Nuclear Nightmare

I ran a nuclear reactor for ages. I remembered always the date April first 1985. The power station was in Tricastin. I just began as a head operator on the second reactor. This plant had the power of one thousand and three hundred megawatts. I managed seven men and one woman and we had to start up the nuclear reactor and supervised its works.
It was the first time that I was in charge of starting up the reactor, alone. I was impatient.
My task was to bring the reactor from a cold condition to full power.
The launching of the reactor is made in five phases. At the beginning the vessel of the reactor was opened and filled with water, strongly concentrated in boric acid, which inhibits greatly nuclear reactions. All the control clusters were in the low position. Thus the fifty three clusters with their two thousand sixty four fuel rods controlled the functioning of the reactor just as the concentration of boric acid of the water in the vessel. Fuels had not yet been renewed. However the fission products contained in these rods continued to produce some heat in the vessel. That is why there are two systems named RRA and RRI which evacuate this excess heat.
I call upon my team and I asked them to begin the filling up of the boiler. They began to move about huge control boards which seemed to be palettes of buttons. The panels incandesced as fireworks of small yellow lights. It was magical and wonderful. These actions filled up the primary circuit. Actually, we had to mix some pure water with that already present in the reactor thus decreasing the concentration in boric acid and so increasing the chain reaction. Then everything was linked, we got back the circuit pressure up to thirty one bars. Then, we putted in operation a pump which decreased the pressure to three bars in a few seconds.
Now was the most delicate point of the operation. It was necessary to warm up quite slowly the boiler. This stage should be watched very attentively. Indeed, the reaction should not go critical. Therefore, we adjusted the clusters of control as we reduced little by little the concentration of boric acid in the water.
Even if, as usually no problem ever happened, I was afraid. My hands were clammy and I was anxious of an explosion. I tried to hide these fears to my team. I didn’t want to show them any panic. I knew that all this was ridiculous but nevertheless I had a bad premonition. Imagine a stream of 10^7 neutrons by cm² which knock together to create a colossal mass of heat. It was terrible! If a out of control chain reaction occurred, the temperature of the vessel could reach more of 500°C in about twenty seconds! I was right to be afraid...
Fortunately all worked well, the pressure reached 155 bars and the temperature of 286°C. It was finally the moment! We put in service the secondary circuit... The water warmed little by little and was going to rotate the first turbine. The turbine connected to the generator was going to produce some electrical energy. In a short time our reactor would have reached its maximal power...
Mrs Yukna, the only woman of my team came to see me running. She was in a frenzy. But what was going on? The temperature of the vessel was too high. It did not stop surging. My colleague began almost to cry and was afraid of a cataclysm. I was no more reassured than her. But I tried to stay zen for the team. Suddenly I had a hunch. I could do nothing more to slow down the reaction, I had to stop it.
I had to press on the big red safety button. I had to make it! I began to run, shoved every frozen member of my team... I jumped a cable and I was nigh of the button!! The terror was in the room…
I woke up… It was only a bad dream… What’s luck! 7:00 am, I must get up to go to work at the power plant.