April 26 1986 From the Diary of Vitaly I Vorotnikov Dolgikh told me that during the night of April 26 he got a call from Frolyshev deputy head of the CC CPSU Department of Heavy Industry and told him that according to the report from the director of NPS Nuclear Power Station Bryukhanov at approximately 2 00 a m an accident occurred during some testing that was being conducted at the fourth block There was an explosion and a fire Parts of the fourth block are destroyed There are victims The fire has been extinguished Apparently the reactor was not damaged it had been shut down He Dolgikh immediately informed Gorbachev and Ryzhkov They decided to establish a commission headed by Shcherbina deputy chairman of the Council of Ministers The first group of experts flew to Chernobyl via Kiev at 9 00 a m the second group--the commission members--left at 16 00 and Shcherbina who was in Siberia at the time got to Chernobyl only late that night Among the experts are also Majorets academician Legasov representatives of the Ministry of Medium Machine Building and design institutes and others Source Vorotnikov V I A eto bylo tak Iz dnevnika chlena PB TsK KPSS Moscow Soyuz Veteranov Knigoizdaniya SIMAR 1995 p 95 Translated by Svetlana Savranskaya for the National Security Archive This document is from the holdings of The National Security Archive Suite 701 Gelman Library The George Washington University 2130 H Street NW Washington D C 20037 Phone 202 994-7000 Fax 202 994-7005 nsarchiv@gwu edu