History Recap / ChernobylS1E2PleaseRemainCalm

* OOCIsSeriousBusiness: The Soviet news show ''Vremya'' broadcasts a twenty-second segment announcing that an accident has occurred at Chernobyl. As was noted by Western journalists at the time, particularly in the recording shown by Peter Jennings, the mere fact that the Soviets were admitting something bad had happened--at all--showed just how serious the accident was.

* RevealingCoverUp: Khomyuk initially discounts the idea that Chernobyl might be the source of the radiation spike she's been detecting, since that would mean a catastrophe has occurred at the plant which is located over 400km away. She decides to call them anyway to see if they know anything about the radiation, but then can't get through to anyone on account of the phone lines being cut--confirming a catastrophe at Chernobyl.

->''Vnimanie, vnimanie ...''

-->'''Legasov''': It means the core is open. It means the fire we're watching with our own eyes is giving off nearly twice the radiation released by the bomb in Hiroshima. That's every single hour, hour after hour. Twenty hours since the explosion, so forty bombs worth by now. Forty-eight more tomorrow, and it will not stop. Not in a week, not in a month. It will burn and spread its poison until the entire continent is dead.

That night, Pikalov drives a heavily shielded truck up towards the ruins of the reactor building. He returns largely unharmed, and informs the assembled dignitaries that the radiation level isn't the 3.6 roentgen that has been the official figure until now, or even the 200 roentgen that Sitnikov detected; rather, it's ''15,000''. Asked to explain the full implications of this figure, Legasov grimly explains that the reactor did indeed explode, that the exposed core is giving off twice the amount of radiation as the Hiroshima bomb every hour, and that it will continue to do so until all of Europe and Asia is lethally irradiated. Scherbina immediately has Bryukhanov and Fomin arrested and taken away, uninterested by their attempts to shift the blame to Dyatlov, and asks how they can extinguish the fire. Legasov informs him that water will be useless, as it will just get vaporized by the extraordinary heat of the reactor, and that their best bet is to smother it with 5,000 tons of sand and boron. He also recommends the immediate evacuation of Pripyat, but Scherbina refuses this suggestion. Later, at a nearby hotel, Legasov is asked by a couple if they should be worried about the fire, to which he reluctantly lies and says no.

That night, Pikalov drives a heavily shielded truck up towards the ruins of the reactor building. He returns largely unharmed, and informs the assembled dignitaries that the radiation level isn't the 3.6 roentgen that has been the official figure until now, or even the 200 roentgen that Sitnikov detected; rather, it's ''15,000''. Asked to explain the full implications of this figure, Legasov grimly explains that the reactor did indeed explode, that the exposed core is giving off twice the amount of radiation as the Hiroshima bomb every hour, and that it will continue to do so until all of Europe and Asia is lethally irradiated. Scherbina immediately has Bryukhanov and Fomin arrested and taken away, uninterested by their attempts to shift the blame to Dyatlov, and asks how they can extinguish the fire. Legasov informs him that water will be useless, as it will just get vaporized by the extraordinary heat of the reactor, and that their best bet is to smother it with 5,000 tons of sand and boron. He also recommends the immediate evacuation of Pripyat, but Scherbina refuses this suggestion.

* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: {{Downplayed|Trope}}. When Legasov finishes explaining how a nuclear reactor works, Shcherbina responds that he doesn't need Legasov anymore since that was his whole purpose. However, it is soon clear this is only meant as "so now you can stand in the background and let me do what I was sent for in silence" rather than any kind of threat. When he confirms that Bryukhanov and Fomin were lying to him, he makes Legasov his NumberTwo in helping him contain the crisis.

* BlameGame: When Shcherbina arrives, Bryukhanov and Fomin immediately present him with a list of individuals they believe are responsible. Shcherbina then asks why he saw graphite outside the core, and Bryukhanov ''immediately'' passes the buck to Fomin. Later, when they're being arrested, Fomin protests by saying that Dyatlov was the one in charge -- he's actually right, but since no-one knows the cause of the explosion at this time, it just comes across as him pulling a NeverMyFault instead of justly blaming the person who decided to violate numerous safety protocols.

* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: The scene where Khomyuk meets with a politician who belittles a nuclear scientist as needlessly alarmist despite knowing nothing about the subject may as well have been between a climate scientist and a global warming negationist. Critics, viewers, and Mazin himself have also pointed similarities in the dissonance between the disaster already having a large impact on nature and people remaining oblivious or in denial about it.

* AluminumChristmasTrees: In his review for ''The Moscow Times'', Leonid Bershidsky noted that it's not possible to fly to Chernobyl by helicopter. However, the helicopter that Shcherbina and Legasov fly on is a Mil Mi-8, which has a ferry range (absolute maximum distance from Point A to Point B with minimal cargo) of 600 miles, more than enough to cover the 432 miles from Moscow to Chernobyl. It's true that Legasov and Scherbina ''didn't'' journey directly from Moscow to Chernobyl via helicopter in real life (they went from Moscow to Kyiv, and then from there to Chernobyl by car), but it wouldn't have been impossible for them to do so.

* SpottingTheThread: In spite of the report attempting to greatly downplay the disaster, Legasov is able to read between the lines enough to figure out that what happened at Chernobyl is infinitely worse than anyone can imagine.

Seven hours after the accident at Chernobyl, a measuring station in Minsk suddenly has its radiation alarm go off despite there being no obvious source for it. One of few scientists on duty that day, Dr. Ulyana Khomyuk, takes a sample and determines from the isotopes in the air that the source is some kind of nuclear fuel leak. She calls the nearest nuclear plant, Igalina, and finds out that while they've also detected a radiation leak, it's actually at a lower level than in Minsk. Khomyuk then decides to call Chernobyl, thinking that it's unlikely to be the source of the leak but that they might know more about its source, only for her to slowly infer the AwfulTruth when the plant doesn't answer her call.

* HeroicBSOD: After Legasov shouts at him that they will both be dead from radiation within five years, Shcherbina enters a state of shock, slumping down into a chair with a stunned expression on his face and barely notices the phone ringing beside him. This state persists for most of the episode, but he eventually snaps out of it to deliver a RousingSpeech to the plant workers persuading some of them to volunteer as divers even though it will kill them.

In Moscow, Legasov has arrived for a committee meeting, and as he reads over the dossier he was provided, he slowly (and silently) becomes concerned that they're dealing with an unprecedented catastrophe. Naturally, he's shocked when the actual meeting begins, and Scherbina reassures UsefulNotes/MikhailGorbachev that they're only dealing with a minor accident and a radiation level about equal to a chest x-ray, with most of the attendees being more concerned about whether or not the west knows about the accident. Gorbachev goes to adjourn the meeting, but Legasov objects, pointing out a seemingly innocuous passage about how a firefighter was severely burned by picking up a piece of "black mineral". Scherbina dismisses it as nothing of importance, but Legasov continues his objections, informing the committee that the only place such a black material would be found is in the reactor core, indicating that the core exploded, not just a hydrogen tank. Furthermore, Legasov also points out that the radiation figure is likely vastly higher than has been indicated; the 3.6 roentgen figure would be bad enough, seeing how it's actually equivalent to 400 chest x-rays, but more importantly, it's also the maximum figure that most of the plant's dosimeters can register. After briefly chiding Legasov for speaking out of turn, Gorbachev allows him to continue, and Legasov explains how cataclysmically bad the situation could be if the core actually has exploded. Gorbachev therefore dispatches Scherbina and, over his objections, Legasov to Chernobyl via helicopter. En route, Legasov gives Scherbina a brief explanation of how a nuclear reactor works.

The helicopter arrives at the plant, and Legasov is horrified to see the roof covered in broken chunks of graphite. Scherbina, failing to comprehend the danger, orders the pilot to take them over the reactor for a better look, causing a terrified Legasov to yell that they'll all be dead in a week if they do so. While Scherbina threatens the pilot with being shot, Legasov tells him that it'd be a MercyKill compared to what the radiation would do to them, causing the pilot to reluctantly disobey Scherbina's order.

The next day, a squadron of helicopters flies up to the reactor building, each carrying a payload of sand and boron. When the first helicopter goes to fly directly over the core to drop its payload, a panicked Legasov -- watching from a nearby rooftop -- reminds Scherbina that the helicopters cannot fly over the core. Unfortunately, this order doesn't get relayed to the pilot quickly enough, and the helicopter flies directly over where the radiation is at its worst, delivering a lethal dose to everyone on-board. Fortunately, they don't suffer for long, as the incapacitated pilot inadvertently steers towards a nearby crane; on impact, the helicopter's radiation-damaged rotors immediately disintegrate, and the vehicle falls hundreds of feet to the ground. On being informed by Legasov that there is no other way to smother the reactor fire, Scherbina orders the operation to continue despite the deadly mishap.

In his Pripyat hotel room, Legasov is still dissatisfied with the town's not having been evacuated, and when Scherbina tries to dismiss his concerns, he points out that they themselves have already absorbed so much radiation that they'll likely be dead in five years, leaving Scherbina utterly shellshocked. Things then go FromBadToWorse when they receive a telephone call informing them that the radiation from Chernobyl has reached Sweden, who alerted the U.S., and who in turn used spy satellite photos to confirm that the reactor has exploded. With West Germany having schoolchildren stay inside to avoid being exposed to radiation, the Soviets can no longer feasibly keep people in the town right next to the destroyed reactor.

As the last of the buses leaves the town, Khomyuk arrives at the military checkpoint, and is threatened with arrest if she refuses to leave -- which she's actually quite fine with, since it's the fastest way of getting to whoever's in charge. She's bought to Legasov and Scherbina, where she informs them that they've committed a potentially apocalyptic error. The sand and boron that they're dropping will melt down and combine with the reactor debris to form a radioactive lava; Legasov counters that he anticipated this and that it won't become a serious problem for at least a month, but she points out that in two days, the lava will reach the bubbler pools below the reactor. The pools had mistakenly been assumed to be empty, but between every pipe in the building being fractured in the explosion, Akimov's and Toptunov's fruitless efforts to cool the destroyed core, and the water pumped in by the firemen, the pools are full again, with the potential to cause disaster when the lava burns its way into them.