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Anatoly Dyatlov Quotes

Total quotes: 5
[April 26, 1986: Immediately after the explosion, deputy chief engineer Anatoly Dyatlov stands shocked as shift supervisor Aleksandr Akimov calls his name repeatedly and alarms blare]
Aleksandr Akimov: Comrade Dyatlov? Comrade Dyatlov?!

Anatoly Dyatlov: What just happened?

Leonid Toptunov: I don't know.

[Turbine engineer Vyacheslav Brazhnik rushes into the room]
Vyacheslav Brazhnik: There's a fire in the turbine hall.

Dyatlov: The turbine hall... The control system tank. Hydrogen. [addressing Akimov] You and Toptunov, you morons blew the tank.

Toptunov: No, that's not—

Dyatlov: This is an emergency, everyone stay calm. Our first priority is to—

[As Dyatlov speaks, foreman Valeriy Perevozchenko runs through the open door in a panic]

Valeriy Perevozchenko: It exploded!

Dyatlov: We know. Akimov, are we cooling the reactor core?

Akimov: We shut it down, but the control rods are still... They're not all the way in, I disengaged the clutch—

Dyatlov: Alright, I'll disconnect the servos from the standby console. [to two other engineers] You two, get the backup pumps running, we need water moving through the core, that is all that matters!

Perevozchenko: There is no core! It exploded, the core exploded!

[Beat as all the engineers stare at Perevozchenko in disbelief and fear]

Dyatlov: He's in shock, get him out of here.

Perevozchenko: The lid is off. The stack is burning, I saw it.

Dyatlov: You're confused, RBMK reactor cores don't explode. Akimov!

Akimov: [to Toptunov] Don't worry, we did everything right. Something... something strange has happened.

Toptunov: Do you taste metal?

Dyatlov: Akimov!

Akimov: [to Perevozchenko] Comrade Perevozchenko, what you're saying is physically impossible. The core can't explode. It has to be the tank.

[Perevozchenko wordlessly shakes his head]

Dyatlov: We're wasting time. Let's go. Get the hydrogen out of the generators and pump water into the core.

Brazhnik: What about the fire?

Dyatlov: [annoyed; as if it were obvious] Call the fire brigade. [storms out]
[Pripyat, April 25, 1986 - twelve hours prior to the explosion]

Fomin: I hear they might promote Bryukhanov. This little problem we have with the safety test, if it's completed successfully... yes, I think promotion's very likely. Who knows? Maybe Moscow. Naturally, they'll put me in charge once he's gone, and then I'll need someone to take my old job. I could pick Sitnikov.

Dyatlov: I would like to be considered.

Fomin: We'll keep that in mind. [Bryukhanov enters] Viktor Petrovich, preparations for the test have gone smoothly. Comrade Dyatlov's been working per my instructions, and reactor 4's output has been reduced to 1600 megawatts. With your approval, we're ready to continue lowering power to—

Bryukhanov: We have to wait.

Fomin: Is, uh...

Bryukhanov: Are you going to ask me if there's a problem, Nikolai? You can't read a fucking face? Three years, I've tried to finish this test. Three years. [lights a cigarette] I've just had a call from the grid controller in Kiev. He says we can't lower power any further. Not for another ten hours.

Dyatlov: A grid controller? Where does he get off telling us—

Bryukhanov: It's not the grid controller's decision, Dyatlov. It's the end of the month. All the productivity quotas. Everyone's working overtime, the factories need power, someone's pushing down from above, not that we'll ever know who. [sighs] So do we have to scrap it, or what?

Fomin: No, I don't think so. If we need to wait ten hours, we wait.

Bryukhanov: [to Dyatlov] Running half power, not going to have stability issues?

Fomin: No, I should think—

Bryukhanov: I'm not asking you.

Dyatlov: It's safe. We'll maintain at 1600. I'll go home, get some sleep, come back tonight. We'll proceed then. I'll personally supervise the test, and it will be completed.

Bryukhanov: Well, I'm not waiting around. Call me when it's done.”
[As the courtroom is at a recess, Legasov meets with Shcherbina outside]

Shcherbina: [Coughing] Do you know anything about this town, Chernobyl?

Legasov: Not really, no.

Shcherbina: It was mostly Jews and Poles. The Jews were killed in pogroms, and Stalin forced the Poles out. And then the Nazis came and killed whoever was left. But after the war people came to live here anyway. They knew the ground under their feet was soaked in blood, but they didn't care. Dead Jews, dead Poles. But not them. No one ever thinks it's going to happen to them. And here we are.

Legasov: How much time?

Shcherbina: Maybe a year. They call it a...[coughs] They call it a ‘long illness.’

Legasov: It doesn't seem very long to me.

Shcherbina: I know you told me, and I believed you. But time passed, and I thought, it wouldn't happen to me. I wasted it. I wasted it all for nothing.

Legasov: For nothing?

Shcherbina: Do you remember that morning when I first called you, how unconcerned I was? I don't believe much that comes out of the Kremlin, but when they told me they were putting me in charge of the cleanup and they said it wasn't serious, I believed them. You know why?

Legasov: Because they put you in charge.

Shcherbina: Yeah. I'm an inconsequential man, Valera. That's all I've ever been. I hoped that one day I would matter, but I didn't. I just stood next to people who did.

Legasov: There are other scientists like me. Any one of them could have done what I did. But you...Everything we asked for, everything we needed. Men, material, lunar rovers. Who else could have done these things? They heard me, but they listened to you. Of all the ministers, and all the deputies, entire congregation of obedient fools, they mistakenly sent the one good man. For god's sake, Boris, you were the one who mattered most.

Shcherbina: [Sees a small caterpillar on his lap and lets it crawl on his index finger] Ah, it's beautiful.”
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