Chernobyl: What was the Vienna Conference?

Chernobyl, the entire series, is currently streaming on NOW TV. In episodes four and five, Ulhana Khomyuk (played by Emily Watson) encourages Valery Legasov (Jared Harris) to expose the Soviet Government’s nuclear secrets about previous power plant accidents in the Soviet Union. There had been a series of accidents in the USSR involving the same RMBK reactors like the one that exploded at Chernobyl. At Vienna, Legasov presented his findings into what caused the explosion but chose not to expose the truth about Soviet nuclear secrets.

What was the Vienna Conference?

In August 1986, Valery Legasov presented the Chernobyl report at the meeting of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna.

The conference was attended by more than 800 scientists and government officials who were experts in nuclear engird, radiation safety and health care.

The meeting was also attended by government representatives from Belarus, The Soviet Union and Ukraine.

The conference looked into the explosion at reactor number four a the Chernobyl Power Plant.

Also discussed were the scientific, medical, environmental and social consequences as a result of the explosion.

What did Valery Legasov’s report find?

Legasov’s report looks into the cause of the disaster and the aftermath of the explosion.

In his five-hour-long hearing, Legasov argued that disaster was caused by multiple factors including human error combined with poorly design reactors.

Overall, he stressed human error was the overriding cause.

A year later six men, including Anatoly Dyatlov (Paul Ritter), the deputy chief engineer and supervisor in charge, plant director Viktor P. Bryukhanov (Con O’Neill) and chief engineer Nikolai Fomin (Adrian Rawlins), were sentenced to 10 years in a labour camp for gross negligence.

Legasov reported that the Chernobyl plant was operated by untrained workers who carried out an unauthorised experimental safety test, supervised by deputy chief engineer Anatoly Dyatlov.

He noted that the RMBK reactors used at Chernobyl were faulty and dangerous, and actually banned outside the Soviet Union.

Across the Soviet Union, 16 RMBK reactors were still in operation.

In his report, Legasov wrote: “Neglect by the scientific management and the designers was everywhere with no attention being paid to the condition of instruments or of equipment.”

Legasov’s report contrasted greatly with the narrative of the Soviet Government, who had tried to downplay the scale of the disaster to the rest of the world.

As a result of Legasov’s determination to tell the truth, he was ridiculed by his scientist peers and rejected for Hero of Socialist Labor award, despite everybody else on the commissioner receiving the title.

Legasov took his own life on April 27, 1988, one day after the two-year anniversary of the nuclear power plant disaster.

He was 51-years-old at the time of his death.

Before his death, Legasov reportedly recorded several tapes revealing undisclosed information about the disaster, which was not revealed at the Vienna conference.

The Soviet Government’s censorship of the nuclear industry meant that the findings of their own criminal investigation were not revealed in full detail to the rest of the western world.

In the tapes, Legasov claimed that Soviet security prevented plant operators from knowing about previous accidents with RMBK reactors.

Legasov did not reveal these findings at the Vienna conference.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists argued that Legasov had become disillusioned with the failure of the Soviet government, to tell the truth about RMBK reactors.