Ihor Orestovych Franchuk, Ukraine

Ihor Orestovych Franchuk, Ukraine

Ihor was 17 and at school when the catastrophe happened. The vegetables weren’t growing that year, the bees were dying, and a lot of people had headaches. These and other memories Ihor shared with his son Orest Franchuk in an interview.

Ihor Franchuk was born in 1968 into a regular middle-class family. He attended a state school. After graduating in 1986, he was called up for the army. Then he entered the university. Ihor chose the mechanical engineering major by himself. On weekends, he and his friends used to go to movies or discos at school. Sometimes during summer breaks Ihor was visiting his relatives who lived in a village. His first (current) job was working at Gas Service.

Ihor Franchuk is Greek Orthodox. He has three children. They were born in 1994 and 1996. His parents are also religious. Mr. Franchuk wasn’t against the Soviet regime. At that time he did not realize what the Soviet Union was really about. He says: “We were assured that we lived in the best country”. He did feel oppression during holidays, especially on Christmas and Easter. Ihor is still living in Zboriv and working at Gas Services.

The question “What did you know about the Nuclear Power Plant before the Chernobyl accident?” reminds Mr. Franchuk about his physics teacher who came to his school in 1983. The teacher had just finished the University and was thinking in a somewhat liberal way, nevertheless he was communist. The teacher taught the class that nuclear energy is the cheapest and the safest. Today we know about the hazards of the radiation waste but then Ihor’s generation learned that it’s ecologically clean and safe. In other words nuclear energy was positive from whatever angle you look at it.

Read the full interview