Chornobyl engineer says he stole fuel from Russian military to avoid release of radioactive substances
Ukrainian National Guardsmen guarding the station were taken prisoner.
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The Russians seized the Chornobyl nuclear power plant on the first day of the invasion of Ukraine. Engineers and technical staff were then allowed to continue working at the NPP. At the Chornobyl nuclear power plant told how they stole fuel from the Russian military to prevent a catastrophe, - writes the BBC.Ukraine.
Then Rosatom specialists arrived at the station. "They wanted to know how the facility was managed. They wanted information about all the procedures, documents and operations. I was scared because the interrogations were constant, sometimes by force," said Oleksandr Lobada, head of the station's radiation safety department.
"We had to constantly negotiate with them and try our best not to offend them so that they would allow our staff to manage the facility," said engineer Valeriy Semenov. When the station was without electricity for three days, Valeriy, he said, was trying to find fuel to support the generator - he even stole it from the Russian military.
"If we lost electricity, it could turn into a catastrophe. There could be a release of radioactive substances. The scale of this you can imagine. I was not afraid for my life. I was afraid of what would happen if I did not watch the station. I was afraid that there would be a tragedy for humanity," - Oleksandr said.
"We managed to maintain the security of the facility. But it is sad that they took away 169 of our military," Semenov added.
Soldiers of the National Guard of Ukraine taken out by the Russians from the Chornobyl nuclear power plant are starving and not given water.
Russian invaders, who had been at the Chornobyl nuclear power plant and in the exclusion zone for more than a month, fled the station when the first signs of radiation began to appear. Together with them, they captured Ukrainian National Guardsmen.
There are already the first victims among the Russian military because of the radiation sickness. According to the Russian Military Medical Service, the first death of the occupier in Chornobyl from radiation sickness was recorded. Another 26 people were hospitalized and 73 in critical condition were sent to hospitals for examination and treatment.
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