Chernobyl Twenty Years Later, and South Carolina Today
The NYT has made a multimedia report on Chernobyl available online called "First at Chernobyl, Burning Still," that unfortunately I can't seem to link to effectively. Chernobyl has the attention of the New York Times at the moment because this month marks the twentieth anniversary of the Chernobyl reactor explosion. One of my South Carolina colleagues, Tim Mousseau (who, I must disclose, is also a good friend) has been paying attention to the aftereffects of Chernobyl for years. Below are excerpts from two newspaper articles that describe his work, and then some thumbnails of photographs that he took there.
The first article "Healing after a nuclear disaster," by Sherry Beasley, in the 4/26/06 issue of The State, links the issue to South Carolina. South Carolinians often feel that we get unfairly stereotyped in a lot of negative ways, so this sort of framing of a news story by the local paper is common :
"We South Carolinians have a unique connection to this infamous spot. Researchers from our state have been playing an integral role in studying the effects of Chernobyl’s radiation spill on humans, animals and plants. More importantly, they have been looking for ways to help those affected so acutely, as well as develop models and strategies to use in the event of a similar tragedy. Chernobyl can be viewed as a cautionary tale that yields important information.
"Led primarily by the School of the Environment at the University of South Carolina, teams of scientists and other investigators from USC, Clemson and MUSC have made more than a dozen trips to Chernobyl in the past eight years, securing special permission from the Ukrainian government to work in the highly restricted area. Tim Mousseau, a biology professor at USC who is also an adjunct professor at Clemson, has emerged as one of the world’s leading scholars on the effects of that radioactive environment.
"Teaming with international collaborators, Mousseau has made startling discoveries in mutations in animals, specifically barn swallows. Mousseau and his colleagues are conducting the most comprehensive studies yet undertaken of survival and reproduction in natural populations in areas imbued with radiation. ...
The second article is "2 from S.C. study impact" by James T. Hammon in the 4/26/06 issue of The State. You will see from the excerpt below that Tim does not just check in on Chernoyl to commemorate anniversaries. He has dedicated a good part of his career to doing research on the effects of the radiation release upon the ecology of the area:
"...University of South Carolina researcher Tim Mousseau, who has made many trips to Ukraine to study genetic mutations in barn swallows, believes the world’s political and scientific leaders have failed to take advantage of the opportunity to learn from the disaster.
"In articles in the journal Nature and other publications, Mousseau has urged world leaders to capture the evidence of the impact of Chernobyl on the children of the 100,000 people who worked on the cleanup crews in the aftermath of history’s worst nuclear disaster. So far, he said, there have been just two or three studies of mutations in humans.
"There is not even agreement on the potential long-term death toll from the release of radiation around Chernobyl. Official United Nations estimates of 4,000 deaths from thyroid cancer are scoffed at by many public health experts who say the toll will soar as much as 60,000 over 30 to 50 years.
“There has been virtually no work to study the impact of mutation on the overall ecology,” Mousseau added. “There’s little research on larger mammals — moose, elk, wolves, wild boars — that have expanded their populations in the region.
Research, including that done by Mousseau, shows survival rates just one-third the normal rate in fruit flies and birds. His research on 19 generations of barn swallows shows genetic mutations that are potentially devastating to the species of migrating birds that winters in South Africa and returns to the same nests in Ukraine in the spring.
“The worst-case scenario is that we might see a mutational meltdown, that the (mutation) load would be so great that it leads to extinction of a species, at least a local extinction,” Mousseau said.” ....
If Tim Mousseau was on the faculty of a prestigious university in the Northeast, I have little doubt that the New York Times would have featured his work prominently in its reporting. The lack of attention and respect won't affect Tim's interest or dedication to Chernobyl-related research one bit. He knows that the work he is doing is important, regardless of whether anyone else recognizes that. His work is certainly of interest to the BBC! His photographs are below:
You can learn more about his research, and see more photos (and these in a larger format) here.
Thanks for signing in, . Now you can comment. (sign out)
(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)