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Watch Chernobyl Inside The Meltdown () free Season 1 Episode 4 online in HD on Dailymotion (2026).
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00:13I was the first Western scientist invited to do scientific research with the Complex Expedition.
00:22A small group of scientists who worked on forensic analysis of the remains of the destroyed reactor, Unit 4.
00:34The Soviet Union was collapsing.
00:38They took me to the plant kind of undercover.
00:42They dressed me up in workers' clothing and just under the radar.
00:52I thought it was just, hey, let's take this American along kind of thing.
00:55But no, it was get up, work until you drop.
01:00Pretty much every day.
01:03People sometimes laugh at scientists, but that's because they don't understand the sheer beauty of seeking the truth.
01:11And that's what these people wanted.
01:38This is where officials say a crime was committed.
01:44It's here that engineers conducted the experiment that led to the explosion.
01:52The destroyed reactor is still hot, buried deep within what the Soviets call a sarcophagus,
01:58a gigantic concrete tomb where the radioactive material will be buried for centuries to come.
02:22The structure of the sarcophagus was really a combination of improvisation and brute force.
02:31When it was complete, the Soviet engineers said that the sarcophagus was another triumph of Soviet engineering.
02:40But inside the ruins of the reactor building, around 190 tons of uranium fuel remained unaccounted for.
02:51The scientists were worried about what's called a critical mass coming together and restarting a nuclear reaction.
02:59They noticed on their neutron detectors a spike of neutrons that led them to believe that a critical mass had
03:08indeed formed and that a nuclear reaction had happened.
03:14They were puzzled.
03:15They were puzzled.
03:17So, we got to know where this fuel is.
03:23Scientists from the Kirchatov Institute, the Soviet Union's chief research and development agency for nuclear energy,
03:31launched what became known as the Chernobyl Complex Expedition to locate the fuel.
03:44It was this eclectic, almost ragtag group of scientists.
03:53They were soft-spoken people, just trying to get to the bottom of things.
04:02They were soft-spoken people, just trying to get to the bottom of things.
04:11It turned out to be used, but I don't know how it's called all the devices.
04:16So, they gotinental samples, which said that all actors took them to work out and transferred their lives…
04:36…when they worked out, they looked too fast.
04:39Everything is coated with varying degrees of contamination.
04:45I mean, you don't want to stay in there.
05:10I'm sorry, I'm a little dead.
05:26Some of the fuel had been thrown out of the reactor core by the explosion.
05:31But it was assumed that the rest remained inside reactor number four.
05:50The rest of the reactor was made.
05:51I told the manager,
05:51all right, you're going to go to the block with us.
05:55We're going to mount the car for video cameras,
05:59to launch the reactor reactor.
06:04It was made like a stone stone,
06:06so that we could be able to do it.
06:09And there was water there,
06:11there were stills in the reactor reactor.
06:14Well, it was active.
06:15It was active, so it was.
06:17It was like...
06:19And there was a lot of water,
06:20and there was a lot of water,
06:21but I went forward.
06:26It was like,
06:28it was heated.
06:32It was not a good thing.
06:34Yeah.
06:52Nobody had been inside the reactor vessel.
06:55Anybody who went in there would have been exposed to very high fields of radiation.
07:02They told me that under my legs there were 200 rongens.
07:06I thought that was a lot.
07:09Three hours is a single dose, if it's possible.
07:18We took the camera to the reactor.
07:26It didn't go.
07:28It was somewhere.
07:32I went to the reactor.
07:38I changed the camera.
07:49We found an interesting thing.
07:56That's when they noticed what core.
08:00There was no core.
08:03There was nothing left inside the reactor.
08:10And so the immediate question was, where the hell did the fuel go?
08:20To help them locate the fuel, they would strap cameras to toy tanks.
08:29Because they were the ones that could withstand the radiation in there, other more sophisticated robots failed.
08:42They would have aerosol and air current detection methods.
08:49And that's when the bigger picture started to emerge.
08:54What happened was the core itself, the fuel and the graphite, basically were percolating through the floor of the reactor
09:03cavity.
09:05The fuel melted through and fell down onto the floor of the sub-reactor region.
09:13There were holes that led to what are called steam distribution headers.
09:18It flowed out the steam distribution headers and then two more floors down pipes into the water that was there.
09:34Roughly 75% of the fuel ended up in the lower regions of the reactor building.
09:43They thought that they could have a critical mass coming together to restart reactions.
09:51So you have these great energies released, which would cause damage.
09:57Thank God that never happened.
10:01We later found out, once the fuel broke through and spread out, it basically shut itself down.
10:07Right? It just froze in place. And you can see that to this day.
10:18If you're going to be working in the kind of environment that the complex expedition was,
10:26you really have to be dedicated.
10:29Dedicated to getting to the truth.
10:51A year after the accident, it had become clear that the Soviet authorities intended to lay the blame
10:56for what had happened almost entirely at the feet of the operators.
11:06In a makeshift courtroom in a building in the centre of Chernobyl,
11:10six men went on trial today charged with safety violations that caused history's worst nuclear accident.
11:16The defendants face up to 12 years in jail if they are convicted.
11:23The courtroom was packed with workers from the power plant and families of the victims.
11:29The defendants are accused of allowing unauthorised experiments at the plant,
11:34ignoring basic operating procedures and overriding safety systems.
11:39The judge made it clear that he wasn't going to listen to anything
11:42that contradicted the official version of events.
11:45It was effectively one of the final show trials of the Soviet East.
12:09A chapter ended today in history's worst nuclear accident in Chernobyl in the Soviet Union.
12:15Six Russian nuclear power plant officials, who flouted safety regulations,
12:19were held criminally responsible for the deaths of 36 people.
12:23They had to have a scapegoat, and that became the operators.
12:27The verdict was all six guilty of varying degrees of criminal negligence.
12:33Victor Brukhanov, the former plant director,
12:36ten years in a labor camp for gross violations of safety rules,
12:40including a concurrent five-year sentence for abuse of power.
13:02The trial has been closed to foreign journalists, and no detailed reports have appeared in Soviet media,
13:08so it's not known whether or how the accused defended themselves.
13:13On the opening day, one of the defendants suggested some of the blame lay with the reactor design,
13:19but that's the only thing that's been said publicly in their defense.
13:25You called the police.
13:27You called me as a witnesses.
13:28I did not understand if I was a witness of safety or did I
13:32свидetElem with the prosecution, do not know.
13:37And I asked some questions about the equipment, I was not aware.
13:44And they did change all the time.
13:46I went to the police, i was in a car,olyn車,
14:10After leaving Chernobyl, Steinberg eventually became part of an independent commission that
14:17reopened the investigation into what had happened at Chernobyl.
14:51Data about the performance of the reactor during the accident was being recorded.
14:58But in the immediate aftermath, all the documentation and data from the plan was seized and returned
15:05to Moscow and classified.
15:54The KGB classified the real reasons for the causes of the Chernobyl accident.
16:00Any dissent from the official line that the operators were responsible was essentially
16:07forbidden.
16:17So, through the Supreme Court, the jurors said that all the affairs were in the court,
16:26which was conducted in the court.
16:27Who conducted the court?
16:29The court.
16:30I met him in the court, I met him with the president of the court, and he gave me the
16:37chance to open this room.
16:42We found out the documents that we needed.
16:46We, step by step, worked for about 1,5 years.
16:55We found out the documents that were in Vassalagraga.
17:00They pushed these documents in 6 seconds.
17:10This allowed them to say that the personnel is wrong, that he has violated the regime.
17:19That is, they falsified it.
17:22Yes.
17:42The findings of Steinberg and the rest of the investigators finally brought to line the true causes of the disaster.
18:09The new information tended to shift the focus of responsibility from operator actions to
18:18fundamental design flaws in the reactor itself the Chernobyl power station used
18:26RBMK type reactors that was uniquely Soviet technology there was nothing like
18:32that produced in the West
18:38RBMK type reactors are very large reactors that is large physically a core
18:44that was 14 meters in diameter and seven meters high this is extremely large compared to reactors
18:53in the West which have a diameter of maybe three or four meters the RV and K reactors had nearly
19:011700 fuel channels that contain the uranium fuel that produces heat that's used to boil water to
19:10make steam to make electricity this core is so large it's almost like having two reactors in
19:17one one at the top and one at the bottom one side of the reactor couldn't speak to the other
19:23side of
19:24the reactor so it forced the operators to keep careful watch over this but so more like a list of
19:36parameters the only way that the operators can control the reactor is with control rods
19:58insertion of the control rods tends to decrease the reactor power
20:15the control rods are used by the operators to fine-tune the level of the chain reaction taking place
20:25so it's really like having brakes and accelerator on a car
20:39the control rods are also used to shut down the RBMK reactor
20:46the emergency shutdown function on the RBMK also called the AZ-5 about Soviet terminology was to shut
20:53the reactor down quickly in an emergency the AZ-5 system was designed to insert almost all of the
21:00remaining control rods into the core at the same time and it was intended simply to bring the reactor
21:08into a safely shut down state during tests in 1983 nuclear engineers at another RBMK plant in Ignolina had discovered
21:28that there was a disturbing anomaly about the way the AZ-5 system worked with a very low number of
21:37control rods inserted into the core of the reactor
21:39when the emergency shutdown system was activated it could induce a runaway reaction leading to a meltdown and an explosion
21:49of the core
22:11they began to make progress on modifying the emergency shutdown system and although the Chernobyl
22:20level 4 unit was on the list as due for those modifications they decided that they would just save it
22:28until the next scheduled maintenance shutdown to make the fixes
22:33information about this fault did not make its way down to the level of the individual operators
22:56the operators were attempting a experiment to power the reactor when the off-site power had been lost
23:07the midnight shift came in and they were told that they would conduct the experiment they were
23:15not expecting to do this they had not been familiarized with the test protocol
23:26the operators had great difficulty in bringing reactor up to a power level that would make the test possible
23:36they had withdrawn an equivalent of 203 of the 211 control rods from the core of reactor number 4
23:46making the reactor as unstable as it was possible to be and very sensitive to any further changes in control
24:02by the time the test actually began the reactor was like a loaded gun just waiting for someone to pull
24:08the trigger
24:21in the test protocol the completion of the test was marked by the operators pressing the az5 button to release
24:30the control rods to shut the reactor down
24:33they press the az5 button at 1 23 am
25:24it was a design flaw of the control rods that ultimately caused the explosion
25:32the control rods are made of boron which is a material that reduces the reaction rate in the reactor
25:39unlike most reactors underneath those rods was sections of graphite which tend to increase the reaction rate
25:48if the rods were completely withdrawn then this graphite was pulled into the core
25:57under normal circumstances this graphite would never cause a problem
26:03but in this case the core was already in such an unstable state
26:07the slightest additional power fluctuation could initiate a runaway chain reaction
26:17the az5 button that was pushed by the operators inserted all the control rods at once
26:24the problem was the graphite caused the power to increase at the bottom of the reactor
26:31power is shutting down at the top but you had a power surge at the bottom
26:36the overall effect was disastrous
26:58it literally caused the reactor to explode hence the building being destroyed
27:11it was as if when you stamped on the brakes of a speeding car it accelerated instead of slowing down
27:18the soviet version of events was that the accident began to occur and then in a panic
27:24the operators pressed the az5 button in order to try and shut down the reactor
27:30so ép – no unclear
27:33and thenknollstep the carers
27:48it was 질 are still illegal
27:49it is wounds
27:51really fine
27:51it isn't oak of or anything
27:52it proved itself to be a disaster
27:56then there were no illusions of anhoe
27:58which was척 in the prevented
27:59we told it
28:06правда хорошо но те кто ответственен за это они не понесли никакого то есть никакой никакого
28:16наказания
28:19сидели другие которые были невиновны
28:25январь
28:26почему он взорвался
28:32the operators in uniform in the night of the accident not know the potential consequences of triggering the
28:38emergency shutdown system the soviets believed that their system was so superior that no mistake could
28:48ever be made that their technology was beyond reproach
28:54the reactor had been designed by people at the pinnacle of the soviet scientific state
29:03so if it came to a choice between making these people culpable for this catastrophe
29:09and laying the blame at the feet of some lowly reactor operators in ukraine
29:15then they were going to be the ones who took the fall
29:23the design flaws set them up for failure
29:27when the perfect storm of the circumstances the actions
29:30and the design problems came together it was almost inevitable
29:39the nature of the soviet system was such that denial secrecy and cover-up was endemic to the way of
29:47their operation
29:51the truth is chernobyl is more of a metaphor for the failure of the soviet system than it is a
29:58reactor safety story
30:02the increasing reporting about what had really happened and information about the failures of the design of the reactor
30:13finally revealed to citizens of the ussr that the soviet union did not in fact lead the world in high
30:21technology
30:22the dramatic failures of the chernobyl accident undermined one of the last sources of soviet pride
30:30foreign
30:31We are here today, as you are.
30:33There will be and there will be.
30:37The great pain of our nation is Chernobyl.
30:40But not the most important thing.
30:42Because until we don't have our real state,
30:46Chernobyl will be, there will be and there will be.
30:49Until we don't have our own state...
31:06Good evening. Eleven Soviet republics agreed to form a new commonwealth of independent states today
31:12and consigned the Soviet Union to history.
31:21The Soviet Union saw itself as a great empire.
31:24And in one day, that all came crashing down.
31:28With eleven signatures and a round of applause, the Soviet Union had ceased to exist.
31:39There was chaos. People lost their jobs, they didn't have any food.
31:44It was deeply humiliating for many Russians, for millions of Russians.
31:48We have really encountered such a dangerous force,
31:53which is the nuclear energy that was released from control.
31:58Gorbachev said he thought the Chernobyl accident was the ultimate cause of the collapse of the Soviet Union.
32:06Because huge numbers of people, especially in Ukraine,
32:12began to realize the Communist Party protected itself.
32:16It didn't protect us.
32:42The Soviet Union's initial attempt to try to cover over the destroyed reactor building
32:47was a hastily engineered structure that they built in the summer of 1986.
32:53It was leaky. It was not as structurally strong as it could have been.
32:59It's way beyond its design life.
33:02It's crumbling.
33:03We've already had a collapse from one part of the turbine hall with a very heavy snow load.
33:07We see some very, very major structural damage there.
33:13If it had collapsed, it could have stirred up some of the radioactive debris
33:16and caused additional release of some of the radioactive material that was within it.
33:23Because of these concerns, Ukraine and Western donors got together
33:27and created a structure to cover over the entire building,
33:30a very large structure called the New Safe Confinement.
33:40Construction began on the New Safe Confinement in 2010.
33:48A massive international effort.
33:50Something like 40 countries and organizations
33:53played a role in funding and designing that structure.
33:58It was hugely expensive as well, the best part of $2 billion.
34:04This is actually one of the most ambitious projects in the history of engineering.
34:08It is twice the length of a 747 aeroplane.
34:11It is the largest moveable land-based structure ever built.
34:18The New Safe Confinement was actually built to be mobile
34:22and was built off to the side of the reactor
34:24and moved on rails over the original building.
34:30Over these nocks, we put the Teflon pad.
34:34And basically, if you put a lot of them, you make your own sliding way
34:38for the skid shoes to slide on.
34:50Construction on the New Safe Confinement was a long and arduous process.
34:55And it ended six years later in 2016.
35:03It's a big state for safety.
35:06And Ukraine and Europe will be much safer now.
35:12Ukraine, unlike the Soviet Union,
35:14very much wants to be part of the international community
35:17and not an insular state.
35:26I was standing on a roof doing a live shot on CNN.
35:30Ukrainians who resist...
35:32Oh! I tell you what, I just heard a big bang right here behind me.
35:37I thought we shouldn't have done a live shot here.
35:40It was quite shocking that Russia had decided
35:43to send its forces into Kiev, into Ukraine.
35:48And the first explosions of that conflict were being heard.
35:51Russian forces are said to have taken control
35:54of the Chernobyl power plant in northern Ukraine,
35:57the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster.
35:59Military adviser says staff members are held hostage.
36:02There's a potentially dangerous military confrontation
36:06around that nuclear reactor.
36:08That could kick up all sorts of horrific radioactive material
36:13and cause that massive catastrophe
36:15to repeat itself all over again.
36:18The Russian soldiers ploughed across the exclusion zone.
36:25They dug trenches in the forest,
36:28which is an extraordinary thing to do.
36:30The amount of contamination absorbed by those soldiers
36:34is pretty shocking.
36:37They will undoubtedly suffer health consequences
36:41of exactly the same kind that was suffered in Ukraine
36:44post the 1986 calamity at Chernobyl.
36:48The Soviet Kremlin had an utter disregard
36:51for the liquidators, for the firefighters of Chernobyl.
36:55In the same way the Russian Kremlin
36:58had an apparent disregard for the welfare of the soldiers.
37:05Shortly afterwards the Ukrainians took back
37:08the Chernobyl exclusion zone.
37:13The Russians found they had to fight for every square inch
37:16of the territory they were going to capture.
37:32You're looking at footage that shows a Russian drone
37:35with a high-explosive warhead striking the shelter
37:40that covers the fourth unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant,
37:44sparking a fire that was later contained.
37:49Are you kidding?
37:52Lobbing a missile into Chernobyl?
37:56What possessed you to do that?
38:08The strike on the new safe confinement structure
38:12underlines the nuclear threat throughout the whole Ukraine conflict.
38:18That it could cause another Chernobyl.
38:21Another nuclear disaster.
38:24Another nuclear disaster.
38:25And that would be catastrophic.
38:28That would be catastrophic.
38:55And this would be catastrophic.
39:00When we left Chernobyl, I was a child, but I was put in a situation that not even some
39:07adults can live through.
39:10It feels that the situation repeats itself, that we again are forced to leave our home.
39:18When the Russians started the invasion in 2022, we left Ukraine and moved to Luxembourg
39:27and now they are here.
39:33I hoped better for my kids, but it didn't happen.
39:40I always teach my children to be adaptable and be resilient.
39:48And Ukrainians are proved to be resilient.
39:55What can we learn about the history of Chernobyl?
39:57What can we learn about the history of the war?
39:59What can we learn about the history of Chernobyl?
40:05Every one of these terrible actions brought to people a lesson of the consequences of
40:13the wrong actions.
40:17And so, and so, it's a huge shame, a huge shame and a huge threat for every nation.
40:36I think that this war has affected psychologically on everyone.
41:05I think the legacy of Chernobyl, 40 years on, isn't just a war, it's a war, it's a war, it's
41:10a war.
41:10Not just in the minds of people, the scars are physical as well.
41:16These radioactive toxins caused a huge spike in thyroid cancer.
41:21And you can go to Ukraine today and you can see people who were around in 1986 when the
41:26catastrophe happened.
41:31They've got little scars on their necks where they've had operation on their thyroid glands
41:34to take out parts of the thyroid because they've become cancerous.
41:39I remember quite often I would hear that that person died, friend or neighbor or colleague, just
41:48young people.
41:50It was radiation, but doctors would not mention that, so it was silent war.
42:03What to take from the story of Chernobyl?
42:08Oh, that's a hard one, what would I say?
42:14To maintain open societies that can provide checks and balances to the pride that comes
42:26with having huge, complex technologies.
42:32If I were to give a lesson for my grandchildren, tell the truth, no matter how bad the situation
42:39is, it can only be made worse by lying and being untruthful.
42:48I think that the Chernobyl story is arguably more relevant than ever.
42:53given that the causes of the accident lie in a government and a society that had completely
43:02lost touch with what the truth really was.
43:32One of the things that I think we all learned,
43:35is when the regime is serving itself rather than the people, that's when power evaporates.
43:45That's the moral binder, the truth.
44:00that mind you, it's with character.
44:02Oh, and anyway.
44:02I just, I, I, I, you, I love language.
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