The U.S.’s reaction to this catastrophe was immediate shock and horror. A lot of false news reports were made, dramatizing what happened. Nonetheless, the message was the same: nothing like this could ever be allowed to happen again.
Two days after the incident a Soviet news agency known as Tass reported on the nuclear accident, yet the Soviet government only acknowledged the incident eighteen days after it happened. Despite trying to cover up their error, the Soviet government did quickly make plans to evacuate over 50,000 residents from the nearby area, Pripyat.
The U.S.’s reaction to this catastrophe was immediate shock and horror. A lot of false news reports were made, dramatizing what happened. Nonetheless, the message was the same: nothing like this could ever be allowed to happen again.
USA power plants have more than thirty years of technological development, constantly changing for the better. After the Chernobyl incident, a “Safety in Depth” approach was reinforced, insuring that at least one full time resident inspector would be at the site of the power plant. The 1979 Three Mile Island, a U.S. power plant meltdown, caused an uproar, leading to even more emphasis on safety
protocol, further ensuring that the Chernobyl accident remain a tragic mistake, and not a common occurrence.
“I hope that now that we know more from declassified archival records about the major public health catastrophe that followed the Chernobyl accident that we will be more careful in the future in building (or not) nuclear reactors and storing radioactive waste from those reactors. That is our most major problem right now.” ~Kate Brown, author of Manual For Survival: A Chernobyl Guide to the Future
Chernobyl's Four Reactors