Dyatlov broke every rule we have, and pushed a reactor to the brink of destruction. He did these things believing there was a fail-safe. A-Z-5. A simple button to shut it all down. But in the circumstance he created, there wasn't. The shut-down system had a fatal flaw. At 1:23 and 40 seconds, Akimov engages AZ-5. The fully-withdrawn control rods begin moving back into the reactor. These rods are made of boron, which reduces reactivity. But not their tips. The tips are made of graphite, which accelerates reactivity.
Why? For the same reason our reactors do not have containment buildings around them like those in the West. The same reason we don't use properly enriched fuel in our cores. The same reason we are the only nation that builds water-cooled graphite-moderated reactors with a positive void coefficient... It's cheaper.
No one in the room that night knew the shutdown button (AZ-5) could act as a detonator. They didn't know it, because it was kept from them.
KKadnikov
Comrade Legasov, you're contradicting your own testimony in Vienna.
My testimony in Vienna was a lie. I lied to the world. I'm not the only one who kept this secret. There are many. We were following orders, from the KGB, from the Central Committee. And right now, there are 16 reactors in the Soviet Union with the same fatal flaw. Three of them are still running less than 20 kilometers away, at Chernobyl.
KKadnikov
Professor Legasov, if you mean to suggest the Soviet State is somehow responsible for what happened, then I must warn you, you are treading on dangerous ground.
I've already trod on dangerous ground. We're on dangerous ground right now, because of our secrets and our lies. They're practically what define us. When the truth offends, we—we lie and lie until we can no longer remember it is even there. But it is...still there. Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth. Sooner or later, that debt is paid. That is how...an RBMK reactor core explodes: [turns around to face the members of the courtroom] Lies.
[Legasov is arrested by the KGB for refusing to toe the party line and is led to a private interrogation room]
CCharkov
[reads file] Valery Alexeyevich Legasov, son of Alexei Legasov, Head of Ideological Compliance, Central Committee. Do you know what your father did there?
CCharkov
As a student, you had a leadership position in Komsomol. Communist Youth, correct?
CCharkov
Answer the question.
CCharkov
At the Kurchatov Institute, you were the Communist Party secretary. In that position, you limited the promotion of Jewish scientists.
CCharkov
To curry favor with Kremlin officials. You're one of us, Legasov. I can do anything I want with you. But what I want the most is for you to know that I know. You're not brave. You're not heroic. You're just a dying man who forgot himself.
I know who I am, and I know what I've done. In a just world, I'd be shot for my lies, but not for this, not for the truth.
CCharkov
Scientists... and your idiot obsessions with reasons. When the bullet hits your skull, what will it matter why? [beat] No one's getting shot, Legasov. The whole world saw you in Vienna; it would be embarrassing to kill you now. And for what? Your testimony today will not be accepted by the State. It will not be disseminated in the press. It never happened. No... you will live, however long you have. But not as a scientist. Not anymore. You'll keep your title and your office, but no duties. No authority. No friends. No one will talk to you. No one will listen to you. Other men, lesser men, will receive credit for the things you have done. Your legacy is now their legacy; you will live long enough to see that. [beat] What role did Shcherbina play in this?
None. He didn't know what I was gonna say.
CCharkov
What role did Khomyuk play in this?
None. She didn't know either.
CCharkov
After all you've said and done today, it would be curious if you chose this moment to lie.
I would think a man of your experience would know a lie when he hears one.
CCharkov
[beat] You will not meet or communicate with either one of them ever again. You will not communicate with anyone about Chernobyl ever again. You will remain so immaterial to the world around you that when you finally do die, it will be exceedingly hard to know that you ever lived at all. [starts to exit]
CCharkov
[turns back to face Legasov] Why worry about something that isn't going to happen?
[scoffs] "Why worry about something that isn't going to happen?" Oh, that's perfect. They should put that on our money.
[Ending scene: As Legasov is driven away from Chernobyl by the KGB, his voice on tape is heard]
To be a scientist is to be naive. We are so focused on our search for truth, we fail to consider how few actually want us to find it. But it is always there, whether we see it or not, whether we choose to or not. The truth doesn't care about our needs or wants. It doesn't care about our governments, our ideologies, our religions. It will lie in wait for all time. And this, at last, is the gift of Chernobyl. Where I once would fear the cost of truth, now I only ask: "What is the cost of lies?"
Valery Legasov took his own life at the age of 51 on April 26, 1988, exactly two years after the explosion at Chernobyl. The audio tapes of Legasov's memoirs were circulated among the Soviet scientific community. His suicide made it impossible for them to be ignored. In the aftermath of his death, Soviet officials finally acknowledged the design flaws of the RBMK nuclear reactors. Those reactors were immediately retrofitted to prevent an accident like Chernobyl from happening again.
Legasov was aided by dozens of scientists who worked tirelessly alongside him at Chernobyl. Some spoke out against the official account of events and were subject to denunciation, arrest and imprisonment. The character of Ulana Khomyuk was created to represent them all and to honor their dedication and service to truth and humanity.
Boris Shcherbina died on August 22, 1990, four years and four months after he was sent to Chernobyl.
For their roles in the Chernobyl disaster, Viktor Bryukhanov, Anatoly Dyatlov and Nikolai Fomin were sentenced to ten years hard labor. After his release, Nikolai Fomin returned to work...at a nuclear power plant in Kalinin, Russia. Anatoly Dyatlov died from radiation-related illness in 1995. He was 64.
Following the death of her husband and daughter, Lyudmilla Ignatenko suffered multiple strokes. Doctors told her she would never be able to bear a child. They were wrong. She lives with her son in Kiev.
Over 600,000 people were conscripted to serve in the Exclusion Zone. Despite widespread accounts of sickness and death as a result of radiation, the Soviet government kept no official records of their fate.
The contaminated region of Ukraine and Belarus, known as the Exclusion Zone, ultimately encompassed 2,600 square kilometers. Approximately 300,000 people were displaced from their homes. They were told this was temporary. It is still forbidden to return.
