Viktor Kibenok

Lore & Background

Kibenok was born in the village of Ivanivka in Kherson Oblast. His father was also a firefighter and had been decorated for courage in a fire. After finishing school in 1980 he worked for a year as a fireman with the department in Chernobyl, then trained as a cadet and studied at the Cherkasy Fire Safety Institute. He graduated in August of 1984 with the rank of Lieutenant and was assigned to the 6th Paramilitary Fire Department in Pripyat, where he headed the fire brigade.

He was part of the 28-man team that answered the alarm at 01:29 on 26 April 1986, shortly after the first explosion. While putting out fires on and around the roof of the reactor hall he and others received lethal doses and began to show signs of acute radiation syndrome.

Reader's Guide

Kibenok spent one day in the Pripyat hospital before the scale of the accident was understood, and was then flown to Moscow, to a hospital that specialised in radiation victims. He had burns inside his mouth and lung damage from inhaling burning bitumen, which made eating impossible and speaking very painful.

By 9 May 1986 he could no longer stand. He died on 11 May 1986, a few hours after his friend and fellow officer Pravik, aged 23. His funeral was held on 13 May 1986, and he is buried at Mitinskoe Cemetery in Moscow.

The title Hero of the Soviet Union and the Order of Lenin were awarded to him on 25 September 1986. A street in Ivanivka bears his name, and monuments to him stand across the Kyiv region.