Original subtitles

I hear they might promote Grukhanov.

This little problem we have with the safety test, if it's completed

successfully... Yes, I think promotion's very likely.

Who knows? Maybe Moscow.

Naturally, they'll put me in charge once he's gone, and then I'll need someone

to take my old job.

I could pitch Sidnikov.

I would like to be considered.

I'll keep that in mind.

Preparations for the test have gone smoothly.

Comrade Dyatlov's been working per my instructions, and reactor core output's

been reduced to 1 ,600 megawatts.

With your approval, we're ready to continue lowering power to... You have

wait.

It, uh...

Are you going to ask me if there's a problem, Nikolai?

You can't read a fucking face.

Three years. I've tried to finish this test. Three years.

I've just had a call from the grid controller in Kiev. He says we can't

power any further, not for another ten hours.

The grid controller?

Where does he get off television? Not the grid controller's decision, the ad

love.

It's the end of the month.

All the productivity quotas.

Everyone's working overtime. The factories need power. Someone's pushing

from a puff. Not that we'll ever know who.

So, do we have to scrap it or what?

No, I don't think so.

If we need to wait ten hours, we wait.

I'm running out of power. We're not going to have stability issues.

No, I should think... I'm not asking you.

It's safe.

We'll maintain at 1600.

I'll go home, get some sleep, come back tonight.

We'll proceed then.

I'll personally supervise the test.

And it will be completed.

Well, I'm not waiting around.

Call me when it's done.

How do you feel?

You went to the doctor yesterday. How is your health?

You don't know?

From Vienna.

Do you read German?

It says, at last, a Soviet scientist who tells the truth.

Obviously, I resent the insinuation, but I think it's fair to say you made an

excellent impression at the conference.

Turns out you're quite good at this.

At what?

Nine.

Statecraft, Vigasov.

Statecraft. The West is now satisfied that Chernobyl was solely the result of

operator error, which it essentially was.

We have you to thank for that, and we intend to.

Error of the Soviet Union.

Our highest honor.

They haven't even given it to me.

Promotion to director of the Kerchatov Institute.

I'm humbled.

I don't think there's anything humble about you, Valeri Alexeevich.

These rewards are not yours yet.

First, your testimony at the trial.

Comrade Tarkov, I understand my duty to the state.

You gave us assurances.

The reactors would be made safe.

It's been months.

No changes have been made, no changes even discussed. First, the trial.

Once it's over, we will have our villains, we will have our hero, we will

our truth.

After that, we can deal with our reactors.

Did you take a train?

Yes, I took a train.

Now let's talk about Vienna.

I'm not here to scold you.

I know how the world works, despite what Shevina says.

So, why are you here?

Because I'm brutally stubborn, which you were hoping for.

Charkov is saying they're going to fix the reactors after the trial.

Do you believe him?

The state will never willingly fix the reactors because acknowledging the

problem means admitting that they lied. They will have to be forwarded.

At the trial, you're going to tell the truth.

You're going to convince the jury.

If it's a true trial, the jury's already been handed their verdict. I'm not

talking about them.

The Central Committee have invited members of the scientific community to

observe the trial.

Our colleagues from Kachatov, from Sredmash, from Mininago.

They will be sitting in the crowd listening to every word you say. A jury

only we know is there.

And when your testimony arrives at the moment of the explosion, that is when

jury will finally hear the truth.

And do what with it?

Insist on reform.

Not just for the RBMK, but the entire industry.

No, no, no. They can't function without us. If we... Do you know what happened

to Volkov, the man whose report you found?

They just removed him from his position at the Institute.

That. for the crime of knowing.

And you think that these scientists, hand -picked to witness a show trial,

somehow be stirred into action by me because of some heroic stance I take in

defiance of the state?

Yes.

Why? Because you're Valery Legatov and you mean something.

I'd like to think that if I spoke out it would be enough.

But I know how the world works.

You told me to find out what happened. I spoke to dozens of people.

Every word they said, I wrote down.

All illegal.

These are the ones who are still alive. These are the ones who are dead. They

died rescuing each other, putting out fires, tending to the wounded. They

hesitate. They didn't waver. They simply did what had to be done.

So have I.

So have I.

to an open reactor.

So I've already given my life.

Isn't that enough?

No, I'm sorry, but it is not.

The Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the

Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR has determined that justice be

carried out on behalf of the people in accordance with the general goal of our

party, as determined by its 20th, 21st, and 22nd Congresses, which is a Leninist

goal. It was, is, and will be the only immutable goal in the Soviet state.

The path of Leninist principles shall be consistently and undeviatingly followed

as it expresses the vital interests of the Soviet people.

its hopes and aspirations as we guide the life of the party and state.

This session of court is now open. Comrade Judge Milan Kadnikov presiding.

Indictments. Victor Brukhanov, Anatoly Dyatlov, Nikolai Samin

are accused of violating Article 220, Section 2 of the Criminal Code of the

Soviet Union, resulting in a nuclear disaster on April 26, 1986.

The state calls witnesses Comrade Chamyuk of the Belarusian Nuclear

Comrade Legatov of the Kachatov Institute of Atomic Energy, and Comrade

Yevdokimovich Shevbina, Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers and Head of

the Bureau for Fuel and Energy.

It began with, of all things, the safety test.

Why was there need for a safety test at all?

Reactor number four was not new when the accident occurred.

In fact, it went into operation on December 20th, 1983.

And 11 days later, on the last day of the year,

plant director Viktor Bryukhanov signed this document, certifying...

the completion of the construction of the reactor.

As a result of finishing the work before the end of the year,

Comrade Brukhanov was awarded Hero of Socialist Labor.

Comrade Fomin was awarded for Valorous Labor.

Comrade Dyatlov was given an Order of the Red Banner.

But the work was not finished.

This document was a lie.

In order to sign this certificate, all safety tests had to have been

successfully completed, and yet one remained.

A nuclear reactor generates heat in the core here.

A series of pumps here and here send a constant flow of cooling water through

the core.

The core's heat turns the water to steam, and the steam spins the turbine

and the result is electricity.

But what if a power plant has no power?

What if the power feeding the plant itself is disrupted?

A blackout, equipment failure, or an attack by a foreign enemy?

If there's no power, the pumps cannot move water through the core, and without

water, the core overheats.

The fuel melts down, is short, a nuclear disaster.

The solution, three diesel fuel backup generators here.

So, problem solved.

Now, Brichano knew that the problem was not solved at all.

The backup generators took approximately one minute to reach the speed required

to power the pumps and prevent a meltdown.

And by that time, it would be too late.

So we arrived at the safety test.

The theory was this.

If the facility lost power, the turbine, which had been spinning, would take

some time to slow down and stop.

What if you could take the electricity it was still generating and transfer it

to the pumps? What if the dying turbine could keep the pumps working long enough

to bridge the 60 -second gap until the generators came on?

Any questions?

No.

Continue, please.

To test this theory, the reactor is placed in a reduced power mode, 700

megawatts, to simulate a blackout condition.

Then the turbines are turned off, and as they slowly spin down, their electrical

output is measured to see if it's enough to power the pumps.

The science is strong.

But a test is only as good as the men carrying it out.

The first time they tried, they failed.

The second time they tried, they failed.

The third time they tried, they failed.

The fourth time they tried was April 26, 1986.

Comrade Hamyuk.

To understand what happened that night, we have

to go back ten hours earlier.

April 25th, the day the test was meant to take place.

By 2 in the afternoon, the reactor had been lowered by half from its normal

output level of 3 ,200 megawatts to 1 ,600 megawatts and is stable and ready

be reduced to its final output level for the test, 700 megawatts.

But before they can proceed, there is a phone call.

Power grid officials in Kiev say that they cannot afford a further reduction

electricity until after midnight.

They are asking for a 10 -hour delay.

This is the first critical moment, the first link in the chain of disaster.

Competent management would have insisted on cancelling the test.

These three men allowed it to proceed.

Why was this delay so dangerous?

It created two problems.

One of them is scientific in nature, and the other is very human.

This is the one we will consider first.

At midnight, there is a shift change.

Look at it. Find another fool.

Stopped enough.

Want to buy a motorcycle?

Stopped enough.

That's it, the little boy. He's got more hair on his face than on his balls.

Yeah, that was on his lip.

Leonid Fedorovich,

the chemo specialist will come to the control room as soon as you can.

Are you already here?

Came in early.

Something about a tap.

Sasha. You know the test they're supposed to run?

The turbine run -down, they tried it last year.

They couldn't do it on the day shift, so they've given it to us.

To us?

We don't know what... We don't know what it is.

It's fine.

We take it down to 700, hold it there, rest of the study at your concussion

bound, but... You know, love is going to be supervising.

I have to do something I've never done before with Dyatlov looking over my

shoulder. Oh, don't worry.

We'll do it together.

I'm clicking the instructions now.

Are we supposed to do those or not?

Yes, this is Akimov from 4.

I have the manual for the run -down test.

You did it last year, aren't you?

Yes, in the program there's instructions of what to do and then there's a lot of

things crossed out. What should I... What should I...

Are you sure?

Right.

Thank you.

He says to follow the crossed out instructions.

Then why are they crossed out?

I've been cleared to run the test.

1 ,600. Good.

Is it too much to ask that you all know what you're doing?

Well, yes.

Absolutely.

Delia Chook?

Yes. Kirsten Baum?

I haven't reviewed. We only just found out. There.

Review it.

Or you can just do what I tell you.

Being even you, stupid as you are, can manage that.

Well, let's go.

Switch the turbine off while the reactor's still running.

Is this not good? Shut the fuck up and do your job.

Topton off.

Reduce power to 700.

I've never done this with the power so low before. It's okay, I'm with you.

Reducing power to 700.

I want you to think of Yuri Gagarin.

I want you to imagine that he has been told nothing of his mission into space

until the moment that he is on the launch pad.

I want you to imagine that all he has is a list of instructions that he has

never seen before, some of which have been crossed out.

This is exactly what was happening in the control room of Reactor 4.

The night shift had not been trained to perform the experiment. They hadn't even

been warned it was happening.

Leonid Toktunov, the operator responsible for controlling...

and stabilizing the reactor that night.

All of 25 years old.

And his total experience on the job?

Four months.

This is the human problem created by the delay.

But inside the reactor core, in the space between the atoms themselves,

something far more dangerous is forming.

A poison.

The time is 28 past midnight.

Comrade Legasov.

I'm pleased to see some of my colleagues here from the Kurchatov Institute and

Menenegro.

But you don't need to be a nuclear scientist to understand what happened at

Chernobyl.

You only need to know this.

There are essentially two things that happen inside a nuclear reactor.

The reactivity which generates power either goes up or it goes down.

That's it.

All the operators do is maintain balance.

Uranium fuel.

As uranium atoms split apart and collide, reactivity goes up. But if you

balance the reactivity, it never stops rising.

So, boron control rods.

They reduce reactivity like brakes on a car.

But there's a third factor to consider, water.

Cool water takes heat out of the system. As it does, it turns to steam or what

we call a void.

In an RBMK reactor of the type used at Chernobyl, there's something called a

positive void coefficient.

What does that mean?

It means that the more steam present within the system, the higher the

reactivity. which means more heat, which means more steam, which means, it would

appear we have a vicious cycle on our hands.

And we would, were it not for this.

And we would, were it not for this,

the negative temperature coefficient.

When nuclear fuel gets hotter, It gets less reactive.

So, fuel increases reactivity.

Control rods and water reduce it.

Steam increases it.

The rise in temperature reduces it.

This is the invisible dance that powers entire cities without smoke or flame.

And it is beautiful when things are normal.

As uranium splits apart to release energy, it breaks down into a new

xenon.

Xenon reduces reactivity.

This is the poison Comrade Homyuk mentioned.

When the core is running at full power, it burns the xenon away before it can

cause a problem. But because of the delay, Chernobyl reactor 4 has been held

half power for 10 hours.

The xenon did not burn away.

It built up, poisoning the core.

We're starting to lose balance.

At 28 minutes past midnight, the reactor is now primed to slow down.

And yet, in less than an hour, it will explode.

If you can't understand how a stalled nuclear reactor could lead to an

explosion, I don't blame you.

After all, you don't work in the control room of a nuclear power plant.

As it turned out, the men who did didn't understand it either.

Easy now.

Take it down.

Good. Like that.

It's going to finish by now.

We're following protocol for reduction rate. You're procrastinating.

Ten other men in this plant would have done it already.

Kirsten Baum, come get me when these old women are ready.

Yes, Comrade Dyatlov.

Okay, very slow now. Let's ease it down to 700.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, slow.

I didn't move any rods there.

What is this?

I'm not even touching it.

Did everything right to think that maybe the core is poison? Well, if you

thought the core was poison, then you didn't do everything right because

choking my reactor. Get it back up!

I think we could turn off LAC if it may be possible to get more control.

Do it. Go.

Switch off local automatic control. Go to global.

LAC disabled.

Global control activated.

What did you do?

I did what you said. I switched... Look at it!

I don't understand.

Fucking amateurs. You stole the reactor.

How the fuck did you get this job?

Comrade, the antler. You're going to tell me that you did everything right

again, you incompetent arsehole.

I apologize for this unsatisfactory result.

What are you doing?

We have to shut all the way down.

No. We could be in a xenon pit.

We have to shut down and wait 24 hours. No, we're doing the test tonight. Raise

power to 700.

We can't raise the power from here.

Don't talk to me about rules.

No, no, we fell from 50 % of power. The rules don't say 50. There is no rule.

Comrade Diadlov, I apologise, but what you're saying makes no sense. Raise the

power. No.

I won't do it. It isn't safe.

Safety first.

Always.

I've been saying that for 25 years.

That's how long I've done this job. 25 years. Is that longer than you, Akimov?

Yes. Is it much longer?

Yes. And you with your mother's tip early out of your mouth?

See, if I say it's safe, it's safe. And if the two of you disagree, then you

don't have to work here, and you won't. But not just here. You won't work at

Kursk or Ignalina or Leningrad or Novo Voronezh. You won't work anywhere.

Ever again, I'll see to it.

I think you know I will see to it.

Raise the power.

I would like you to record your command.

Raise the power.

I wasn't even there.

What?

I wasn't in the room when they raised the power.

If you weren't there, then where were you? You are a witness, not a

I will ask the questions here.

If you weren't in the room, then where were you?

The toilet.

The toilet.

Comrade Khamyuk interviewed everyone who was in the control room that night.

They all told the same story.

I knew what Dyatlov ordered was wrong.

But if I didn't do what he said, I would be fired.

Leonid Toptunov.

One day before he died.

No, Comrade Dyatlov, you were in the room.

You ordered them to raise the power. This is a fact.

Course is now in recess.

30 minutes.

Do you know anything about this town, Chernobyl?

Not really, no.

It was mostly Jews and Poles.

The Jews were killed in pogroms and Stalin forced the Poles out.

And then the Nazis came and killed whoever was left.

After the war, people came to live here anyway.

They knew the ground under their feet.

Choked in blood, but they didn't care.

Dead Jews, dead Poles.

But not them.

No one ever thinks it's going to happen to them.

And here we are.

Well, it's time.

Maybe a year.

They call it a... They call it a long illness. It doesn't seem very long to

I know you told me and I believed you.

But time passed and I thought it wouldn't happen to me.

I wasted it.

I wasted it all for nothing.

For nothing.

Do you remember that morning when I first called you?

How unconcerned I was.

I don't believe much that comes out of the Kremlin, but when they told me they

were putting me in charge of the cleanup, they said it wasn't serious. I

believed them.

You know why?

Because they put you in charge.

I'm an inconsequential man, Valera.

That's all I've ever been.

I hoped that one day I would matter, but I didn't.

I just stood next to people who did.

There are other scientists like me.

Any one of them could have done what I did.

With you, everything we asked for, everything we needed.

Men, material, lunar rovers.

They heard me, but they listened to you.

Of all the ministers and all the deputies, the entire congregation of

fools, they mistakenly sent the one good man.

God's sakes, Boris.

You were the one who mattered most.

Comrade Legasov.

The time is 38 past midnight.

The reactor is nearly shut down.

The operators of reactor 4 are locked in a path that leads directly to disaster.

There's no way to turn back.

They do not yet know it, but the dive comes.

At 30 megawatts, xenon is still being created, but none of it is burning away.

The reactor is drowning in poison.

To make matters worse, the reactor isn't hot enough to produce sufficient steam.

The only way to safely raise power from this state is to do it very, very slowly

over the course of 24 hours.

The Atlas wants it done now.

Akimov and Toptunov have only one course of action.

They begin pulling control rods out.

Dozens at a time.

Halfway out, three quarters of the way out.

Still, the power does not budge. So they begin pulling them all the way out.

There were 211 control rods in reactor 4.

Akimov and Toptunov completely withdrew 205. Remember, control rods...

are the brakes on this car.

Of 211 rods, only six now remain in the reactor.

As for the fuel, it's gone cold, so the negative temperature curve is no longer

weighing down the reactivity.

But even still, the xenon poisoning is so strong, the best they can do is raise

the power to 200 megawatts.

The control rods are out.

The emergency system has been disconnected. The only thing keeping the

in check is water and xenon.

It's one in the morning.

The task is minutes away.

I'm sorry.

This is all we can get.

It's 200 megawatts. We've pulled almost everything out.

That's all we have. That's all we have.

But the test requires 700.

Steliachuk, let's get ready. Switch on pump four. No, wait a second.

Steliachuk. We have barely enough steam as it is. The turbine is going too slow

for the test to deliver any valid results. And if we add more water, there

be even less. I said it's enough. I know what I'm doing. Steliachuk.

Main pump four connected.

I wish you one heard him, Chu. The pipes are going to be jumping. Never mind

him. Curtain bomb.

The steam in the separated drum is too low. Five atmospheres. All right, let's

all help him. Get it up and spread the gas.

We stop.

Turn that fucking thing off.

You have 15 minutes.

15 minutes.

They may as well have had 15 days.

The problem they were facing was not solvable. The power was too low. The

was too high. The test was already ruined.

The results would have been useless.

But Dyatlov didn't care.

All he wanted to do was report a completed test.

1 .22 a .m.

Less than two minutes remain.

Yushchenko, a mechanical engineer, is in his office.

Baravozchenko, reactor section foreman, is in the refueling hall, high above the

1 ,000 -ton steel reactor cover.

Dziktayevko, Kudetuk, circulation operators are in the pump room.

None of them have been told about the tech.

None of them know what is about to happen.

At 1 .22 and 30 seconds, Toktunov sees a report.

from the reactor's SCALA computer system.

Based on the absence of sufficient control rods, the computer is

that the reactor be shut down.

Well, of course it's saying that. It doesn't know we're running a test.

All right, comrades.

Another few minutes and we'll all be over.

Attention bound when you're ready.

We did everything right.

Still a graph on?

Closing number 8, throttle valve.

Generator rotor beginning run down.

1 .23 and 4 seconds.

With every decision, they have pulled this reactor back like a slingshot,

further than anyone has ever pulled.

Now the test begins.

The pumps are shut down, and they've let go.

The pumps stop moving water through the reactor.

Uranium fuel is now unchecked by fresh coolant, unchecked by control rods.

The balance immediately swings in the opposite direction. In less than a

reactivity increases.

Inside the core, the remaining water is quickly converting to steam. A void is

being created.

There is no fresh water to replace it.

Steam increases reactivity, increases heat.

Increases steam, increases reactivity.

The remaining xenon decays away.

The power is rising.

There's nothing left to stop it.

One, twenty -three, and thirty -five minutes.

We have a power surge, Sasha!

What did you do?

1, 23, and 40 seconds.

In every control room of every nuclear reactor in the world, there is a button

with one single purpose.

Scram or instantly shut down the reaction.

In Soviet reactors, that button is called AZ -5.

You press AZ -5.

All of the control rods insert at once and the reaction is stopped dead.

But...

What

are you waiting for, Legato?

Tell your lies. Comrade Dyatlov, you will not be warned again.

Or what?

For God's sake, Comrade Dyatlov. Legasov's already given it away. He said

Saul... Comrade Dyatlov. There was no way to avoid what was coming. He knows

something. Comrade Dyatlov. He knows something.

I know what you are, Valerian Alexievich. You're a liar.

We've heard enough for today.

The defendants will be remanded in custody.

Court will... I haven't finished.

You'll have more evidence again.

It's not necessary. Your testimony is concluded, Your Honor.

Court is now adjourned.

We will resume tomorrow.

Then finish.

Comrade Sabino.

Then finish.

broke every rule we have.

He pushed the reactor to the brink of destruction.

He did these things believing there was a fail -safe.

AZ -5, a simple button to shut it all down. But in the circumstances he

there wasn't.

The shutdown system had a fatal flaw.

At 1 .2340, a chemoth engages AZ -5.

The fully withdrawn control rods begin moving back into the reactor.

These rods are made of boron, which reduces reactivity, but not the tip.

The tip are made of graphite, which accelerates reactivity.

Why?

For the same reason our reactors do not have containment buildings around them,

like those in the West. For the same reason we don't use properly enriched

in our cores.

For the same reason we are the only nation that builds water -cooled,

-moderated reactors with a positive void coefficient.

It's cheaper.

The first part of the rods that enter the core are the graphite pits, and when

they do, the reaction in the core, which had been rising, skyrockets.

Every last molecule of liquid water instantly converts to steam, which

and ruptures a series of fuel rod channels. The control rods in those

can move no further.

The graphite pits are fixed in position, endlessly accelerating the reaction.

Chernobyl reactor 4.

is now a nuclear bomb.

1 .23 .42.

Korovochenko looks down on the enormous steel lid of the reactor and sees the

impossible. The control rod and fuel channel caps, which each weigh 350

kilograms, are jumping up and down.

He runs to warn the control rod, but there's nothing he can do to stop what

coming. 1 .23 .44.

The steam blows more fuel channels apart.

We do not know how high the power went. We only know the final reading.

Reactor 4, designed to operate at 3200 megawatts, went beyond 33

,000.

The pressure inside the core can no longer be held back.

At long last we have arrived at 12345.

In the instant the lid is thrown off the reactor, oxygen rushes. It combines

with hydrogen and superheated graphite.

The chain of disaster is now complete.

No one in the room that night knew the shutdown button could act as a

They didn't know it.

Because it was kept from them.

Comrade Legasov, you're contradicting your own testimony in Vienna.

My testimony in Vienna was a lie.

I lied to the world.

I'm not the only one who kept the secrets. There are many.

The following order from the KGB, from the Central Committee, and right now

there are 16 reactors in the Soviet Union with the same fatal flaw.

Three of them are still running, less than 20 kilometers away at Chernobyl.

Mr. Legasov, if you mean to suggest the Soviet state is somehow responsible for

what happened, then I must warn you, you are treading on dangerous ground.

I've already trod on dangerous ground. We're on dangerous ground right now

because of our secrets and our lies.

They're practically what define us.

When the truth offends we we lie and lie until we can no longer remember it is

even there but it is still there.

Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth.

Sooner or later that debt is paid.

That is how

An RBMK reactor core explodes.

LIE!

Valery Alexievich Legasov.

Son of Alexei Legasov.

Head of Ideological Compliance, Central Committee.

Do you know your father did that?

Yes.

As a student, you had a leadership position in Komsomol.

Communist youth, correct?

You already know. Answer the question.

Yes.

At the Kachatov Institute.

You were the Communist Party secretary.

In that position, you limited the promotion of Jewish scientists.

Yes.

To curry favor with Kremlin officials.

You're one of us, Legato.

I can do anything I want with you.

But what I want the most is for you to know that I know.

You're not brave.

You're not heroic.

You're just a dying man who forgot himself.

I know who I am.

And I know what I've done.

In a just world, I would be shot for my lies, but not for this, but for the

truth.

And you're idiot obsession with reasons.

When the bullet hits your skull, what will it matter why?

No one's getting shot in the castle.

The whole world saw you in Vienna.

It would be embarrassing to kill you now.

And for what?

Your testimony today will not be accepted by the state.

It will not be disseminated in the press.

It never happened.

No.

You will live however long you have, but not as a scientist, not anymore.

You keep your title and your office, but no duties, no

authority, no friends.

No one will talk to you.

No one will listen to you.

Other men, let the men, will receive credit for the things you have done.

Your legacy is now their legacy.

You'll live long enough to see that.

What role did Chibina play in this?

None. He didn't know what I was going to say.

What role did Homyuk play in this?

None.

She didn't know either.

After all you've said and done today, it would be curious if you chose this

moment to lie.

I would think a man of your experience would know a lie when he hears one.

You will not meet or communicate with either one of them ever again.

You will not communicate with anyone about Chernobyl ever again.

You will remain so immaterial to the world around you that when you finally

die, it will be exceedingly hard to know that you ever lived at all.

And if I refuse, why worry? about something that

isn't going to happen.

Why worry about something that isn't going to happen?

Oh, that's perfect.

They should put that on our money.

To be a scientist is to be naive.

We are so focused on our search for truth, we fail to consider how few

want us to find it.

But it is always there, whether we see it or not, whether we choose to or not.

The truth doesn't care about our needs or wants. It doesn't care about our

governments, our ideologies, our religions.

It will line wait for all time.

At last is the gift of Chernobyl.

Where I once would fear the cost of truth, now I only ask, what

is the cost of lies?