Vasily Ivanovich Ignatenko (; ; ; 13 March 1961 – 13 May 1986) was a Soviet firefighter and first responder to the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. Ignatenko was raised on a collective farm near Gomel in the Byelorussian SSR, and worked for a time as an electrician. He became a firefighter in 1980 as part of his service in the Soviet Military, and was employed as a paramilitary firefighter afterwards. On 26 April 1986, Ignatenko's fire brigade was involved in mitigating the immediate aftermath of the Chernobyl disaster, fighting the fires started by the initial explosion. In the process, Ignatenko received a high dose of radiation, leading to his death in a Moscow radiological hospital eighteen days later. Early life Vasily Ivanovich Ignatenko was born on 13 March 1961, in the Brahin District of the Gomel Region of the Byelorussian SSR. He was the third child of Tatiana Petrovna Ignatenko and Ivan Tarasovish Ignatenko. Tatiana Ignatenko was a collective farm fieldworker, and Ivan Ignatenko a tractor, and later truck driver. They had been married in 1958. Ignatenko had an older sister, Lyudmilla, a younger brother, Nikolai, and a younger sister, Natasha. Lyudmilla trained in medicine and worked as an ambulance paramedic, Nikolai became a bus and truck driver, and Natasha, after working in a state-run kindergarten for a time, would follow Ignatenko into the fire service. Ignatenko also had an older brother named Vitya, who had died from fever at age two or three, before Ignatenko was born. As a child, Vasily Ignatenko lived in the village of Sperizh'e with his family, helping with chores on the collective farm after school every day. He was especially fond of sports, spending Sundays playing football and other games. Firefighting career After Ignatenko completed the requisite 10 classes of schooling, he enrolled in the Gomel vocational school of electrical engineering (PTU No. 81), studying to become an electrician. Following his graduation in 1978, he was assigned work at a mechanical fertilizer machine factory in Bobruisk. Ignatenko worked at the factory as an electrician for two years before he was called up into the Soviet Military. Military service Ignatenko's firefighting career began during his time in military service. Following his call up in April 1980, he was assigned to the military fire department of Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), in Moscow. (The Moscow fire department, at this time, was manned