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THIRTY-FIVE YEARS after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, Ukrainians view the site not only as a monument to human mistakes but also as a source of inspiration, solace and income.
Reactor No 4 at the power plant 65 miles north of the capital Kyiv exploded and caught fire deep in the night on April 26, 1986, shattering the building and spewing radioactive material high into the sky in what remains the world’s worst nuclear accident.
Soviet authorities made the catastrophe worse by failing to tell the public what had happened. Although the nearby plant workers’ town of Pripyat was evacuated the next day, the two million residents of Kyiv were not informed despite the fallout danger. The world learned of the disaster only after heightened radiation was detected in Sweden.
Eventually, more than 100,000 people were evacuated from the vicinity and a 1,000-square-mile exclusion zone was established where the only activity was workers disposing of waste and tending to a hastily built sarcophagus covering the reactor.
Radiation continued to leak from the reactor building until 2019, when the entire building was covered by an enormous arch-shaped shelter. As robots inside the shelter began dismantling the reactor, officials felt new optimism about the zone.
“This is a place of tragedy and memory, but it is also a place where you can see how a person can overcome the consequences of a global catastrophe,” said Bohdan Borukhovskyi, Ukraine’s deputy environment minister.
“We want a new narrative to appear — it was not a zone of exclusion, but a zone of development and revival.”
For him, that narrative includes encouraging tourism.
“Our tourism is unique, it is not a classic concept of tourism,” he said. “This is an area of meditation and reflection, an area where you can see the impact of human error, but you can also see the human heroism that corrects it.”
Chernobyl recorded a twofold increase in tourism after the lauded HBO television mini-series of the same name in 2019, and officials hope that level of interest will continue, or grow, once the global pandemic has receded.
One of the prime draws for tourists is to see the ruins of Pripyat, the once-modern town of 50,000 now being taken over by decay and vegetation. Work is underway to build paths to make it easier for visitors to navigate the ruins.
The Chernobyl plant is out of service, but there is still much work to be done at the decommissioned plant. Mr Borukhovskyi said all four of its reactors would be dismantled only by 2064.
Ukraine also has decided to use the deserted zone as the site for its centralised storage facility for the spent fuel from the country’s four remaining nuclear power plants, and that is to open this year. Until recently, the fuel was disposed of in Russia.
Storing the spent fuel at home will save the country an estimated 200 million dollars (£144 million) a year.
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It has since become a profitable source of income of certain NGOs who focus on unaffected children born decades after the disaster rather than adults, who were children at the time, who carry a burden of an increased risk of thyroid cancer.
Though it should be pointed out that thyroid cancer his highly treatable, it has >99% survival rate. It is Ironically that it is often cured with the help of Iodine-131 (the same isotope responsible for thyroid cancer in the first place).
“By 2005, 5,127 cases of thyroid cancer were reported among those exposed in 1986 under the age of 14 years; 6,848 cases have been reported for those who had been under the age of 18 years; 15 cases had proved fatal.”
And a study just published found no increase in mutations in children where one or both parents had either helped clean up the accident site or had to evacuate because they lived close by.
“Study finds no excess germline mutations in children of Chernobyl survivors”
Ref.:
Yeager, M., Machiela, M.J., et al. 2021. Lack of transgenerational effects of ionizing radiation exposure from the Chernobyl accident. Science, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abg2365.
Weiss, W., 2018. Chernobyl thyroid cancer: 30 years of follow-up overview. Radiation protection dosimetry, 182(1), pp.58-61.
@David Jordan: a real eye opener. Thanks for that
@David Jordan: Excellent insight into how the charities around Chernobyl work.
Eye opening stuff
@Marie Mc: sounds like the modus operandi of alot of charities
@David Jordan: Would that be the charity that still claims on their website…
“Scientists feared that a further explosion could occur, producing a force of three to five megatons, and exposing the whole of Europe to enormous radioactive contamination.”
“700,000 men, known as liquidators, risked their lives and exposed themselves to dangerous levels of radiation to contain the situation. At east 40,000 of these men have died and a further 70,000 are disabled”
@Gavin Tobin: “700,000 men, known as liquidators, risked their lives and exposed themselves to dangerous levels of radiation to contain the situation. At east 40,000 of these men have died and a further 70,000 are disabled”
Well they are 35 years older. This is expected for an aging population that was also affected by the collapse of the Soviet Union, that resulted in increased in poverty rates, worsening diet, alcoholism and smoking.
But what about comparing them to others who were not involved in the cleanup, don’t they have relatively higher rates of ill health?
Well, there’s a plausible suggestion that Chernobyl Liquidators’ increased concern for their health resulted in a higher rate of diagnosed medical conditions. They were also offered yearly medical check-ups. Medical care in the Former Soviet Union collapsed, so diagnosis and treatment all too often relied on a patient’s own initiative. There was also a problem with medical record going missing.
So this may give a false impression that Chernobyl Liquidators have higher rates of ill health.
Similar happened in reverse in Iraq, harsh sanctions caused medical care to collapse under Saddam’s rule, as a result cancer and birth defects went undiagnosed, untreated and unrecorded. After 2003, medical care improved and they they started diagnosing cancer again and a reliable record of birth defects was kept. This gives a false impression of an explosion in cancer cases and birth defects.
@David Jordan: the 2021 study you cite has a sample of 130 children. A quantitative study with a sample of 130 born between 1987-2002. Is neither rigorous nor generalisable so I would not take such findings at face value. Further to this, the study does not offer much information on the methodology of the study which also raises questions regarding the validity of the findings
I visited the site 2 yrs ago. Would recommend it to any adult (for safety reasons). Great place for reflection on the human, ecological and historical scale of the sote as mentioned in the article.
Humans: F-up the environment for themselves
Nature: Thanks and dont let the door hit you on the way out
No mention of the horrific effects on children born to people affected by radiation fallout from Chernobel, abandoned and rejected left in orphenenages to be cared for by the state.
@Richard Mccarthy: A study just published found no increase in mutations (abnormalities) in children born to parents who had either helped clean up the accident site or had to evacuate because they lived close by.
“Study finds no excess germline mutations in children of Chernobyl survivors
The study investigated the long-standing question of whether radiation exposure results in genetic changes that can be passed from parent to offspring.
In fact, the number of de novo mutations in these children was similar to those in the general population.
These findings suggest that the ionizing radiation exposure from the accident had a minimal, if any, impact on the health of the subsequent generation.”
Ref.:
Yeager, M., Machiela, M.J., et al. 2021. Lack of transgenerational effects of ionizing radiation exposure from the Chernobyl accident. Science, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abg2365.
@Richard Mccarthy: Because it a myth.
And not one superhero…….
Tragedy disaster Chernobyl power plant melt to blow to everywhere place land radioactive won’t gone next 2,000 years. Should banned power plants all world
@Brian Flavin: An estimated 2,000,000 lives have been saved by nuclear power.
@Brian Flavin: what?
@Brian Flavin: in English?
I believe he said “Tragedy disaster Chernobyl power plant melt to blow to everywhere place land radioactive won’t gone next 2,000 years. Should banned power plants all world”
@Darragh Lynch: I believe he uses some type of speech to text converter due to a disability.
What’s your excuse for being ignorant?
@Darragh Lynch: Brian said that the Chernobyl plant meltdown was a tragedy and a disaster. He said that radiation was blown everywhere and that the land became radioactive. He added that the radiation won’t be gone for the next 2,000 years. He said that power plants (nuclear) should be banned worldwide.
@Gavin Tobin: They’re not worth the risk.
@Ken Loughman: right, there’s about 440 active reactors in the world currently, producing around 10% of all power. What do you replace them with?
@Michal Rozanski: Dirty great big coal fired power stations or giant hydroelectric dams that can flood rain forest, displace towns and villages, and can collapse ,killing thousands.
1975 Banqiao Dam failure
“The dam failure created the third-deadliest flood in history which affected a total population of 10.15 million and inundated around 30 cities and counties of 12,000 square kilometers (or 3 million acres), with an estimated death toll ranging from 85,600 to 240,000 (26,000 according to the Chinese government).”
“Property damage:
62 dams collapsed
30 cities and counties (3 million acres) inundated
6.8 million houses collapsed
10.75 million people affected
Fantastic psvr game
have your say