Interesting new paper on Chernobyl

[jimgraber]

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00295450.2017.1384269
According to this paper, two nuclear explosions and one steam explosion took place.

 

[Aufbauwerk 2045]

I saw an article just a few days ago about a radioactive cloud over Europe. I haven't had time to follow up.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo...ud-over-europe-hints-at-accident-farther-east

 

[Rive]

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00295450.2017.1384269
According to this paper, two nuclear explosions and one steam explosion took place.

A note from the paper:

This nuclear explosion concept must not be confused with a nuclear bomb as the two differ considerably in their principles of operation, neutronics, released energy, and temperatures involved.

Fighting over definitions. At least this paper seems to be honest since they include a short definition:

in this paper we reserve the word “surge” for the reactivity coefficient–driven energy generation across the full core and the phrase “nuclear explosion” for what is here suggested to be the positive scram–driven explosive energy generation in a number of close fuel channels.

Many papers I've seen so far about 'nuclear explosion' and 'Chernobyl' did not bother with such minor details as 'definitions'...

 

[etudiant]

A note from the paper:Fighting over definitions. At least this paper seems to be honest since they include a short definition:

Many papers I've seen so far about 'nuclear explosion' and 'Chernobyl' did not bother with such minor details as 'definitions'...

In fairness to the journalists, the idea that a reactor could surge in power output by orders of magnitude within fractions of a second was not well publicized. So calling it an explosion was not entirely wrong, it is just that we've been conditioned to think of nuclear explosions as nuclear bombs, even though the latter are quite different.