After we finished in the substation, it was time to head to control room 4, the room where it all happened. We continue walking down the golden mile through more full body scanners for radiation and move into rougher hallways, hallways that run along the original sarcophagus.
We enter through a small door, and we are in the room, we are in control room 4. Taking it in is something else. The complete struggle started here. We are shown the button, A3(Z in the Russian alphabet)-5 the SCRAM button for emergency shut down. The room isn’t too high on radiation but there are strict time limits and we only spend 10ish minutes inside. We are only 15 meters away from the elephant’s foot. 15 meters! Wild.
-
- Welcome to control room 4
-
- Inside the computer panels
-
- This is the location of the original SCRAM button
On our way out we walk past a memorial to the first person who died during the explosion and continue through more hallways through the pump rooms for reactor #3 these setups are huge, have redundancies and can obviously move some serious amounts of water. These next rooms are very dark and taking photos is quite tough, as I didn’t want to take in my big camera. So just cell phone photos for here.
-
- The no no door, that goes into the original sarcophagus
-
- Pump room
-
- Hallway next to pump room
After the pump room, we walk into a massive hall, Reactor room 3. We stand on the reactor, and even at one point with another guy lift up a little box to see if the readings changed, which they did so we put the cover back on. It didn’t go up much, so still in the safe zone. There is a huge crane here for lifting the rods out and swapping them. Asareh finds a phone and tests it, currently disconnected.
-
- The coloured ones are for sensors
-
- Put that back pretty quick
-
- The crane
-
- In the crane
-
- I’m guessing for picking up fuel rods?
-
- Calming
-
- Testing 1,2,3
Our final stop will be the control room 3, which is in excellent condition, still has power and is still connected to the power plant, as we found out when we pressed a button, which then caused a lady to talk in and give us the mom talk. Apparently, they had it hooked up for power for filming, so while normally you can press buttons, right now, not the best move. Even our guide didn’t know and he works there. Very cool to see it all hooked up and working.
-
- Control room 3
-
- Depth indicators
-
- I was a shoe-in for this job
-
- The button, Well it has been changed to a switch to avoid incident.
And that’s a wrap for this bit of our trip, hope you enjoyed it.
Final scan for exit
It took months, but I finally received my results, that was the dose from 3-4 hours inside the plant.
We find ourselves back in Kyiv that night to see them practicing for the Independence Day celebrations coming in a few days’ time, a drink ends out night.
