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Comment by tomswartz07 | Hacker News Reader

To further point out, the test that caused the incident was not a 'routine test'. They had purposely disabled a large number of safety catches in order to perform a risky and ill-advised test.

The aim of this test was to determine whether cooling of the core could continue to be ensured in the event of a loss of power.

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Far too often I see the test described only superficially or with the misleading political euphemism of "routine test". As you mentioned, it was a test of of the cooling system in the even of a power loss, but even that description softens just how insane the test was. I recommend this[1] description of the events that lead to the test and what happened during the test itself.

[1] https://leatherbarrowa.exposure.co/chernobyl#photo-group-938... (if the #photo-group-93861 doesn't work, see the heading "The Accident To End All Accidents")

Thanks for posting that link. I was familiar with the general outlines of the test and how it went wrong, but I had no idea it was a standard test that had been falsely signed off during the initial commissioning. Just makes it even crazier.

It is sad how the loss of face and position was used as a cudgel to push ahead against protocol and notions of safety in what was supposed to be a workers republic.

Makes one wonder if the systems where more alike than different...

Question answered successfully, I suppose.

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