HBO’s Chernobyl sensationalism
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HBO’s Chernobyl is great entertainment. So is The Simpsons. Sadly, the sensational way nuclear power is depicted in popular culture energizes the anti-science, anti-energy Left.
Nuclear energy is perhaps our best source of electricity. Nuclear also emits no CO2 (if that’s your thing).
Dr. Kelvin Kemm is an award-winning South African nuclear physicist. Check out his detailed review of HBO’s Chernobyl at CFACT.org:
As a nuclear scientist I can tell you that the fundamental story of the sequence of events during the portrayal of the Chernobyl accident were correct. Issues around governance and procedure as portrayed were essentially correct.
But the blood and skin peeling scenes were not. Sadly the producers lied – intentionally, to gain box office income. They succeeded in the income goal. But they insulted we nuclear scientists and insulted the intelligence of those viewers who knew a bit more science than most. They also led many other viewers down a twisted path to further ignorance and confusion, which certainly should not be the objective of a history documentary…
Human bodies do not become radioactive in a situation like that. What can happen is that someone, like a fireman, leaves the scene with radioactive dust on his clothes and maybe in his hair. Any radiation protection officer present would then make him take off all his clothes and take a good shower, before going home.
Firemen were not radioactively contagious, as portrayed by HBO. A fireman could not have irradiated his pregnant wife at home as HBO claimed. Her baby could not have died of heart and liver disease as a result. That is pure HBO bunk. Something like playing a tune on the aircraft fuselage in the Andes, using human bones as drumsticks. Very good for viewer horror, but very far from the truth.
Nuclear energy has a fantastic safety record and the latest designs could not be more impressive.
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