Comments by "Mikko Rantalainen" (@MikkoRantalainen) on "Chernobyl Episode 1 - 1:23:45 - Nuclear Engineer Reacts" video.

  1. A highly simplified way to describe nuclear reactors is to say that nuclear reactors have special kind of rocks close to each other under water, which boils the water and you can use the steam to make electricity. And the power is adjusted by moving those special rocks closer or further from each other. And Chernobyl was result of putting a lot of those rocks too close to each other because operators didn't understand putting all those rocks too close to each other could be dangerous. In addition, the reactor core emergency shutdown system (called SCRAM in modern reactors) was poorly designed and didn't work correctly when the operators finally tried to activate it.
    1