10.

Tokaimura, Japan 1999 – Level 4

When a group of unqualified workers decided to put more highly enriched uranium in a precipitation tank
than was permitted, disaster struck. Two of the workers eventually died with another fifty six plant
workers also being exposed to high levels of radiation. To make matters worse, 21 civilians were also
exposed to high doses of radiation and residents within a thousand feet of the plant were evacuated.

9. Buenos Aires, Argentina 1983 – Level 4

An operator’s errors during a fuel plate reconfiguration lead to him dying two days later. There was an
excursion of 3×10 fissions at the RA-2 facility with the operator absorbing 2000 rad of gamma and 1700
rad of neutron radiation. Another 17 people outside of the reactor room absorbed doses ranging from 35
rad to less than 1 rad.

8. Saint- Laurent, France 1969 – Level 4

On the 17th October, 1969 50 kg of uranium in one of the gas cooled reactors began to melt. This was
classified as Level 4 on the INES and to this day remains the most serious civil Nuclear disaster in French
history.

7. SL-1 Experimental Power Station, Idaho USA 1961 – Level 4

On 3rd January, 1961 a USA army experimental nuclear power reactor underwent a steam explosion and
meltdown killing its three operators. The cause of this was because of improper removal of the control
rod, responsible for absorbing neutrons in the reactor core. This event is the only known fatal reactor
accident in the USA. The accident released about 80 curies of iodine -131.

6. Goiania Accident, Brazil 1987 – Level 5

On 13th September, 1987 a radioactive contamination accident occurred in the Brazilian state of Goais.
An old radiotherapy source was stolen from an abandoned hospital site in the city. Subsequently it was
handled by many people, killing four people. 112,000 people were examined for
radioactive contamination’s with 249 having significant levels of radioactive material in or on their body.

5. Three Mile Island Accident, Pennsylvania USA 1979 – Level 5

28th March saw two nuclear reactors meltdown. It was subsequently the worst disaster in commercial
nuclear power plant history. Small amounts of radioactive gases and radioactive iodine were released into
the environment. Luckily, epidemiology studies have not linked a single cancer with the accident.

4. Windscale Fire (Sellafield), UK 1957 – Level 5

The worst nuclear disaster in Great Britain’s history occurred on the 10th October, 1957 and ranked at
level 5 on the INES scale, The Windscale Fire. The two piles had been hurriedly built as part of the
British atomic bomb project. The first pile was active from October 1950 with the second close behind in
June 1951. The accident occurred when the core of Unit 1’s reactor caught fire, releasing substantial
amounts of radioactive contamination into the surrounding area. 240 cancer cases have since been linked
to the fire. All of the milk from within about 500km of nearby countryside was diluted and destroyed for
about a month.

3. Kyshtym, Russia 1957 – Level 6

The Kyshtym Nuclear disaster was a radiation contamination incident that occurred on 29 September
1957 at Mayak, a Nuclear fuel reprocessing plant in the Soviet Union. It measured as a Level 6 disaster
on the INES, making it the third most serious Nuclear disaster ever recorded behind the Chernobyl
Disaster and Fukushima Daiichi Disaster. The event occurred in the town of Ozyorsk, a closed city built
around the Mayak plant. Since Ozyorsk/Mayak was not marked on maps, the disaster was named after
Kyshtym, the nearest known town.

2. Fukushima, Japan 2011 – Level 7

The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster was a series of equipment failures, nuclear meltdowns and
releases of radioactive materials at the Fukushima, Nuclear Power Plant, following the Tohoku
Tsunami on 11 March, 2011. It is the largest nuclear disaster since the Chernobyl disaster of 1986 and
only the second disaster (along with Chernobyl) to measure Level 7 on the INES.
1. Chernobyl, Ukraine 1986 – Level 7
The Chernobyl Nuclear disaster is widely considered to have been the worst power plant accident in
history, and is one of only two classified as a level 7 event on the International Nuclear Event Scale (the
other being the Fukushima, Daiichi disaster in 2011). The battle to contain the contamination and avert a
greater catastrophe ultimately involved over 500,000 workers and cost an estimated 18 billion rubles.
The official Soviet casualty count of 31 deaths has been disputed and long-term effects such as cancers
and deformities are still being accounted for.