The Fallout

by Knox, J. C.

  Chapter 14

  Reactor 3 in Forsmark Nuclear Power Plant in Sweden.

  He should never have agreed to swap shifts, he hates working the night shift and doesn’t normally work in reactor 3, plus his supervisor tonight is an ass. Ever since the catastrophic explosion three years ago at Chernobyl, the power plant has been under scrutiny by the government. Pen pushers who don’t know anything about nuclear energy. It’s a lot quieter on the night shift and he has more time to examine the figures more accurately, but something is wrong. These numbers, the readings can’t be right, he’d checked the same figures earlier this morning in reactor 4 and they were fine, but these, these, are way off kilter. There were some significant rumblings earlier in the day and talk of a minor earthquake. Oscar’s wondering if that is what has upset the readings or if it really is something to worry about? No one knows exactly what happened at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant; everything was destroyed; and it is still a no-go area and will be for tens of thousands of years. The blast caused several nuclear reactors across Asia and Europe to explode. The blasts and fallout are a major incident across the globe, wiping out the majority of humanity. Sweden has remained unaffected, with reports of some small areas on the west of North and South America, some central African countries along with the Arctic and Antarctic, where communities have survived, but Oscar knows, the fallout is likely to wipe everyone out, eventually. After the explosion the nuclear plant in the far north of Sweden where Oscar has worked since he left school seemed to shift, it dropped somewhat into the ground, but everything has been extensively tested and it’s been running smoothly since, until now. When he started his shift this evening, his boss told him to prepare for an emergency shut down, to simulate what would happen if there was a black out, but Oscar doesn’t know what to do? These readings are unstable; they’re too unstable to try an emergency shutdown. But his boss isn’t a guy to listen to reason, so he calls one of his colleagues to double check the readings.

  ‘Erik, can you check these readings, they don’t seem right to me?’

  ‘Fucking dayshift workers don’t know shit!’ Erik grumbles as he grabs the chart on his way to the control panel.

  Oscar watches as Erik carries out the same test he’s just done, which produces the same result. Stepping back to read the chart Erik looks at him.

  ‘What did you do? These results are fucked.’

  ‘I didn’t do anything, just the test, what do you think it means?’

  ‘That you fucked up, that’s what’ he said marching out of the control room returning moments later with the boss.

  ‘Show me what you did’ the boss barks at Oscar who carries out the procedure yet again which produces even worse results.

  ‘What the fuck is going on? This can’t be right; it must be a mistake. Now get everything set up ready for the emergency shut down.’

  ‘What…? But we can’t do a shutdown with these readings,’ Oscar said, unable to believe what he is hearing.

  ‘How long have you been working the night shift?’ the boss snarls at Oscar.

  ‘Just tonight, I’m covering a shift.’

  ‘Well, on the night shift I’m in charge and you do what I say, got it?’

  ‘Yes, I understand, but I still don’t think we should do an emergency shut down until the readings are more stable. Can’t it wait until the morning?’

  ‘Erik, put this idiot to work,’ the boss said, turning to Oscar ‘If you value your job you will do as I say, or you can leave and forget about working anywhere in Sweden again,’ he said, before leaving the two men to begin the procedure to carry out an emergency shut down.

  ‘Erik, I know you don’t like me and you’re just following orders, but this is madness, we need to wait, what if we do a Chernobyl?’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous. Chernobyl happened because the workers were incompetent.’

  ‘Like ignoring dangerous readings after several tests carried out by two different people, incompetent like that?’

  ‘Fuck off Oscar, just do your job.’

  ‘Okay, I will, but I want you as my supervisor to write in the procedure book what you want me to do and the levels from the last three tests.’

  ‘No, I won’t do that, now do your job or leave.’

  Realising that Erik was going to carry out the shutdown despite the readings, Oscar takes his outerwear off and places it on the side,

  ‘Erik I would rather be alive and jobless than dead because incompetent fools ignored the danger signals, take this as my notice. But seriously, for the sake of Sweden consider not doing the shutdown, these readings are not safe.’

  Oscar knows by leaving his job in the middle of the night during a shift, especially during a planned shutdown will mean that he will never get work in another power plant again. But he’s certain those readings are unstable and that could potentially be catastrophic. On the drive home he has a feeling of dread in his stomach, he makes the decision to get his family and get as far away as they possibly can, trying to remember where the nearest bunker is?

  Stepping through the door to his flat, he grabs as much packet foods as he can and bundles them into a bag before waking his wife Lilly, and two teenage daughters Olivia and Alice.

  ‘Get up, get up everyone, you have to get up NOW!’ he yells, storming through the flat, switching all the lights on.

  ‘What’s going on, Oscar?’ Lilly asks, clambering out of bed.

  ‘I think the nuclear plant might blow… Like Chernobyl, I’m serious, this is not a joke!’

  Oscar watches the colour drain from his wife’s face.

  ‘We have to get as far away from here as possible, they’re doing an emergency shutdown in two hours, but the readings were not stable enough for a shutdown. We need to pack warm clothes, travel documents, food and bottled water, then we need to get as far away from here as we can.

  It’s been three hours since Oscar and his family set off towards Norway when they feel the car jolt and momentarily the ground seems to disappear from underneath them. Glancing into his rear-view mirror Oscar see’s what he has been dreading, a large plume of orange smoke is billowing into the air.

  ‘Shit…! Oscar, you were right, how did you know? Are we safe?’ Lilly asks.

  ‘No, we’re not safe, but we’re safer than we were at home.’

  ‘Holy fuck!’ Olivia exclaims, leaning over her sister to watch out the back of the car.

  ‘Watch your language young lady,’ Oscar scolds, even though he’s thinking the same thought himself.

  ‘Where can we go, where we will be safe? Lilly said.

  I think we should keep heading west, to Norway and beyond, I’ve heard that there is a community that survived the Chernobyl explosion in Iceland, that’s where we should head.

  ‘Okay, but we will have to stop at some point before then, will we be safe? Do we need to find a bunker?’

  ‘We’ll be safe as long as we don’t eat any fresh food and only drink water that is from a sealed bottle. It will take a while before the fallout spreads this far, but it will come and the only way to stay safe will be to go underground.’

  After a brief stop to fill the car with fuel and supplies, Oscar with his family drive with snow chains on the wheels, west across the top of Norway through dangerous icy Nordic roads until they come to a port that has a crossing to Iceland.

  Desperate to get away as quick as possible without drawing attention to themselves, Oscar checks himself and his family in, asking the ferry worker what life is like in Iceland?

  ‘It’s good, they have life there, like here they haven’t been affected with the explosion, where are you from?’

  ‘Sweden, but my wife has family in Iceland, her mother is dying from cancer, she wants to be with her in her final days.’

  ‘I completely understand, it’s a difficult time for you all! At least you’ll be safe in Iceland, it’s one of the few safe places left.’

  Oscar is relieved to hear that life in Iceland is carrying
on as normal. It won’t escape the fallout from this latest explosion, all he can hope is that there will be enough space for them in the bunker. He’s planning on using his inside knowledge about what happened, to bargain his way in. Taking the tickets he makes his way back to the car,

  ‘Okay, so, life is normal in Iceland, it hasn’t been affected by the first explosion,’ Oscar said.

  ‘But we will need to bargain our way into a bunker, they won’t know what has happened. Also, if anyone asks, we’re visiting family, we don’t want to give any reason to be turned away.’

  ‘How long will we have to stay?’ Olivia asks.

  ‘I don’t know, but it will be years.’

  ‘What about our friends, our neighbours?’ Lilly asks.

  Oscar looks at his wife and realises, she doesn’t understand the reality of their situation,

  ‘Lilly! This is about survival, we got lucky that I happened to be working the night shift, when does that ever happen? If I’d come home as normal, we would all be dead or dying a painful death. Our home’s proximity to the power plant would mean that you and the girls would all be suffering with acute radiation sickness.’

  ‘What about you?’

  ‘I’d be dead, I wouldn’t have made it out of the plant. Anyone who does survive the initial blast is likely to get radiation induced cancer most likely in the thyroid in the near future.’

  The colour drains from Lilly’s face, Oscar turns to look at his girls who have been listening,

  ‘Girls, you understand we can never go back?’

  ‘Are we going to die dad?’ Alice said, her voice barely above a whisper.

  ‘I hope not, that’s why we left, so we have a chance to survive this. I don’t know what will happen but I’m trying to keep us safe, Olivia are you okay?’ he asks watching his eldest child who looks like she is about to throw up, before opening the car door, vomiting on the floor.

  ‘I am now,’ she replies pulling the door closed ‘Dad, just tell me what I have to do to help, we must survive, there can’t be many humans left alive on earth. Before this accident I’d heard the news, I knew that we were lucky to be alive.’

  They are distracted by a ferry worker in a yellow jacket heading towards them

  ‘Remember, we’re visiting relatives in Iceland,’ Oscar reminds them as the worker reaches the car and knocks on the window.

  ‘The ferry has been delayed, there’s been an incident at the Forsmark power plant in Sweden.’

  ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘Apparently an explosion, it’s all we need, another nuclear explosion.’

  ‘Hopefully it’s nothing too serious, do you know how long the ferry will be delayed for?’

  ‘It shouldn’t be too long, we just have to make sure there’s no one contaminated trying to board the ferry, but the incident only happened a couple of hours ago, it’s unlikely anyone contaminated will be here. Just sit tight for a little while longer and I’m sure we’ll be away soon.’

  ‘Fuck. I hope they don’t dig too deep; it wouldn’t take too much digging to find out that I work there,’ Oscar said looking at Lilly.

  Thirty minutes later, Oscar notices some commotion amongst the ferry workers and suddenly the back of the ferry is being lowered, he looks at his wife and around at the girls who are both sleeping.

  ‘I don’t want to be too optimistic, but it looks like we’ll be boarding soon,’ he said, a rush of relief flooding his system.

  It doesn’t take long before Oscar is guiding the car onto the ferry and parking up. The ferry will take four days to sail to Iceland, Oscar books two cabins next door to each other.

  Four days later Oscar wakes early, the ferry is due to dock at 7:30am and by 5am he’s ready to get his family off the ferry to safety. He made sure to make friends with the cabin crew and soon found out the name of the mayor in Iceland. The mayor will be his first port of call, it will be him, Magnus Jonsson who will decide if Oscar and his family will be given a place in a bunker.

  Chapter 15

  Four months later.

  Entering the mayor’s office George’s heart almost stops when he spots Icelandic prime minister Steingrimur Hermannsson, a man he doesn’t know and a police officer he doesn’t know.

  ‘What’s going on?’ George asks.

  ‘George thanks for coming, this is...’

  ‘I know who it is, tell me what’s going on? What are the radiation levels?’

  ‘Significant. I’m making plans for all government officials and their families to move into the bunkers placed around Iceland. Let me introduce you to Oscar Andersson, he and his family are from Sweden, they arrived here four months ago,’ Magnus said, indicating the man standing in the office.

  ‘No offense but I don’t care who he is, what I want to know is where the rest of the people are going to go, if the government officials are going to the bunkers?’

  ‘We can’t accommodate everyone George, we have to prioritise.’

  ‘And that’s that? As long as the government officials are catered for, the rest of us can go to hell. Will the icebreaker be available to take myself, Sarah, Connor, Seamus and his girls back home? Because if I’d known what was going on sooner, I would have left three months ago when my boat could have got through the ice.’

  ‘Yes, if that’s what you want George, but the reason we called you in is that, Oscar worked at Forsmark nuclear power plant in Sweden and he tells us that he left before it exploded four months ago, that is why we are getting radiation readings. According to Oscar, the readings will continue to get higher depending on the wind. We would like you along with Oscar to help us create a temporary fallout shelter for the people of the town, before it’s too late,’ Magnus said.

  ‘A temporary fallout shelter will be near on impossible, there’s no point unless you’re planning on digging a massive hole, lining it with concrete, filling it with enough non-perishable food and bottled water to do the whole town for up to fifteen plus years. Is that what you, me and Oscar can do? It would be better to help the people build their own smaller bunkers. I can accommodate up to 100 including myself and Sarah, at my bunker but I will need extra supplies, bedding, clothing, food, medicine and bottled water. Have you even told the people to stop drinking the water?’

  George watches the men exchange a look, ‘Of course not, why would you help people help themselves? Better to cover up that they may be in danger, you should be ashamed,’ he said, unable to believe the situation.

  ‘I warned you months ago to get a plan in place.’

  George paces back and forth, stopping to look out of the large window across the town.

  ‘The people trust you Magnus and you have betrayed them.’

  ‘What can I do George? help me help them,’ Magnus said, from behind his desk.

  ‘For a start, I would advise doing a radio broadcast telling everyone about the radiation, and how to start building their own bunkers and stocking their own supplies, there won’t be enough food and water for everyone, but at least give the people a chance. What is the nuclear emergency plan?’

  ‘We don’t have one,’ Steingrimur said.

  ‘Well that is ridiculous, all countries should have a nuclear emergency plan, what were the bunkers built for?’

  ‘Several bunkers were built during the cold war,’ Magnus said.

  ‘That makes sense, the threat of nuclear bombs, nuclear ionised radiation is an invisible enemy and contaminates everything it comes into contact with. Magnus I’ve explained this to you already, you need to tell everyone to stop drinking the water and eating fresh food. Have there been many unexplained deaths recently? I’m out of the loop with Sarah still not fit to work.’

  ‘Yes, there’s been a number of deaths, and I’m afraid to say that the numbers are increasing at a rapid rate recently. The hospital has been warned to quarantine anyone they suspect has radiation poisoning or been in contact with anyone who has symptoms of radiation poisoning,’ Magnus said.

  �
��Good, at least that is something,’ George said. ‘The thing is, the explosion was what, four months ago? Is that right?’ He asks, directing the question to Oscar.

  ‘Yes, the explosion happened shortly after I left work and was already on my way here,’ Oscar said.

  ‘How convenient!’ George said, eyeing the newcomer.

  Ignoring the tension between George and Oscar, Magnus tells them that radiation was traced in the air a few weeks after what they thought was a mild earthquake.

  ‘The air readings have stabilised, but some men went out to test various sites across the island and significant levels have been recorded all over. All the pins in the map show where high levels have been found,’ Magnus said, indicating the map of Iceland on the wall.

  George studies the map, horrified at how many pins there are across the island. ‘The snow that has been falling these past three months is likely to contain significant levels of ionised radiation. When the snow melts, it will penetrate the land, and anything grown will be contaminated. The water will already be contaminated.’

  ‘The only way people will have any chance of survival is for them to go underground,’ Oscar said.

  ‘We know that Oscar, the problem is that there isn’t enough room for everyone, right now Magnus and Steingrimur here are planning on giving the bunker to all the government officials, the rest of us can go to hell,’ George said, staring at the other men in the room.

  ‘George there’s room for you and Sarah in the bunker, we need your expertise, and you and your family Oscar,’ Magnus said.

  ‘Don’t worry about me and Sarah, we’ll go back to Blackcliff Island with Seamus and his girls and Connor. You can use Oscar for information. Magnus have the icebreaker ready first thing in the morning,’ George said, stepping out of the office, leaving the other men staring after him dumbfounded.