I'm not sure I'd ever call a radiation leak "amusing" - but I understand what you mean.
Apart from the unwillingness to admit any mistakes, the old Soviet system also had a very lax attitude to safety issues - which is also apparent in Russian society today.
As this quote from a Russian official when Russian agencies had finally admitted they too had detected high radiation levels - but showed no interest what so ever in finding out where the radiation came from:
"The civil servant then told the Interfax news agency he had "no idea" where the radiation came from: "Why would you look for the source when there isn't any danger?"
That kind of attitude would NEVER be accepted in Sweden - or any western nation, I don't think for that matter.
Here safety levels are not something to be ignored until they are crossed - any release of anything with a safety level is treated seriously as none of that stuff should ideally be released at all.
And a slow release of radiation or toxins well below safety levels might well become more harmful over time compared to one big spill.
So I don't think we can be sure if no one actually noticed that other leak you mention, or if Russian agencies covered it up to minimizes embarrassment to the state, or if they did notice but just ignored it as they didn't think it was bad enough to do anything about?
But either the wind blew in the wrong direction, or the release wasn't big enough to register in Western Europe - because if it had been detectable over her, it had been reported on - we can all be sure of that.
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@KostaRPK
I'm not sure I'd ever call a radiation leak "amusing" - but I understand what you mean.
Apart from the unwillingness to admit any mistakes, the old Soviet system also had a very lax attitude to safety issues - which is also apparent in Russian society today.
As this quote from a Russian official when Russian agencies had finally admitted they too had detected high radiation levels - but showed no interest what so ever in finding out where the radiation came from:
"The civil servant then told the Interfax news agency he had "no idea" where the radiation came from: "Why would you look for the source when there isn't any danger?"
Source: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-radiation-nuclear-radioactive-mayak-urals-southern-greenpeace-chernobyl-a8067386.html
That kind of attitude would NEVER be accepted in Sweden - or any western nation, I don't think for that matter.
Here safety levels are not something to be ignored until they are crossed - any release of anything with a safety level is treated seriously as none of that stuff should ideally be released at all.
And a slow release of radiation or toxins well below safety levels might well become more harmful over time compared to one big spill.
So I don't think we can be sure if no one actually noticed that other leak you mention, or if Russian agencies covered it up to minimizes embarrassment to the state, or if they did notice but just ignored it as they didn't think it was bad enough to do anything about?
But either the wind blew in the wrong direction, or the release wasn't big enough to register in Western Europe - because if it had been detectable over her, it had been reported on - we can all be sure of that.