Publication Laka-library:
The Chernobyl nuclear accident: a summary analysis of its cause and consequences; with a comparative analysis of the accident hazards of the western reactors (1986)
| Author | R.Webb |
| Date | August 1986 |
| Classification | 6.01.3.10/39 (NUCLEAR SAFETY - REACTORS - GENERAL) |
| Front | 
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From the publication:
The radioactivity has, of course, decayed substantially since the first week of the accident, down to a residual level of 10% to 20% of the peak value, but this residual level is due mostly to the long-lived, slowly decaying cesium-137 isotope (30 years half-life), which is the source of most of the eventual accumulated radiation exposure which is expected from the Chernobyl fallout. The cesium-137 levels present now in Bavaria are 6 to 10 times the cesium-137 fallout level that resulted from all of the atomic bomb testing in the atmosphere in the 1950s and 1960s (hundreds of atomic explosions), before the ban on such testing was made between the superpowers in 1963 for world health reasons. In Sweden the maximum cesium-137 levels are now 20 times the atomic bomb testing fallout levels. The radioactive contamination from Chernobyl is unprecedented. It is even worse closer to the reactor, of course.
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