Maksim's On-Line Museum

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  • Home
  • North America
    • U.S. Capitol Flag
    • Coal Mine Scrip
    • Woodstock Ticket
    • Cable Car Cable
    • Pitch Pine Torch
    • Alcatraz Concrete
    • Ringling Bros. Staff Pin
    • Montgomery Bus Token
    • WTC Ticket
    • KKK Membership Card
    • Archaic Arrowhead
    • Prohibition Prescription
    • Smokey Bear Pinbacks
    • Gold Rush Nuggets
    • Edison Disc Record
    • Hoover Dam Cable
    • Jack Dempsey
    • Cal Ripken, Jr.
    • Bre Pettis
    • Steve Wozniak
    • Robert Ballard
    • Glenn Miller
    • El Cazador Shipwreck Coin
    • Panama Canal Matches
  • Political
    • Iranian Hostage Crisis
    • Watergate Scandal
    • White House Easter Egg
    • Eisenhower Rally Ticket
    • CCC Scrip Tickets
    • Condoleezza Rice
    • Gail Halvorsen
    • Berlin Wall
  • Military
    • Stalag POW ID Tag
    • Disney WWII Insignia
    • D-Day Barbed Wire
    • OPA Ration Tokens
    • WWII Polish Home Army Badge
    • Ships for Victory Pin
    • Crimean War Button
    • Korean War Safe Conduct Pass
    • USO Record Home
    • Vietnam War Mess Token
    • Kamikaze Recognition Slide
    • Kilroy Was Here
    • WWII Monopoly Pieces
    • Red Cross Thimble
    • Pearl Harbor Tool Tag
    • U-boat Badge
    • Red Ball Express Patch
    • Allied Military Currency
    • William McRaven
    • Fred Sutherland
    • Woody Williams
    • Harry Ettlinger
    • Richard Cole
    • Charles McGee
    • George Sakato
    • Chester Nez
    • Don Walsh
    • Joe Kittinger
    • Trinitite
    • Revolutionary War Cannonball
    • Antietam Bullets
  • Aeronautics and space
    • Chuck Yeager
    • Catherine Coleman
    • Soyuz Heat Shield
    • Crawlerway Rock
    • Shuttle Challenger AFRSI
    • Bernice Haydu
    • Edgar Mitchell
  • Automotive
    • Model T Radiator Cap
  • African
    • Anti-Apartheid Pin
    • Maersk Alabama Hijacking
    • Okpoho Manilla
  • Natural
    • Organ Cave
    • Woolly Mammoth Hair
    • Shiva Lingam Stone
    • Mount St. Helens Ash
    • Mosasaurus Tooth
    • Knightia Fish Fossil
    • Megalodon Shark Tooth
  • European
    • Viking Fibula Brooch
    • Olympic Clay Pigeon
    • Chernobyl Liquidator Badge
    • Titanic Coal
  • Asia
    • Great Wall Of China
    • Sikhote-Alin Meteorite
    • Petrified Wood
    • Commemorative Coins
    • Greenbrier Bunker Key
    • World Stamps
    • Russia
  • Feedback

Chernobyl Liquidator Badge

On April 26, 1986 the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Pripyat, Ukraine experienced a catastrophic nuclear accident.  At that point, Ukraine (then officially the Ukrainian SSR), was under the direct jurisdiction of the central authorities of the Soviet Union. The explosion and fire that occurred as a result of the accident released large quantities of radioactive particles into the atmosphere, which spread contamination over large areas of western Soviet Union and Europe.  From 1986 to 2000, approximately 350,000 people were evacuated and resettled from the most severely contaminated areas.

The battle to contain the contamination and avert an even greater planet-wide catastrophe ultimately involved over 500,000 workers.  The people who were called upon to deal with the consequences following the disaster were dubbed “Liquidators”.  In the immediate aftermath of the disaster, the worst of the radioactive debris  was collected inside what remained of the reactor, with much of the debris manually shoveled in by Liquidators who could only spend a maximum of 40 seconds at a time working on the rooftops due to the extremely high doses of radiation being emitted.
The item in my collection is a badge issued by the Soviet government to personnel involved in the Chernobyl clean-up operations.  Different badges and medals were issued, but the one in my collection is one of the less common examples, reserved for issuance to the first liquidators or members of the communist party.
Picture
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