The trailer for the HBO Original documentary “Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes” dropped in early June and this show looks obscenely haunting.
The documentary is going to take a deep dive into the 1986 disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine, according to the description in the trailer. It’ll feature some never-before-seen footage and real life accounts of the accident that were otherwise hidden from history until now.
Officially, only 31 people are said to have died as a result of the massive nuclear explosion that almost destroyed Europe, according to the BBC, but so many people were silenced during and after the event that we’ll likely never know the real death toll.
REPORT: Chernobyl Nuclear Facility Becomes Russian Prison As Staff Are Held At Gunpoint 24/7 https://t.co/C4I4cneYhZ
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) March 17, 2022
Even in the trailer for this latest documentary, a Ukrainian man reportedly says, “this talk about radiation is nonsense, guys. We’re healthy.” In the following clip, someone says, “the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant had no impact on the health of the population.”
Some 40,000 people were hospitalized with acute symptoms of radiation poisoning in the summer after the accident, the BBC continued. A further 112,000 to 125,000 people who worked in the Chernobyl clean-up teams had died by 2005, the outlet reported. (RELATED: REVIEW: Bo Burnham Roasts Joe Biden In The Catchiest Way Possible)
If you haven’t seen the dramatization of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster on HBO, aptly named “Chernobyl,” then make sure you do before this new documentary drops June 22. One of the first things I noticed from the trailer for “Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes” was the dramatic destruction of a helicopter sent in to drop sand and boron on the exposed nuclear core. The crash was depicted in the dramatization, but I had no idea just how accurate the show appeared.
However, the most haunting aspect of the Chernobyl accident and subsequent dramatization is the depiction of radiation poisoning on the human body. Firefighter Vasily Ignatenko, who was one of the first people on the scene after the explosion at the power plant, died two weeks later as he coughed up his own internal organs, according to WSLS.
Even after he died, Ignatenko’s massively swollen and deformed body was so full of radioactive material that he was buried in a tomb of zinc and concrete, the outlet continued.
Anyone who witnesses this horrific retelling of the very real horror story of “Chernobyl” should immediately be swayed against supporting nuclear power; while some argue that it’s stable and safe, it fundamentally is not. Like, if a killer virus destroys a huge portion of the human species, a few years after that the world’s nuclear reactors would melt down and destroy everything that managed to survive. (RELATED: Nuclear May Be The Ticket To A Carbon-Free Future. Why Do Environmentalists Hate It?)
Either way, I’m so ready for this documentary. We finally deserve the truth about this moment in history that nearly rendered Europe unlivable for thousands of years.