Nuclear Accidents

The International Atomic Energy Agency defines a nuclear accident as an event that causes

significant environmental, social, or economic consequences. Radiation leaks or reactor

core melt could be lethal to an individual or release large amounts of radioactivity into the

environment. An example of a major nuclear accident is one in which a reactor core is

damaged, and significant amounts of radiation are released, such as in the Chernobyl Disaster

in 1986 and the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Disaster in 2011.

Serious radiation accidents include the Kyshtym disaster, Windscale fire, radiotherapy accident in Costa Rica, radiotherapy accident in Zaragoza, radiation accident in Morocco, Goiania accident, radiation accident in Mexico City, radiotherapy unit accident in Thailand, and the Mayapuri radiological accident in India.

Causes:

• A design fault in an RBMK reactor (a water-cooled reactor with individual fuel channels and using graphite as its moderator)
• A violation of procedures (Human error).
• Breakdown of communication
• Lack of a ‘Safety Culture’ in the power plant

Effects:

• The radioactive fallout may cause radioactive material to deposit itself over large areas of ground.
• The number of thyroid cancers has increased dramatically.
• It became apparent following Chernobyl that the real effects of nuclear accidents are not radiological but socioeconomic and psychological due to the misunderstanding about how radiation affects the human body.

A rise in alcoholism, depression, anxiety, bullying, and suicide has been largely attributed to the stigmatisation of both exposed and evacuated members of the public following the accidents. Some doctors in Europe suggested, “pregnant women to undergo unnecessary abortions on account of radiation exposure due to the Chernobyl accident, even though the radiation levels concerned were vastly below the levels to have any adverse health effects”.

• The worst contaminated areas may decline economically, socially and politically as the birth rate decreases and emigration numbers substantially rise, which could cause a shortage in the labour force in the affected area.

Studies undertaken by organisations like the World Health Organization have found that the radiation health impacts of nuclear accidents have been extremely minimal. The principal effects of nuclear accidents might have been greatly averted because they were psychological and socioeconomic issues brought on by misconceptions and anxieties about radiation, rather than radiation exposure.