after nuclear power plant explosion
* First news about Chernobyl left many questions unanswered
* Gorbachev took 18 days to comment publicly on disaster
By Tatiana Ustinova MOSCOW, March 17 (Reuters) - It took almost three days for confirmation to come and, when it did, the Soviet Union's official news agency issued a five-sentence dispatch saying there had been a mishap at the Chernobyl nuclear power station.
When I arrived at work on April 28, 1986, the bureau was discussing reports of a spike in radiation levels picked up by monitoring stations in northern Europe.
Something serious was obviously going on and fingers were being pointed at the Soviet Union. But how could we find out what had happened and where?
We had one main official source for live news: the printed reports from the TASS news machine. There was no mention on TASS of anything relevant.
The hours rolled by and the agency's printer finally spat out a brief report citing a failure at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Soviet Ukraine.
"Okay, nothing alarming," I thought as I took the TASS report to other members of the bureau. We exchanged glances. "Was this what all the talk was about?"
It was. The Soviet Union was admitting -- in its own way -- an accident at a nuclear power station.
TASS's dry despatch sought to reassure the Soviet people but it left many questions unanswered. There were casualties but it did not say how many. The reactor was damaged but the report did not mention radiation.
"An accident has occurred at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. One of the reactors has been damaged," TASS said.
"Measures are being undertaken to eliminate the consequences of the accident. Aid is being given to those who have suffered injury. A government commission has been set up to investigate what happened," TASS said.
Panic was beginning to spread in Soviet Ukraine as tonnes of nuclear material were spewed out by an explosion and fire at the No. 4 reactor at Chernobyl, but we were unaware of this in Moscow.
As the story developed outside the borders of the Soviet Union, it felt in the Moscow bureau like we were living in a separate reality.
On the surface all was normal. There was no word from Mikhail Gorbachev's Kremlin. State television aired pre-planned programming about preparations for the May Day holidays.
Our correspondents decided to head to Kiev and see for themselves. But in Soviet times, foreign correspondents needed the Foreign Ministry's permission to travel outside Moscow.
A Reuters correspondent finally got to Ukraine. He had to have his trousers tested for radiation when he returned to Moscow.
It took Gorbachev 18 days to comment publicly on the disaster, using a 25-minute Soviet television address to accuse the West of telling a "mountain of lies" about the accident which he called "our misfortune".
For thousands of Soviet citizens it was a misfortune from which they would never recover. (Writing by Tatyana Ustinova, Alissa de Carbonnel and Guy Faulconbridge)
* First news about Chernobyl left many questions unanswered
* Gorbachev took 18 days to comment publicly on disaster
By Tatiana Ustinova MOSCOW, March 17 (Reuters) - It took almost three days for confirmation to come and, when it did, the Soviet Union's official news agency issued a five-sentence dispatch saying there had been a mishap at the Chernobyl nuclear power station.
When I arrived at work on April 28, 1986, the bureau was discussing reports of a spike in radiation levels picked up by monitoring stations in northern Europe.
Something serious was obviously going on and fingers were being pointed at the Soviet Union. But how could we find out what had happened and where?
We had one main official source for live news: the printed reports from the TASS news machine. There was no mention on TASS of anything relevant.
The hours rolled by and the agency's printer finally spat out a brief report citing a failure at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Soviet Ukraine.
"Okay, nothing alarming," I thought as I took the TASS report to other members of the bureau. We exchanged glances. "Was this what all the talk was about?"
It was. The Soviet Union was admitting -- in its own way -- an accident at a nuclear power station.
TASS's dry despatch sought to reassure the Soviet people but it left many questions unanswered. There were casualties but it did not say how many. The reactor was damaged but the report did not mention radiation.
"An accident has occurred at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. One of the reactors has been damaged," TASS said.
"Measures are being undertaken to eliminate the consequences of the accident. Aid is being given to those who have suffered injury. A government commission has been set up to investigate what happened," TASS said.
Panic was beginning to spread in Soviet Ukraine as tonnes of nuclear material were spewed out by an explosion and fire at the No. 4 reactor at Chernobyl, but we were unaware of this in Moscow.
As the story developed outside the borders of the Soviet Union, it felt in the Moscow bureau like we were living in a separate reality.
On the surface all was normal. There was no word from Mikhail Gorbachev's Kremlin. State television aired pre-planned programming about preparations for the May Day holidays.
Our correspondents decided to head to Kiev and see for themselves. But in Soviet times, foreign correspondents needed the Foreign Ministry's permission to travel outside Moscow.
A Reuters correspondent finally got to Ukraine. He had to have his trousers tested for radiation when he returned to Moscow.
It took Gorbachev 18 days to comment publicly on the disaster, using a 25-minute Soviet television address to accuse the West of telling a "mountain of lies" about the accident which he called "our misfortune".
For thousands of Soviet citizens it was a misfortune from which they would never recover. (Writing by Tatyana Ustinova, Alissa de Carbonnel and Guy Faulconbridge)
No comments:
Post a Comment