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OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sat Sep 12, 2020 2:01 pm
by Footslogger
Has anyone here ever heard of this disaster?

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


RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sat Sep 12, 2020 4:14 pm
by geofflambert
Nope

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sat Sep 12, 2020 5:10 pm
by GetAssista
Yep. Not far from the city I was born in

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sat Sep 12, 2020 7:12 pm
by RangerJoe
I had heard about it but by a different name.

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sat Sep 12, 2020 9:58 pm
by John 3rd
Never heard of it but WOW it is pretty nasty! Watch the article--VERY COOL!

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sat Sep 12, 2020 11:11 pm
by 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.

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2020 12:47 am
by Jorge_Stanbury
3.6
not great, not terrible [;)]

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2020 4:50 am
by 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....

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2020 7:46 am
by Pentakomo
Heard and here now.

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2020 10:09 am
by 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

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2020 3:25 pm
by joey
Never heard of it, but I am not surprised....

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2020 5:14 pm
by 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.

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2020 5:34 pm
by 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.

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2020 7:36 pm
by 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

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2020 1:00 am
by 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.

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2020 1:51 am
by 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.

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2020 10:30 am
by 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]

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2020 12:22 pm
by 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 ...

RE: OT: The Kyshtym Disaster?

Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2020 1:19 pm
by 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