VIDEO – Ukraine – Chernobyl

Last modified 10.02.2023 | Published 28.03.2018North and Central Europe, Ukraine, Videos

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Video impressions from a day-trip to the evacuated Exclusion Zone around the former Chernobyl nuclear power plant.

You will discover scenes from the 30 km control post, the town of Chernobyl, a village, a kindergarten, and the sarcophagus around the destroyed reactor no 4. Join me on a walk into the deserted town of Pripyat and on to the last stop of the day. It will be at the formerly very secret Duga-1 radar station.

Read about the visit. Excerpts from that article:

In the very early hours of 26 April 1986 reactor number 4 at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded. It caught fire and exposed all present at the plant and the surrounding vicinity to immediate danger. In the ensuing days and years large numbers of people had to evacuate. Never to return.

The power plant consisted of several reactors. It was situated north of Kyiv, in Ukraine, close to the Belarus border. The operators took immediate action to curb the fires and limit the disaster. 36 hours after the first explosion Soviet authorities ordered the complete evacuation of 49,000 inhabitants from the town of Pripyat, only a couple kilometres from the plant. A few days later another 68,000 evacuated the town of Chernobyl. Over the years the total of permanently resettled persons amounted to 350,000. 

This video from Chernobyl is hosted by YouTube. You may watch it here, or open it in a larger window on YouTube.