Immediately after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, familiar conspiracy theories popped up among survivors.
The causes behind the Chernobyl disaster were both rare and complicated, making it a perfect breeding ground for conspiracy theories. Many of the rumors and conspiracies that popped up in the wake of the reactor meltdown are remarkably similar to the flavors of paranoia and conspiracism surrounding more contemporary traumas in the United States.
The scale of the evacuation, combined with the Soviet government’s efforts to keep the disaster quiet—the wider world was only alerted two days after, when radiation alarms went off at a nuclear power station in Sweden—resulted in conflicting information and wildfire rumors in the absence of clear communications.
Since Soviet authorities kept tight control of information coming out of the Chernobyl exclusion zone, rumors about the effects of radiation began to blossom. Stories spread about the grotesque mutations supposedly caused by the radiation, like descriptions of pike floating around local lakes without heads or tails.
The U.S. also sees theories spread about imagined FEMA camps and the “true” reasons for military drills like 2015’s Jade Helm. Their Chernobyl counterparts involved suspicion of government efforts during the ensuing cleanup of radioactive material . Most conspiracy theories inevitably expand to include extraterrestrials—those surrounding the Chernobyl disaster were no exception. Several people claimed, after the fact, to have seen flying saucers hovering over the power station in the hours before the explosion. Since UFOs are often paired with government cover-ups, Shimanskiy soon heard rumors of “a cosmic experiment being performed on us.”
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