By the fall of 1986, the emergency crews fighting to contain the nuclear disaster at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant made it into the basement. They turned a corner into a steam corridor beneath failed reactor Number 4 and found not steam, but black lava that had oozed out of the core, eaten through meters of concrete, and settled on the floor. The largest and most famous formation in the corridor was a two-ton wrinkled mass that their radiation sensors firmly told them not to approach. With cameras pushed in from around a corner, the workers documented the dimly lit mass. This is the true story of the Elephant’s Foot.
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Thanks for watching. The second in my "Half-Life Histories" series, let me know what you think of the new format!
I love it!
It looks great :D
It's awesome
These are amazing and I look forward to many more!
Keep 'em coming, man.
“This photo cost a man his life.” Chills, dude.
That photo didn't cost a life the guy who took it has a yt channel where he explored the inside for 20 min he made lots of pictures I forgot the name but I'm sure u can find it
@@DammedMan. Alexandr kupyi
Story was fortunately fake.
Alexandr kupyi is the guy who entered Chernobyl and took photos
Me too, me too...
Radiation poisening seems so unreal to me. It's hard to wrap your head around the fact that simply standing near the wrong kind of rock can kill you
And you don't even have the needed senses to notice it. You can't see or feel it. Nor smell, taste or hear. It's just there. And you'll only know when it's to late. (Edit: I have, after dozens of messages, learned that you can in fact taste radiation. The exact taste seems to differ per reaction, but sweet and metallic are named most. You can all now stop filling my inbox. Thanks.)
And it burns like fire that you can't see. It's really bad. Only thing you can hear is the screeching of geigermeter.
Fission radiation does not really occur in nature, this includes the universe. its almost always man made.
@@mennograafmans1595 i heard plutonium taste sweet, i wonder if it'll be a good and healthy exchange for my sugar diet
@@mennograafmans1595 You can feel the presence of very high levels of radiation, because you smell it and it puts a metallic taste in your mouth. Air molecules are ionized by gamma radiation. However, by then you absorbed a serious, if not fatal dose of radiation.
It's crazy how far the radiation actually reached. I have family in the Black Forest at the border to Switzerland and you're STILL not supposed to pick mushrooms in that forest because of the radiation.
What distance is that from the site of the reactor?
@@bobcondon9602roughly 2000km
Even in the UK lamb and milk were banned from parts of Wales and the Lake District until pretty recently due to radiation. The wind was blowing this way at some point and it rained and they were the worst hit areas in the UK. That I know of, there's now nowhere with high enough radiation here that there are restrictions (I could be wrong), but it's only been a few years since restrictions were lifted.
Hahahaha what a joke
@martyvirtue4051 evil much?
10:13, knowing that the photographer died taking this picture, it's just uncanny knowing that if you were actually there in that very perspective displayed in the picture, you too would basically be dead. Like just standing there seeing it ensures you're already in the clutches of the silent horror surrounding it. It's a quality that certainly makes a picture like this... difficult to look at
i'm sure the photographer are unknown to radiation danger at that time, he just being used and command to take a picture by a superior or something, what horrible is they look and picture and probably think that was alien lifeform and dont know it was corium
It just shows and proves not to underestimate radioactivity even many years after the reactor meltdown. Becuase it sticks around for so long
1st camera man in history who didn’t make it
@@reptyy4126yea but it also shows it’s not that dangerous. This is probably the worst it could get. Nuclear power overall is safe and radiation isn’t all that bad. It’s bad ofc but it’s blown wayyyyy out of proportion.
I feel like I’m gonna get radiation poisoning just from watching this video
Every Karen: 5G CaUsEs CaNcEr
This reminds me of Styropyro's video about going blind from laser videos, except this has a much darker tone
Like watching anything horror feel like you’re getting cursed just watching
@Porl Inch How?
@Porl Inch but it’s just a video
“Hi, I’m Steve-O, and today I’m gonna be sitting bare ass on the Elephant’s Foot”
HAHAHA
Underrated comment 😂😂😂
That shit funny asf 😂
The man who could sit everywhere.... dies of ass cancer 😞 History repeats itself
How many videos are you going to put this comment on? Do you have an extra chromosome?
My grandfather was a Latvian man who was sent to Chernobyl as a liquidator, recently I spoke to my nan about it and she told me what the general said to him when he arrived “you’ll face so much radiation that your bones will glow a hundred years in the grave” sure enough he died a few years later from heart failure
mmm....he helped...
Respect for him! may his soul rest in utmost peace!
@@abhijitpodder9916 mhm....
Many thanks to your grand father it's horrifying to know that people died for lack of knowledge and power.
Wow, my family is from Latvia as well, respect to him
As horrible as this incident was, it was important for us to realize what nuclear war could bring. No one wins, everyone loses.
I also don't remember last time a solar panel exploded in my face.
Except this wasn't a deliberate act of destruction. It was just human error at the wrong place at the wrong time.
@@dianauwu1312exactly. It was just a basic and simple accident that caused all of that. So the thought of what an INTENTIONAL nuclear strike would do....tends to spread awareness, yeah?
@@dantees5734And hysteria
Listen to the accounts of the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
What if one day, the elephant’s foot just started... moving around like a slug.
Why didn't you keep that to yourself
Lmao I don't why I imagined it to be funny
don't tempt fate
SCP 1984 (I know it’s not SCP 1984, but for the sake of the joke) HAS BREACHED CONTAINMENT
I'm definitely going to have a nightmare fuel
There’s apparently some fungus growing on the elephant’s foot right now. If you ask me, that’s a seriously impressive display of the adaptability of life.
@The Once and Future King! well, that will make it even more impressive, we should study it ;)
I think that's the Hulk of fungus.
@@iforgot8376 it's a hulkus
@The Once and Future King! let's hope. I thought we would get aliens or some shit by now.
I'm sorry, WHAT? Fungus is growing on it??
My great grandfather was a liquidator. She was a chemist and was one of the very first personnel to arrive at the scene and was responsible for removing contaminated soil. She survived Holodomor, WW2, Chernobyl, the fall of the soviet union, the Russian invasion, and died of natural causes yesterday at age 90.
Grandfather or grandmother? I’m getting mixed signals. Still a chad.
You mixed up the pronouns a lil bit but whichever way it is, your grandparent is a serious tank to be able to stand all of that. I commend them for their strength, they seem like they had so many stories to tell!
Dude your grandparent was a fucking unit
Brain.exe has ceased functioning.
Umm... Grandmother or grandfather? You said "she" twice, but you said grandfather once.
"This photo cost a man his life" geez bro that gave me chills I hope that man rests in peace and calm
Their heart isn't beating. Complete cognitive shutdown. Gone. There is no peace to be rested in as they have died. Just a little fun fact.
@@Tonjit41 edge lord
@@Tonjit41ok pointdexter
Imagine if all the cursed objects in history are just radioactive things.
Probably lol
the fact you had 69 likes when i read this scares me
The ark of the covenant just had a highly radioactive chunk of metal inside of it. Maybe that's why they made it out of gold (radiation shield), and opening it would kill you?
Reminds me of being on the presence of the orb of confusion
Theres actually a lot of hypothesis that believe exactly that
Can't believe this is what my parents walked through to get to school
uno reverse
underrated comment
ikr
This.....this comment right here...... chefs kiss
Oh this is the one right here yall
Radiation poisoning and radioactive material is so fascinating for me. As a Native American descendant, I was always curious about my people’s history, stories, and folklore. And learning about just how much devastation can come from even a small amount of radioactive material makes me wonder if stories about dead lands or cursed bodies, caves, or objects were just how my ancestors came to understand radiation
This is a really fascinating take. The idea would make a great book or TV series, with that unique perspective.
@@benjamindoyle668 it would be now that you mention it
@@tylerallison9735 I would read it!!
Radiation amongst other things. Indigenous knew humans are not meant to live in some places . Another reason is because of other beings who lived in such areas
i highly doubt it, our ancestors were smart asf but not no Einstein an the folk lore is most likely just fiction
The amount of force required to explode the lid off the reactor through the roof was approximately 709 million Newtons. That means the lid accelerated at 391 m/s^2 which is equal to 875 mph. That’s insanity… I don’t think we can really even comprehend the shear magnitude of what was happening in the reactor. Great video, love you work!
Lid was ejected by force of overheated and expanding steam only, not by nuclear explosion (as many still believe).
You literally would not even be able to see it, it’s actually INSANE
Stop with your numbers math wizard and and explain it to me like im a 5 year old.
@@KadenHartley wild shit
@@KadenHartleythe lid went bing bang boop pop!
I don't think as humans we can possibly grasp how ridiculously hot "half as hot as the sun" is
Yeah we can. Tungsten has a ridiculous 3400C° melting point, that's more than half as hot as the sun surface and hotter than the elephant's foot even been, yet we can melt it. Core sun temperature though, that is uh... 15 million C°. Kinda wild
Well yeah, just approaching the sun would likely disintegrate a human.
I think that everybody who had a girlfriend before grasps "half as hot as the sun".
the sun isn't even that hot of a star, yet its still incredibly hot, also if you are curious about some man made hot temperatures, the guy mentioning tungsten has a point, but also, look up arc welding, its a nifty trick.
I mean, a single lightning bolt of 5x hotter than the surface of the sun
The fungus that lives in the basement with the elephant's foot: "Finally some good fuckin food"
The fungus after seeing the humans not approaching the basement: “pathetic.”
The fungus after 38.000 years: "WAAAAAAGH DA ORKZ! KRUSH SMASH KRUMP STOMP!"
The fungus protected by the emperor
@@tripweed O h no
@@davisdf3064 Commencing orbital bombardment.
Having the Elephant's Foot described as 'escaping confinement' gives massive SCP vibes. Honestly Corium feels like an IRL SCP and i think its wild that we exist at a point in history where we hear about manmade horrors beyond our comprehension and just carry on with our day lol. Sick video btw 👍
I currently am trying to get an scp approved.
IRL SCP is straight-up what cleaning up radioactive contamination is, now that you mention it. Special procedure(s) carried out to contain a strange hazard, preventing it from harming others with its destructive properties... such as rad emissions. It's literally the same thing... which is a little terrifying to think about lol
Does this include/related to asbestos removal?
Actual people died and were horrifically maimed by intense radiation, and you're here to make jokes about shitty creepypasta
@@TransistorBased That's how we humans are. We always have, we always will. For many, even those involved in such events, it's a good coping mechanism. And people make jokes in far, far worse taste than this.
If Lovecraft was freaked out by the color spectrum and air conditioners, imagine what story he'd write about this!
He did. One of the Outer Gods is called the Nuclear Chaos adter all.
Nuclear power is like Airplanes; Extremely safe, but when it *Does* go bad, it goes bad big time.
and both are used in civil and military stuff
Anything that dangerous has to be super safe but it seems that if anything is extremely safe and it fails, it's always a big disaster. Oil rigs, space shuttles, or anything of the sort basically means certain death but nuclear reactors take the number one spot of the worst man-made disaster that could happen. Well maybe the artificial disaster that was avoided when all of the world's flora would've died tops that.
Still would rather stick with steam engines, thank you very much
@@wolfetteplays8894 arent most energy sources just steam engines except with different ways to turn them?
@@wolfetteplays8894 which are more dangerous
“Wow! Check it out guys! That thing looks just like an elephant’s foot. Lol!” *coughs blood*
Dang, right.
This shouldn't be funny, but it is.
*heart falls out*
I feel so bad for laughing at this haha
Lo
One of my earliest memories is actually of the news coverage of this accident. I was 4 at the time. My mom, who had grown up in the darkest years of the Cold War, was horrified, which is probably why it remains a strong memory for me. It was a hell of a thing to see on the news, and how grim the newscasters were talking about the fallout.
I remember it too although I was a little bit older. Terrifying. Even at the other side of Europe.
I remember hearing about a big time Hollywood movie that was filming in eastern Europe. They told everyone on set that it was a minor meltdown and nothing to worry about... but don't drink the milk for the next few weeks.
"CORIUM" what an awesome name for a hard/heavy rock band!🎉
Indeed.
Yea but how heavy? at the start he said it was 2 tons, then he said 4000 kg. That is 4 metric tons or 4.4 imperial tons.
The elephant's foot is the closest thing we have to an SCP entry
There are a few but it's the best candidate.
Probably be like a Keter SCP due to probably how hard it would be to transport Edit: Thanks for replying to me everyone! I was rather new to SCPs so I was still confused. Thanks!
@@boop993 wouldn't it be safe? They dont need to transport it, they just have to keep people away. Edit: please stop replying, the debate was fun at first but now it is just kinda annoying.
As it is currently contained, but still deadly and approaching groundwater- I would say that it is currently Euclid class, but could potentially upgrade to Keter if it's determined it would explode again from the contact
Scp rating is based off of how hard it is to contain not how dangerous it is so it would be a safe as everything has already been evacuated meaning nothing else would have to be done to contain it
Recently scientists discovered a fungus living there. It just decided to snack on the foot. What a madman.
We need to know more
Life finds a way
The "godzilla" fungus that use radiation as food ala plant using sunlight?
Rad rhodium fungus funk
Shit bruh got hungry
The corium deposit below chernobyl is one of the only things on this planet that can still kill after it’s dead
As someone who was born less than 100 miles away. Its terrifying but also informative as well. Thank you.
Corpse of Chernobyl is a pretty good name for a death metal band
There's a band called Cytotoxin that made a whole album about Chernobyl named "Gammageddon"
Damn, yes it is.
I was just thinking while watching this that there's probably a band out there named Corium.
I love how the acronym is CoC... the death metal band pronounced "cock"
@@smokugoku well that just makes it better
"This picture cost a man his life. End quote." That really affected me.
Same.
Chills!😱
Affected you how? Where is the proof of it killing the man, just a story.
@@odgie9915 I was deeply saddened by the simple notion of unintended sacrifice. Being in the military, I had lost someone I knew through something similarly unecessary. Whether the photographer in this story actually died or not with vetted evidence is inconsequential to the quote and idea "affecting" me.
@@AaronPaulIbarrola and that's why not to join the military
I have to say, a lot of people who make these kinds of videos put on ominous music in the background and talk about the subject like at any moment it could break down your door and kill you. So it’s kind of relieving that you explained it so calmly.
I’ve gone down a rabbit hole of the Elephant’s Foot. I can’t get enough of it. This is my favorite thing right now.
I’m going down the same rabbit hole right now. It fills me with so much dread, but I just can’t get enough!
It’s kinda scary to think that this thing is alone, sealed away in the cold, dark, wet basement of a power plant in a city that has long since been abandoned. And it’ll still be there when all of us are dead, in that cold, dark, wet basement
And its still eating its way down and down under the basement
Scary to think this thing will be there for so long. It could impact us, our children, our grandchildren.
I like this description. It's truly terrifiying and scarier than any horror movie ever made, IMO.
That is a scary way to put it, but i like it!
I wonder... Will it run out of steam before it reaches the core? Is it even possible for it to do that? If it does, what would happen, if anything?
“The elephant’s foot” is the most ominous, terrifying name they could’ve chosen for that It sounds like the name of an scp
What is a SCP?
@@alventuradelacruz522 SCP stands for Secure, Contain, Protect. It's a fictional organization that tries to contain objects that violate natural law.
@@Endymion766 That's their motto. SCP stands for Special Containment Procedures.
Maybe it is a scp
I mean for all intents and purposes it might as well be one. It's just the Russian government containing it now instead of some hidden organization. Could either classify it as a very dangerous "safe" SCP or maybe "euclid". Depends on how much it costs to contain and how well they have it contained now.
I find it ironic the best way to block radiation is another dangerous rock
Which dangerous rock were you referring to?
@@user-wm3bf7pi3u Lead
@@user-wm3bf7pi3u lead
@@user-wm3bf7pi3u probably lead or graphite, if you count either material as a rock
@@jackradzelovage6961 Or dangerous, OK don't like the lead but we ARE graphite.
THANK YOU so much for bringing context to some of the pictures. Always wanted to know more about how they came to be.
Can’t believe you left the best part about this thing out of the video. This thing is so dense that not even a drill mounted on a remote controlled trolley could break through it. It took an armor-piercing round from an AK-47 to even damage the surface, which means someone had to look at it and go, “What if we shot it?”
that was something I immediately thought about
I hope I don't sound weird, but it looks so smooth, as you could sit on it or something. I couldn't imagine it would be so hard and dense.
@@IaIaIanopipipi I imagine it is like slag on a fresh weld. Brittle, but super fucking hard.
that was literally my first question i had. what would it take to shoot a hole into it
I don’t imagine that would work because I imagine you do know how a ap round works but the outside jacket comes off and the inner one carries it’s motion and I can’t imagine that working agains something as thick or as hard as something that can withstand a drill as drills can dig into harder things than a bullet can shoot
“Could be dubbed as the most dangerous piece of waste in the world” My parents would beg to differ
Why is that? Haven't cleaned your room again?
@@Beef1188 I mean more being a dyspraxic with a music degree. I’m either gonna be broke or I’ll break my neck falling down stairs.
@@Someone89a nearly thought you were a serial killer, mate.
:)) Good one!
@@Someone89a im currently majoring in music so.... same
What an amazing video. Never had the meltdown explained so well before. Thank you!
I still often think about all the brave souls that put their lives on the line (and were frequently taken from this world as a result) to help clean this mess up.
"This photo cost a man's life." That is the most eerie thing I've ever heard
Damn, this shit is so cool the biggest planet in our solar system wants to comment
Jupiter is cool and all but I'm more interested in Uranus...
@@adityagunjal7104 lol
@@kellanfeng Thanks for sucking up all those Earth-killing asteroids, solar system daddy. ❤
@@JohnGardnerAlhadis Hmmm📸
In times I need to be humbled I can remember that a literal pile of goo would clap me into the next dimension after bout 2 minutes.
This comment right here sent me.
This sent me too
This is absolute nonsense and I don't get why this keeps being propagated over and over.
@@Dennis19901 what are you on about
@@silentxwxlf It should be pretty clear if you can read my and the OP's comment.
This is by far the best video I've seen on the internet about the elephants foot brother, thank you so much for learning all this info and then explaining in a way that is easy for me to understand. I would have been much smarter if I had a teacher that would have explained information like you do. Again, many thanx to you!!
A really arresting and engaging piece of work, clearly based on some very solid background research for your original work. Thank you so much for posting this!
arresting? you mean interresting right?
@@TantalumPolytopeor captivating
I feel like the Elephant’s Foot is something that idiot middle school boys would dare one another to touch if it weren’t (presumably) heavily-guarded.
yeah you can't go anywhere near reactor four without being forcefully escorted away or, if that doesn't work, outright shot. the nearby city of pripyat, now a ghost town because of the disaster, is open for tours (in case you wanted to visit).
We can't decide who deserves to die... But if anyone's dumb enough to touch that monstrosity *then* they deserve to die!😱
“Hey Jim, touch the Elephants foot.” Fuvkin dies.
cheese touch
I DOUBLE DOG DARE YOU!!!
The name of the "elephant foot" and tone of the video make it look like an SCP, the terrifying fact is that it's an actual real thing.
Perhaps the origin of the flesh that hates?
Yeah, at 5:45 when he shows that diagram of corium dissolving concrete really reminded me of the foundation.
Ohh the SCP thing is blowing up
SCP-1986
What is a SCP?
Just imagine the gorgeus amount of calories
Forbidden cheat meal
Quite spicey
Yummy yummy in my tummy.
"This picture cost a man's life" The quote hit hard
“The radioactive lava flow...” That’s three words that shouldn’t be in the same sentence.
God... "The" is so dangerous... Cant imagine what it's like whilst being radioactive AND lava
So why did you add a fourth? You looking for a sentence meltdown or something?
@@GetawayFilms The obvious highlight is “radioactive lava flow”. I’m sure the quote wouldn’t have made sense without the “The”.
@Insomnia_Gaming I don't have to worrie about that my mum has passed 20yrs ago
The.... WHAT
"This photo cost a man his life." I think that might be the most poignant one sentence summary of the Chernobyl disaster I have heard.
Assuming it is true. It was just some shit the guy heard at third hand, and who knows how honest the second guy (or third guy) is. It came from a guy who claims that he got it from a guy who told him that "he heard" that it was taken by a man "they sent down" to snap a single photo. Any one of those people could be lying or mistaken, and who did he hear it from, the guy who held the photographers safety rope, or a guy who heard from a guy who heard a story once? They knew well enough to rig up a remote camera for the other photo, yet they are sending a man down to risk his life for an inferior photo at a later date? Seems implausible.
And it is attention grabbing bullshit like a lot of the rest of this sadly very unscientific video. Just a simple google of the "Elephant's Phoot Photo" dismisses this story every time it is posted. The guy that visited the Elephants Foot dozends of times over the years is hard to reach but was at least in 2014 still alive and giving interviews. If you want further examples in this video there is also the statement "Corium might be one of the rares artificial materials". By his own admission over 100t of corium had been created by Chernobyl alone, and then you have Elements like Oganesson or Astatine of which not even a single gram exist in the Earths crust at any given time and only micrograms have ever been artificially produced.
Had to comment, it was at 666 likes lol
There's also the urban myth that the 3 divers who volunteered their lives died, but actually two of them are still alive and the third one died in 2005 (aged 65). The lack of official communication from the Soviets resulted in an insane amount of speculation that are now often considered as facts.
It must've been terrifying for the guys who went down there when they measured the radiation just to find out it's Off the chart high... They either took the photo before measurements or that photo is not that old meaning it was taken at a time the elephant's foot wasn't nearly as radioactive anymore, cause you ain't gonna tell me some guys went down there saw radiation levels that would make a nuke blush and decided "well...we are going to die so might as well take a picture"
This video was excellently narrated - thank you for sharing this
I remember my mom told me (she lived in a little town in Romania) that after they reported the incident in a few days lot of the trees were cooked by radiation. Bark turning yellow, leaves turning crimson red. And since they were town folk when the officials told them to stay inside they didn't listen and some they still turned out fine!
The fungus near elephants foot: “Why is it spicy”
i can hear this comment nooo 😭😭😭
Spicy, burning cold, and tastes like a penny
@@Hesuklista Do you taste metal?
If fungus had a brain like ours, it would detect a metallic taste but in general, radiation has no flavor, it would be dead instantly anyway.
@@XTCYDVL same 😭
It's hard to believe that one day this monstrosity might end up in a museum (if the human race survives long enough for the radiation to die off). Imagine how surreal it would be to look at it in person.
It would be like 2100 years in the future
@@varioustie3182 like 5 times longer my man
@@mateuszodrzywoek8658 oh lol
@Its me or whatever Visiting the elephants foot in a museum carrying 20 rad-aways like its fallout.
They say it's becoming full of little fractures. In the future, it might just fall apart due to radioactive decay, who knows...
Kyle im ngl. Youre like Bill Nye. You make science interesting, terrible, human-driven freak accidents and all. Keep up the good work man.
and to think that it is STILL "alive".... incerdible yet terrifying
those brave souls who tried to contain the mess after the meltdown, they are truly selfless.
*were
They had no idea what they were doing. The soviet union wasn't known for it's transparency.
They had no choice
I knew a doctor specialized in geriatrics in my hospital, where I work as a nurse, who once briefly mentioned that he was a firefighter in That disaster. My respect for him maxed out at that moment.
@@wutzibu I thought they all died..?
My Chemistry teacher in eleventh Grade was just a kid when Chernobyl happened. He was living just three blocks from reactor four. He says it's because of this he went on to become a chemist so he could teach the future generation how to prevent this from happening again. We always joke about science teachers being tough when it comes to do experiments without proper ppe, but he would give you a month of detention for taking your safety glasses off before he said we could leave class. He made sure we understood that if we didn't follow the rules there was severe consciousness. I thank him almost everyday because I love chemistry and I follow the rules to the T and go off if someone doesn't, even in my daily life
More power to both of you
What a wise man with an incredible life lesson to give
*severe consequences* you mean?
To be fair, he had personally experienced what can happen if you do not follow the rules as specified. Even though the operators at the plant did not know that they set the reactor up for disaster (effectively turning the AZ-5 key into a detonator), the rules specified that they was not suppose to do what they did. But they did not know WHY the rules was what they were (as that would have likely been politically embarrassing as it showed that the RBMK reactor design at that time was not as safe as it should have been) and simply assumed that it was the same as so many other rules in the USSR which was there for political reasons (and could thus be violated by the authorities without too serious consequence, especially if other political considerations superseded them).
Good things happen when you pay attention to your teachers
Honestly when i first heard about chernobyl like a few years back i thought there were like freaking zombies running around and that was the dangerous part, [yes i was stupid] but now i understand that radiation is even more disturbing than that
Yeah I thought there was some half life sh going down over there until like 2019
Thanks for making this video! Found this during my hyper fixation on the Chernobyl disaster and it was super helpful!
"this photo, cost a man his life." It was such a scary sentence to hear. I just began to imagine just what was going through his mind after seeing the elephant's foot and how he felt when he came back up. It was just such a terrifying sentence when lots of thought is put behind it.
Especially when you know you have already received a death sentence and there is no way to escape
He was a legend.
He definitely was
Chad cameraman goes down, takes a picture, refuses to elaborate. Virgin Elephant's Foot keeps standing there confused.
This man would've likely felt nauseous at first, his skin reddening with a side of dizziness, but then after a few days it would seemingly disappear, until then he'd rapidly deteriorate and die. A horrible way to go.
Well done as always science Thor! Your work has always brought me joy and kept me learning. I do have a question on this subject. Has there ever been speculation on utilization of corium for any nefarious purpose?
I have to say I find your videos fascinating and to know the facts and relate them the way you do bravo.
I read a comment about this once: "The elephant's foot is the real Medusa from greek myth, to look at it directly you die."
Jesus Christ, that sent a shiver down my spine.
That could be a cool black mirror episode lol
@@ThePsychicCellPhones Oh yeah!
And the average human could only survive unblinking for about 200 seconds, way too similar, it’s like the Greeks found some Corium in a cave that had revolved around one of their raise or summin
Statue
I don’t have a foot fetish, *but those are some hot feet*
Feet pics to die for
They are very *hot*
Nice joke
You just had to Gonzalez
This comment KILLED me!
Your very good at explaining things…..this was very interesting and informative I appreciate it
Thanks for the work. Saw your short and now I’m here learning to prevent another rewrite of history
Did you know that one of the study notes on the elephants foot says “not penetrable by kalashnikov rifle”
Yeah they fired some shots at it and they all bounced off.🤣 Makes me wonder why exactly they carried AK's in the first place.
I saw that on the wiki page
Why not try shooting at it
@@gonnegottkehaskamp1667 it was Russia (Ukraine technically) in the *1980s*. You tell me why they had Kalashnikovs.
@@dancingcarapace What I meant was why did they carry AK's down there into the belly of the reactor? Thats about 3,5 kg of long, clunky and (in that situation kinda useless) weight. Still they carried at least one AK with them. Makes me wonder what they were expecting to find down there.
It's just so horrifyingly fascinating that this terrible radioactive accident just... spawned this uncanny thing that kills you if you get near it. It's like a story straight outta comic books.
It’s man made
I think it’s called “the demon core” and it had the potential to be very radioactive and give you over 10 times the lethal dose within a fraction of a second.
Halo Reach killball
"Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't." -Mark Twain
Bro it’s a irl SCP
Very good video. I don’t really understand the science behind it, but it’s very well explained and shown. Great work.
Really epic stuff. Great writing and presentation, thanks for the videos.
My uncle was a liquidator of this disaster, he volunteered right after it became a public knowledge in the Soviet Union, he served in the "Chemical Troops" before, and knew what the radiation can do. He was one of the group which was tasked to spot and map out the places in and around Pripyat that were exposed to the highest doses of radiation, basically a radioactive intelligence. He was hospitalized and had his bone marrow transplanted, he was on a wheelchair for around a year. He's alive and feeling good now.
Your uncle is a badass, I wish you and him all best.
A living legend with glow-in-the-dark bones!
@@gaelen5868 😐
That's amazing! What an absolute legend!
HOW- That man is a legend, God bless his soul he's doing ok now
So the elephant's foot is like the monkey's paw, except you only get one wish and that wish is required to be "I want to die horribly"
So you're the type of person that goes around comparing things that are totally different to each other, then claim they are the same... You should be in politics
@@GetawayFilms chill out lol. They were just trying to make a statement
@@Jas13579 chill out.. so was I
@Its me or whatever what? rofl, so is that
@@GetawayFilms you must be fun at parties
You're a very good storyteller. Entertained and informed by your narrative.
that was extremely educational and something our society should know!!! Thank you for putting that out there for us!
There's not enough coverage of the brave ppl that sacrificed their lives to contain Chernobyl, everyone knows about the meltdown but not many people know of the dozens of people who knew they were going to die if they went in, but still marched in with 1 bag of sand, dumped it in the core then came back and waited to die. Amazing people and an amazing sacrifice I'm glad you mentioned them.
They dumped sand and Boron with helicopters on the core also. And an estimated 600,000 people worked on this project. And in my opinion this began the fall of the Soviet Union. And I agree, not nearly enough are these many heros who knowing gave their lives to save millions, possibly 10s of millions.
@@coffeetoffee0x019 🙄 Drink some coffee and chill.
The sacrifice is unbelievable. They did it because there was no choice, they could attempt to live but much of Europe would die instead. Not all of them did it being fully informed or with much agency in the choice to serve, though. We should remember them too. I remember an anecdote somewhere (maybe even this video? Idk) that Russian soldiers were offered a tour of 2 minutes on the roof of reactor building four or 2 years on the front in Afghanistan. Crazy.
The firemens clothes are also still in pripyat hospital and will be forever because its one of the places with most radiation
@@Al-jt3dw "but much of Europe would die instead" How?
My favorite tumblr shitpost: [teleports myself inside of the chernobyl nuclear reaction mere inches away from the infamous elephants foot] oh cool they got a bean bag chair
That's fucked up. Take my like and please stay away from me and my son.
i want you to take my funny internet point and let me take my leave safely
Doctor: you have ass cancer, now tell me have you sat on anything radioactive lately? This video:
@@yttrium7678 Plot Twist: The Ass Cancer can only be cured by sitting on the Elephant's Foot
The ass foot
Video was well done & informative! Thanks!
13:47 You are the sole reason I know about the elephant's foot, or the actual name of "that place from call of duty." That being said you are also the reason I Know how safe nuclear energy can be, how to keep it safe, and the puppieyts. As well as The Basalisk and a bunch of other science and etheical topics. AND I LOVE IT. Thank you so much Kyle
I feel like im getting radiation poisoning just by watching this
Its literally so terrible
@Sjdidjcn Jdir9fj why....
You are oxidizing from breathing right now
Don’t worry nuclear energy is extremely safe 🥴
@@cheezew1zz it IS safe comparatively. Burning fossil fuels has killed and continues to kill many more people than nuclear energy ever did, not to mention burning fossil fuels is literally also killing our planet and could lead to human extinction. How can you not understand that?
As a grown man nothing scared me more than playing the Chernobyl game and entering that room with the elephants foot
Stalker?
A game?
@@Fishfartyparty its possible hes referring to the game S.T.A.L.K.E.R Shadow Of Chernobyl where your last mission is to head inside the sarcophagus
@@billetede2peso113 yea that's the one
@@billetede2peso113 liquidator simulator?
“200 seconds in its presence” is a severely drastic simplification of what it means to even be near this thing. Search up some cloud chamber videos and take a look at what uranium 235 really looks like. Now imagine 200 seconds of being constantly bombarded by the energy THIS thing is putting out. I can’t even imagine what the room would look like if it itself were a cloud chamber.
Yes it’s strange how we both watch very similar videos as close together lol but the cloud chamber is amazing to watch it makes it obvious how just been near is massively dangerous.
Great synopsis of the disaster with excellent visuals, makes a complicated and tragic disaster understandable to the average person.
Someone actually did a worse job than Homer Simpson as safety officer. Let that sink in.
God damn
If this happened at the plant, Mr. Burns would destroy Springfield just so no one would ever know it connected back to him.
D'oh!
Dang it, what does that damn sink want this time?
@@crimsondynamo615 Well in the simpsons mobile game thats what happens. Homer blows up Springfield
This scared the hell out of me when I was a kid. I thought the elephant's foot was a living thing and it would soon spread all over the world and melt everybody from existence
You sounded like a weird kid
Now THAT would be an interesting plot for a world ending story
Maybe the fungus on it will make it come to life :)
@@MASTEROFEVIL far from weird, I believed tectonic plates were plates in the sewers that cause earthquakes by rubbing against each other. But that's just stupidity on my part.
@@kiwi3310 That's pretty funny
Just the thought that right now somewere in the world there is something so disturbing and scary gives me goosebumps now that I thonk about it. Especially the sentence at the end that it will sit there for centurys in the dark creeps that hell out of me
I'm so intrigued by this human made terror. Thank you for this information!!
If Chernobyl is a corpse, then the Elephant’s Foot is the Polonium bullet still stuck inside it
This guy literally stole another guys work - Fascinating Horror - channel. Disgusting.
@FettTheRanter Sorry I meant Dark5. The channel. This guy who uploaded this has basically just stolen another guys work.
@@vipr1142 this was adapted from an academic essay Kyle did in 2013. Way further back than even Dark5's first video on Cherynobyl
@@vipr1142 know the background behind the video before comparing it. Don't say comments like this without fact as someone said this video was based off a essay the guy made a while back
Imagine listening to a four million pound lid shoot through the roof of your job at the nuclear plant, then imagine your boss telling you to go look at it to see what happened.
Sounds like another day in the life of Homer Simpson
I quit then run very fast
On top of that the so called boss is in denial.
That's the part I actually remember the most about the Chernobyl TV series. When the guy told the other guy "go out there and see what happened", I was like........ you couldn't drag me out there with a gun pointed to my head. Might as well just pull the trigger and get it over with quick.
@@BAGGStheAugmented "There is no core! The core is gone!!"
Thanks for the informative clip!👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽
love this video I'm working on a paper for my school and I chose Chernobyl this helped a lot!
35 years later and it’s affects are still being felt today. I give all my gratitude to all the liquidators who gave their lives for the world. They are all heroes. Edit:Thanks for all the likes, I think each one pays respects to the heroes who stopped this catastrophe from spreading.
most of them where fine afterwards.
@@rampage3337 actually, most of them either died or were sick for weeks afterwards and had to be in a hospital
@@issatr4p Source?
@Todd La Rue Actually, during the actual explosion, no one died, all direct deaths during the fires were from radiation poisoning, but no one got liqudified. Liquidstors cleaned the areas of radioactive ash with water or something like that
@@JV-bj4kx except that one guy whose body is still in the reactor, just framed up in cement
I always find reactor core meltdowns due to negligence sad. They've pushed back nuclear energy a ton, and it's clearly the only type of energy that's viable long term with the amount of energy our society needs. Of course, it's much too dangerous in the hands of incompetent people, so instead of treating it with the necessary precautions, it got stigmatized to high hell.
Oh no, they definitely have upped the ante since Chernobyl. Modern nuclear plants are next to 100% idiot-proof, as idiot proof as one can feasibly get. Also Chernobyl had a particular intentional design flaw that made what happened at Chernobyl an entirely unique occurrence.
@@fructosecornsyrup5759 that didn't stop the fear mongering making nuclear energy unsafe in the eyes of the average uninformed person.
@@bradman7281 Yup. You can blame oil and natural gas companies for that.
Nuclear now is actually pretty safe and Chernobyl was old technology so now they’re pretty safe and we just need to educate people on how its not as bad as they think
@@fructosecornsyrup5759 it wasn’t design flaws, they were pushing it well beyond what they knew were safe limits just to see what would happen. They knew how to operate safely, they actively went out of their way just to see what would happen
Thank you , excellent video 👍
Subscribed, god dang that thing is eerie, man made disasters are hell on Earth.
"Radioactive lava" has to be one of the scariest phrases I've ever heard. The way you described it oozing through pipes and consuming solid steel in its path definitely didn't help.
132
yeah, i pray that i never come face-to-face with corium ever in my life (even if that's already insanely unlikely)
What gauge or meter do you buy to find radioactivity? I dont know what levels are good or bad. But I dont know if it can do mold too around or under a house
"Rabies went airborne."
@@mariastevens6406"Corona become usain bolt"
I'd like to hear about the fungus that has started growing on the walls of this place feeding on the radiation by using something similar to photosynthesis except it uses the ionising radiation and the pigment melanin.
Once you go black you don't go back
.....this is an absolute perfect example of the old saying...... "Once u go black...... U turn the hell around and run THE FUQ BACK!!!!!! "
Heck some fungi are growing on the elephants foot
@@dislexicdicktionary god to the people choosing their skin color:
That's very interesting!
A lovely use for an otherwise forgotten personal essay! Great stuff.
I live in Poland and I was a kid when it happened, we weren't informed about the danger at all... People were outside, kids playing, enjoying good weather and sun. Then we found out that something bad happened and we had to drink Lugola, it was like drinking liquid iron, I'll never forget the taste or the sense that we may all die... It was terrible, nobody knew anything for sure because of the censorship. Of coutse, nothing bad could have come from the USSR, our faithful ally, right? We found out what happened much later, when nothing could have been done to prevent the effects of the radiation. I'll always remember the sunny day, children crying in fear waiting for their share of Lugola 😔
💔 When will people see how awful, how dangerous this is? It is not worth it. For money? Blood money? They lie and tell us it is safe. When it is the most dangerous thing to life. It is crazy. Heartbreaking to say the least. Horrifying.
@@sgili586 how dangerous what is? propaganda? yeah def but yk it will get to you some day once you live in that very specific country for years or even decades (America being a example with their "best country in the world") nuclear power plants on the other hand are very safe and chernobyl was just done by stupid people (mostly the guy who controlled the site bc he was ignorant to all of the warnings )
@@sgili586 Chernobyl happened because the humans in charge decided they were smarter than the the engineers and ignored basically every saftey protocol in the books. Nuclear power has advanced tremendously over the years and now the possibility of another Chernobyl incident happening is litterally 0 due to countless automated systems keeping everything in check
@@Skibbutz Human error, tragic. There will always be better ways, safer. But the human error, it's just terrifying. But life is scary.
@@soup7694 Yeah I agree.