After the Protests
Punishments
Protests demanding the trial for five power executives were successful. Their trial took place from the 7th to the 30th of July 1987 in a temporary courtroom set up in the House of Culture in the city of Chernobyl, Ukraine. Five plant employees were sentenced up to ten years in labor camps. The families of Aleksandr Akimov, Leonid Toptunov and, Valery Perevozchenko had received official letters, but prosecution against the employees had been terminated at their deaths.
Radiation
The short-term impact of the protests was that people were demanding the end of the nuclear age. People were also getting afflictions like thyroid cancer and cataracts. The total case count was 20,000 people. Radiation from the core of graphite was leaking high amounts. Contamination in rivers and lakes was a big thing too, poisoning livestock. Now reactors around the world have immense safety precautions to alert and evacuate the public in the event of a disaster.
Map of Radiation, farlabs.edu, date unknown
Some of the workers who were put to trial.
Anatoly Dyatlov, V.A. Orlov, Date unknown
Victor Bryukhanov, Chernobylx.com, date unknown
Nikolai M. Fomin, thesun.co, date unknown