Frederik Pohl - Chernobyl

But Istvili, the Georgian from the Ministry of Nuclear Energy, took firm charge. For a man who'd been wakened at four in the morning and had been traveling ever since, he was surprisingly clear-eyed and collected. "We won't wait for the people coming from Kiev by car," he announced. "Our first order of business is a situation report. I understand the Chernobyl plant is now completely shut down."

"I gave the order for Reactors One and Two myself," nodded Varazin. "As a precaution. Of course, I consulted the load dispatchers in Kiev first."

"So that situation is stable," said Istvili. "Now we come to damage control."

"The fire was extinguished at eight minutes after three this morning," said the general of fire brigades.

Smin cut in. "Yes, but, excuse me, your firemen are still on the roof and the hoses are still going."

The general looked down his nose at him. "They are cooling the scene down and extinguishing small outbreaks."

"I don't think I am making myself clear. All that water from the hoses is contaminated with radioactivity. It must go somewhere, and wherever it goes it's dangerous."

"Radiation," said the general thoughtfully. "That's not our concern. Our business is fighting fires, and we put this one out in an hour and a half. Radiation is your business."

"It's the business of your firemen too! They're in great danger, out there without protective gear!"

Istvili raised a hand. "Please. Two issues have been raised now, contamination of water from the runoff from the fire and proper gear for the workers controlling the damage. When we have finished-What is it, Varazin?"

The Chief Engineer only wanted to announce, "There is some tea and mineral water coming in now. My wife is bringing it."

And his wife, with a young girl beside her, was hovering in the doorway, trays in their hands. "Thank you, Comrade Varazin," Istvili said dryly. "As I was about to say, when we have finished this preliminary conference, we will establish working groups to deal with each of these. First we have to deal with immediate problems. The graphite in the core is still burning."

Everyone turned to look at the fire commander. He looked annoyed. "That is a different question from the fire in the structure," he explained. "However, we are continuing to hose it. We have more pumpers coming, even a couple of water cannon; they should drown it, just as the British did at Windscale."

"No, no!" cried Smin, but the other man from the Ministry, Lestilyan, spoke ahead of him:

"That is unacceptable for the reasons Smin has given. Also, it probably will just fracture the graphite and expose more combustible surfaces to the air. We'll have to cover the core."

"What with?" the fireman demanded. "Foam's out of the question."

"Things much denser than foam. Sand, clay, even lead. Probably boron, too, because that swallows neutrons."

"And how are you going to get it on the core?" the fire commander asked sarcastically. "Do you want my men to carry it up there in hods, like bricklayers?"

Lestilyan said crisply, "Of course, we will need heavy earth-moving machinery. That, too, I think, should be referred to a working group?"

"Exactly," Istvili said promptly. "In fifteen minutes I will adjourn this meeting and we will start the work of the groups. Comrade Rasputin? Do you want to say anything about the casualties and risks?"

"All of the injured are being evacuated; the Pripyat hospital can't handle them all, so most of them are being sent elsewhere-"

The head of the hospital raised his hand. "The hospital itself should be evacuated, I think. And probably also the town itself."

"Of course," Smin put in. "As soon as possible."

One of the men from the Council of Ministers in Kiev stirred himself. "Why of course? The wind is blowing the smoke the other way, isn't it?"

"It could change at any moment."

"That's true," added Rasputin. "And rain would be a serious added problem; rain brings fallout. It was raining in Kiev earlier this morning."

"It isn't raining here. Evacuation would cause mass panic," the man from Kiev stated.

"Then at least the people should be informed," Smin said doggedly. The man frowned.

"That decision is not ours to take, Comrade Smin."

"But if we wait for Moscow to approve, it could be hours! At least, let us have an announcement on the Pripyat radio station," Smin urged.

Istvili took over command of the meeting. "We simply do not have enough information yet for public announcements to be made. When we have full facts to give them, yes. Then it will be authorized. For now that discussion is closed. Now let us turn to the cause of the accident."

There was one thing you could say for these high-powered people from the Ministry of Nuclear Energy, Smin thought to himself. At least they got things done. All three of the section chiefs had spoken quickly but unhurriedly; the meeting had been going less than seven minutes by Smin's watch. Against his will, Smin was beginning to respect, even almost to like them; it was hard for him to remember that these men were the "they" who had bombarded him every week with stern orders to hurry up, increase the proportion of working time, fulfill the Plan! Even the fourth man, the one no one had bothered to introduce, was appearing to be getting down to business. For the first part of the meeting he had been sitting quietly, smoking a cigarette and sipping his cup of tea as he gave each speaker polite but detached attention. But now that they had come to the question of the cause of the accident, he had taken out a pencil and was beginning to make notes.

"It appears," said Istvili, "that the accident occurred during the course of an unusual experiment, which involved shutting off some or all of the safety systems of Reactor Number Four. Is that correct?"

Chief Engineer Varazin set his cup down so hard he spilled some tea. "It was not an 'unusual' experiment. It was approved in advance in all particulars by the Ministry!"

"Not quite in all particulars, I think," said Istvili. "Not to take place at one o'clock in the morning. Not without a safety inspector present."

Varazin said obstinately, "There was no directive about the time or about safety inspectors."

"There was also no directive giving authority to dismantle the automatic systems, however," Istvili pointed out, and Smin sucked in a deep breath.

"Then it's true," he groaned. "Is it? The idiots turned everything off? My God, Varazin! How could you let them?"

Chief Engineer Varazin had never been a really close friend, but it was in that moment, Smin saw, that he had converted him into a irreconcilable enemy. The engineer kept his face straight, but muscles were jumping in his cheeks as he ground out, "At least I was there! And, if you are so wise, Deputy Director Smin, why weren't you yourself present?"

The whole meeting waited patiendy for Smin's answer. Why? Because the Chief Engineer should have been responsible? Because at last word the experiments had been postponed indefinitely? Because he had not for one second imagined such stupidity?

Smin shook his head, more to himself than to the men from the commission. "I agree that I should have been present," he said clearly, and watched the silent man from Moscow carefully writing his words down.

Saturday, April 26

Dean Garfield is thirty-four years old and he really is a highly successful television producer in America. The reason for that, perhaps, is that his father's money from the jewelry-findings business had paid for four years and a subsequent master's degree from the University of Southern California at just the right time, in the early 1970s. Just then a lot of bright young college boys were getting ready to be the film and TV geniuses of the later 1970s, and they remembered their classmates when they got big. A consequence of that, perhaps, is his wife. Candace Garfield-her professional name is Candace Merlyn-was the star of Garfield's first sitcom. Unfortunately the show failed to get past the eight-week cutoff, and Candace had been looking for another series ever since. She is very happy about Garfield's present success with his all-black series, which has just been picked up for a third year, except that there are no ongoing parts in it for tall, beautiful blondes. She is confident, however, that she could play a tall, beautiful, blonde Soviet nuclear engineer -or Soviet almost anything-in a new series, and she has been developing this idea for Garfield since breakfast.