Nikolai Fomin
Nikolai Maximovich Fomin (, ; born 1937 in Novoekonomichne, Donetsk Oblast, Ukrainian SSR) is a Ukrainian engineer. He was the chief engineer of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant from 1981 until the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986. Biography. Nikolai Fomin was a member of the CPSU, but was expelled after the Chernobyl disaster. He started his career at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant. In 1972 he began working at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. As chief engineer, he approved the infamous turbine safety test that led to the explosion of the reactor. However, the deputy chief engineer Anatoly Dyatlov was  the principal person responsible for the test. Fomin learned of the accident at about 4 am on April 26, 1986, and subsequently participated in cleaning up the aftermath. He was subsequently arrested together with plant director Viktor Bryukhanov. The start of the trial, originally scheduled for March 24, 1987, had to be postponed several times due to Fomin's suicide attempt. Eventually, he and Bryukhanov were each sentenced to 10 years in prison. While in prison, Fomin received psychiatric treatment several times. For health reasons, he was released from prison early and transferred to a psychiatric hospital. After his release  from the hospital, he worked at the Kalinin Nuclear Power Plant. Since his retirement in mid-2000, he has lived with his wife, children and grandchildren in Udomlya. While the initial Soviet investigation put almost all the blame on the operators and management, later findings by the IAEA found that the reactor design and how the operators were informed of safety information was more significant. However, the operators were found to have deviated from operational procedures, changing test protocols on the fly, as well as having made "ill judged" actions, making human factors a major contributing factor. Other. In the television  series "Chernobyl", he is portrayed by Adrian Rawlins.