A random web search led me to a BBC interview with Mary Mycio, author of Wormwood Forest: A Natural History of Chernobyl. The interview, titled Chernobyl, twenty years on aired on 29 March 2006 on Woman’s Hour.
The interview was fascinating and informative.
Here is a sample exchange from the interview:
Q: So what is your feeling about nuclear power?
A: My feeling about nuclear power has less to do with Chernobyl than with global warming. As a result of global warming, as a result of two Iraq wars, I have come to reluctantly support nuclear energy. And even when people say, “How about the victims of Chernobyl?”; “How about, you know all these health effects and all that”; the health effects of burning fossil fuels are spread out so diffusely that we can’t point to something while in nuclear energy it is easier to point to something, but that doesn’t make it any less real.
There is also a transcript of a different interview at Thereby Hangs a Tale where Ms. Mycio shares some stories about the research trips into “The Zone of Alienation” that led to her Wormwood Forest. Highly recommended.
I would love to talk with Ms. Mycio. Perhaps I can figure out how to contact her and interview her for The Atomic Show Podcast.
