Silent Nightmare

Part I of Essay
On the night of April 25,1986, what was later described by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D,Ver.), as "by far the worst nuclear reactor accident known to mankind... beyond even the worst nightmares of nuclear scientists," occurred in the Soviet Union. At first, the Soviets said n ....

Part II of Essay
.... too contaminated by radioactivity to be resettled in the foreseeable future; and that "the radiation released stretched world wide (1). We also know that the explosion and fire tore apart one of the reactors and that "31 people died" (2). However this figure conflicts with the April 29,1986 United Press International "unconfirmed" report that over 2000 people were killed by the Chernobyl nuclear reactor explosion (3). Looking back, we can see that as the story unfolded, international outrage grew over Soviet limitations on news of th ....