OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

[Footslogger]

Has anyone here ever heard of this disaster?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j45g9oCLjtk

[geofflambert]

Nope

[GetAssista]

Yep. Not far from the city I was born in

[RangerJoe]

I had heard about it but by a different name.

[John 3rd]

Never heard of it but WOW it is pretty nasty! Watch the article--VERY COOL!

[spence]

Have to admit that I've never heard of it but certainly Soviet nuclear submarines have had several nuclear accidents. I guess most don't know about them or have ignored them since the subs involved mostly ended up under 12000 meters of salt water. Sorta like Roosevelt pseudo-war with Nazi Germany in 1941: over the horizon and out of sight to most people.

[Jorge_Stanbury]

3.6
not great, not terrible [;)]

[fcooke]

Never knew this other either. Interesting video. I wonder how many of those gulag workers were German POWs. I imagine they would not be motivated to do high quality work. Actually, I cannot imagine any gulag folks would be motivated to do high quality work....

[Pentakomo]

Heard and here now.

[GetAssista]

ORIGINAL: fcooke
I wonder how many of those gulag workers were German POWs.

None, the disaster happened in 1957. The last (surviving) prisoner returned from the USSR in 1956 according to the German sources from Wiki

[joey]

Never heard of it, but I am not surprised....

[geofflambert]

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

ORIGINAL: fcooke
I wonder how many of those gulag workers were German POWs.

None, the disaster happened in 1957. The last (surviving) prisoner returned from the USSR in 1956 according to the German sources from Wiki

1957 is when the accident happened not when all that work (with poisonous materials) was done.

Also, I wouldn't bet that the last surviving German POWs were ever returned, especially if they were working on secret projects. An awful lot of people, not just POWs went to the gulags and were never heard from again.

[fcooke]

Yep, if you think of the USSR at that time, nearly 'free' labor would be desirable. Food and lodging being the expenses. But we will likely not know the reality in our lifetimes.

[GetAssista]

ORIGINAL: geofflambert
1957 is when the accident happened not when all that work (with poisonous materials) was done.

Also, I wouldn't bet that the last surviving German POWs were ever returned, especially if they were working on secret projects. An awful lot of people, not just POWs went to the gulags and were never heard from again.

I trust German sources to be meticulous in this regard, coupled with archives opened during Gorbachev's perestroyka in the 90s. If there were notable numbers of German POWs in the USSR after that, they would not have gone unnoticed.

Also, Stalin died 1953 and the whole gulag affair winded down in the several years after, so it all checks out

[geofflambert]

Ask the Union in the Civil War (if you've got a time machine), who kept meticulous records, what happened to their POWs in Confederate hands, who practically kept no records at all. Crickets. And they were the winners, the Germans lost that war.

[rsallen64]

I wrote a paper while in law school that discussed the environmental devastation of the Soviet nuclear program. Ksyhtym was one of the subjects I covered. There is a book called Red Atom: Russia's Nuclear Program from Stalin to Today, by Paul R. Josephson, published in 2000, that covers this, and many other disasters, (Chernobyl, Mayak, etc.) if you're interested.

[GetAssista]

ORIGINAL: geofflambert

Ask the Union in the Civil War (if you've got a time machine), who kept meticulous records, what happened to their POWs in Confederate hands, who practically kept no records at all. Crickets. And they were the winners, the Germans lost that war.

Did you compare Germans with some Americans just now? [:D]

[geofflambert]

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

ORIGINAL: geofflambert

Ask the Union in the Civil War (if you've got a time machine), who kept meticulous records, what happened to their POWs in Confederate hands, who practically kept no records at all. Crickets. And they were the winners, the Germans lost that war.

Did you compare Germans with some Americans just now? [:D]

There's Germans, and then there's Germans. There's Americans, and then there's ...

[RangerJoe]

ORIGINAL: geofflambert

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

ORIGINAL: geofflambert

Ask the Union in the Civil War (if you've got a time machine), who kept meticulous records, what happened to their POWs in Confederate hands, who practically kept no records at all. Crickets. And they were the winners, the Germans lost that war.

Did you compare Germans with some Americans just now? [:D]

There's Germans, and then there's Germans. There's Americans, and then there's ...

Then there was the GermanSwiss-American who was in charge of the Andersonville prison camp.

https://www.history.com/topics/american ... ersonville