Secret Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Comrade V I Dolgikh I am reporting on the results of the work of troops to liquidate the consequences of the accident at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Station in November of this year 1 The radiological situation in the area of the Nuclear Power Station NPS is improving Levels of radiation amount to at a height of 200 m above the reactor - less than 4 Roentgen per hour in May of this year it was more than 200 in close proximity to the reactor 100-400 at the perimeter station - from 0 003 to 1 1 in the beginning and 0 0030 56 Roentgen per hour at the end of the month On a daily basis helicopters and up to 80 ground chemical reconnaissance patrols were involved in monitoring the radiation situation 2 Work on the NPS site was carried out in three shifts and involved up to 6000 people On the 10th of November decontamination of the main housing and the auxiliary spaces of the third energy block was completed Levels of radiation decreased from 200-1300 to 30-250 milliroentgen per hour In order to maintain the resulting level of radioactive pollution until the end of the month they treated 194 4 thousand sq m of surfaces altogether taking into account repeated decontamination 1 782 000 square meters were treated In the inner rooms of energy block 1 and 2 in order to maintain permitted levels of radioactive pollution treatment is being carried out as needed 397 5 thousand square meters of area have been deactivated with a total since the beginning of the work of 1 million 604 thousand square meters Levels of radiation from the machine room in the first energy block amount to 1 1 to 1 5 milliroentgen per hour and in the second 8-11 milliroentgen per hour Work was carried out on decontamination of the NPS site the treatment facilities and the open distribution units They laid 1 5 thousand square meters of concrete sheet and 15 5 thousand square meters were covered with asphalt Totals from the beginning of the effort are 350 8 and 32 3 thousand square meters respectively They removed contaminated soil from an area of 315 thousand square meters for a total of 709 1 thousand since the beginning of the work The special manufacturing shop of the construction plant had been treated Per month they deactivated 18 4 thousand square meters of inner rooms altogether from the start a total of 44 1 thousand square meters and 19 2 thousand square kilometers of territory from the start a total of 44 4 thousand square meters They began work on the decontamination of the building site and of the facilities of the third stage They processed 467 7 thousand square meters of outer and inner surfaces and also 430 1 thousand square meters of territory The levels of radiation of the facilities decreased from 25-30 to 10-11 milliroentgen per hour and the levels of the territory from 30-50 to 12-20 milliroentgen per hour 3 Work in the city of Pripyat and the city of Chernobyl In the city of Pripyat the decontamination work in the residential area has been completed 316 buildings were treated with a total area of 522 5 thousand square meters They removed contaminated soil in an area of 1160 7 thousand square meters Levels of radiation are reduced from 15-34 milliroentgen to 2-4 milliroentgen per hour Treatment facilities were decontaminated 68 thousand square meters and work started on the decontamination zone adjacent to the residential area in Pripyat 445 4 thousand sq meters were processed from the 635 thousand sq meters scheduled under the plan In the city of Chernobyl the planned decontamination work has been completed on 36 buildings and their surrounding areas 294 7 thousand sq meters of building surfaces have been treated as well as roads and sidewalks and contaminated soil was removed from an area of 425 1 thousand sq meters Levels of radiation are reduced from 1 5-2 down to 0 1-0 5 milliroentgen per hour The laying down of 6 7 km of heating pipes has been completed 4 Work in other populated areas Decontamination work in November was conducted in 54 populated areas in the Kiev Zhytomyr and south Gomel oblasts Since the 15th of May 350 populated areas have been treated Zone # of communities In November Developed Total from 13 5 From These Completely Partially No 1 strict control 212 29 178 157 21 No 2 resettlement 102 6 94 91 3 No 3 alienations 48 1 21 17 4 Outside the zone 67 18 57 25 32 In Total 429 54x 350xx 290 60x x Decontamination of public institutions and their territory xx From these 68 settlements were treated twice 15-three times 8-four or more times Commissions of regional executive committees approved the work conducted by troops in 35 communities designed for the re-evacuation of the population 18 in the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic and 17 in the Belorussian Soviet Socialist Republic 5 During the course of November the Air Force conducted 533 flights and transported 643 people and 17 6 tons of cargo In total starting from the 27th of April 18 818 flights had been completed and they had decontaminated around 2500 hectares of land delivered 52 978 tons of special liquids and transported 25 500 thousand people and more than 5 5 thousand tons of cargo 6 Altogether the Armed Forces employed 22 5 thousand people and 6 5 thousand units of equipment Plans for December - Conduct radiation surveys - Maintain permissible contamination levels inside the first second and third energy blocks - Decontaminate special construction the building sites of the fifth and sixth energy blocks and the territory adjacent to them and the roads and treatment facilities - Clean contaminated debris from the roof of the third energy block around 58 tons - Decontaminate settlements and the seven electrical power substations within the 30 km zone and territory adjacent to the residential areas in Pripyat S Akhromeyev 1 December 1986 312 1 0172 Source READ Box 26 Russian and Eastern European Archive Documents Database Russian State Archive of Contemporary History Moscow Russian Federation F89 opis 53 delo 50 Translated by Brooke Lennox 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