In the city of Chernobyl there stands a simple memorial to the liquidators who rushed to reactor number four in the immediate aftermath of the explosion.
“To those who saved the world.”
The firefighters who initially responded to the disaster on the morning of April 26, 1986 were unaware that they were entering a radioactive environment, and rushed to the plant without donning protective suits and respirators. While they labored to extinguish the fires, their bodies absorbed lethal doses of radiation, and many of them later died of Acute Radiation Sickness. Overall, some 600,000 workers, including scientists, miners, and Soviet military conscripts, participated in the Chernobyl cleanup efforts. To this day, many of them continue to experience a variety of health problems stemming from their time spent in the zone.
We passed another checkpoint and entered the 10km exclusion zone that surrounds the V.I. Lenin Memorial Chernobyl Nuclear Power Station. Our driver stopped the bus and we soon found ourselves standing on the road staring at large mounds of dirt skewered with radiation signs. Our guide explained that this was the village of Kopachi. Shortly after the Chernobyl disaster, liquidators arrived with bulldozers and dismantled the town, burying the radioactive houses underneath tons of dirt.
Off in the distance is Chernobyl-2, a now abandoned radar station formerly used by the Soviet military.
Further down the road we had our first glimpse of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Station. Across a small canal stand reactors five and six, both abandoned in mid-construction after the explosion at reactor four.
The power station
Reactor four
Reactor five
Water cooling tower
As our bus entered the grounds of the nuclear power station, our guide warned us that photos were not permitted here for “security reasons.” He led us towards a disused railroad bridge that spanned one of the cooling pond’s adjacent canals and hopped onto a rail in order to avoid walking on the dirt. Recalling his previous warning to “stay off the dirt”, we followed his example, hopscotching from the road to the rails to the wood planks of the bridge. Looking into the canal directly below us, we could see hundreds of catfish swimming in the water. A loaf of bread was passed around (ah, so that’s what that was for) and we took turns throwing chunks into the water, watching as the pieces were devoured by the largest catfish I have ever seen in my life. If I were telling you this story in person, I would spread my arms as wide as I could – they were literally the size of sharks. We were soon joined by a group of plant workers who had brought along their own bread to feed the monsters. I guess there isn’t much to do on your lunch break at Chernobyl.
Workers feeding the fish (snuck this pic once we got back on the bus)
While feeding giant fish was entirely thrilling, we had more interesting places to go, namely closer to reactor four.
Memorial to the heroes who contained the disaster
Situated on the westernmost perimeter of the nuclear power station, reactor four is a massive structure surrounded by decrepit concrete walls lined with barbed wire. Following the 1986 disaster, a sarcophagus was hastily constructed over reactor four to contain the radioactive material that lay inside. Some twenty years later, the damn thing just looks like it could collapse at any moment. Sets of yellow “braces” were recently added to provide a bit of structural integrity, but the sarcophagus is plagued with holes of varying sizes that allow moisture to collect inside the structure, further weakening it. Fortunately, however, plans are currently underway for the construction of a so-called “New Safe Confinement” structure that will more effectively contain the radioactive material that remains in reactor four. From the material that has been released, it looks to be an impressive feat of engineering.
The sarcophagus
Standing in that parking lot, with reactor four a mere 100 meters ahead, was intensely surreal. If you’ve read other accounts of Chernobyl visitors who stood in the same spot as we did, this is where you would see the sentence “Our dosimeter was registering 470+ microroentgens per hour!” But, as I previously mentioned, our guide apparently didn’t find it necessary to carry one of those around (instead taking a loaf of bread for the monster fishies), and so we hadn’t the slightest idea how much radiation we were exposed to at that moment. Brilliant, I know.
Ryan and I, with reactor four in the background
Laura
We spent a few minutes here taking photos and then returned to the bus. Our next stop would be Pripyat, the model Soviet city of 50,000 that housed the Chernobyl plant workers and their families.
Read more about the tour:
1. Dispatches from Chernobyl, Part I: Dude, where’s your Geiger counter?
3. Dispatches from Chernobyl, Part III: The ghosts of Pripyat
4. Dispatches from Chernobyl, Part IV: Chisto?
Related posts:
- Dispatches from Chernobyl, Part IV: Chisto? With the visit to Pripyat over, our tour of the exclusion zone was slowly drawing to a close. We stopped at the 10km exclusion zone checkpoint, where a guard ran a Geiger counter along the side of the bus and gave us a thumbs up to proceed back to the...
- Dispatches from Chernobyl, Part III: The ghosts of Pripyat “Stay off the moss. Very radioactive.” We were standing on another bridge outside the city of Pripyat, this time surveying the lush green landscape below, hoping to catch a glimpse of the rampaging packs of wild boar that were apparently proliferating throughout the exclusion zone – or so our guide...
- Dispatches from Chernobyl, Part I: Dude, where’s your Geiger counter? “Are you ready to go to the ghost city of Pripyat and die a painless death from radiation?” These were, more or less, the first words that greeted us on a beautiful July 4th morning. Most Americans spend their Independence Day holiday grilling burgers and dogs, drinking beer, eating CostCo...
From austin:
wow nice pics
i get cold chills looking at the memorials
From pablo sigismondi:
Hi, I go now to Ucraina and, meaby, Chernobyl…please, it is possible to help me about the best way to visit this place?
Thanks very much,
kiss
pablo
From Frank:
Those pictures are really great, I love all the wonderful information you included it was very intresting reading all this.
From lesley underhill:
Hi Lindsay,
Many thanks for your blog, tis information is just fascinating. There was an irishwoman who went to Chern a while back, she was with one of the children’s charities, and she wrote a book which might interest you if you have not read it, although I forget the name. I could go through a library catalogue and find it if you were interested.
You are very brave…I found your blog through searching for mention of the giant catfish – I had heard of them before.
I am very interested in this type of thing as I am vitally concerned that nuclear power not be seen as a “green” alternative !!!! and collect information on effects of radiation when I can.
All the best, Lesley. If there is anything you want to know that you think I could help with, feel free to ask…
From Florencia:
I wonder how did you do to go there, is that the chernobyl reactor?
wasn’t it full of radiation? :/
From brandan:
we are learning about chkernobyl
From RyanG:
Hey thanks a lot for taking these pictures. They’re a surprisingly incredible amount of help for a highschool project.
From Janelle:
What are you smiling about in that last photograph of you and Ryan? Maybe you always smile in every photo, even if it were the Nazi concentration camps behind you.
There’s nothing to smile about in Chernobyl. You tourists are sometimes unbelievable.
From Joe:
Tragic!
A trip I would like to take some day.
Awsome pictures!
Remember – Technology improvements make Nuclear a safer option…it’s kinda like airplane travel. No one remembers how many flights make safe landings, they remember the one that crashland in the Potomac with just scrapes and bruises on the passengers or the Concorde jet with ZERO(100 passengers, 9 crew and 4 on the ground)survivors .
If we research 3 Mile Island we would realize that it was an example of a reactor problem shutdown in the correct manner…unlike Chernobyl.
From luka:
is this really????i cant belive !!are u get a cancer?or something?ohh im scared
From Marvin:
Hi, now that the reactors are close to meltdown in Japan I wonder if it is still something to smile about like you do in your pictures, or the fact that the half-life of the radiation is over thousands of years. You and everyone else who goes to Chernobyl will certainly get cancer. But hey, be and idiot and ignorant to the fact that the area is full of radiation and that it is still an abandoned city.
Nuclear power is not safe, the technology has become better, but as you can see now in Japan an earthquake was enough. The meltdown will happen, there is nothing that can stop it. I can only hope we will stop using such primitive type of power source.
From Joe Young:
Marvin, what a hate filled person you must be in order to hope someone gets cancer after visiting Chernobyl. It looks like they were making the best of vacation.
I think you need to study up on what is happening in Japan and not believe everything you see on TV or the NET.
Once the earthquake hit Japan the nuclear chain reaction stopped at the 40yr old reactors and the fuel rods were contained in the containment vessel. The cooling of the rods started to occur just like the reactor was designed to do. The true problem occurred when the tsunami flooded the cooling pump generators. This is what started the overheating of the ‘core’. Now we may or may not have a radioactive issue; but that is yet to be seen as they are working on cooling the balance of the reactors. What we have seen so far is a small amount of radioactive steam being released (these radioactive elements has a half life of 8 days, 3 minutes, to seconds).
I’m not an engineer nor do play one on TV, but I’m smart enough to listen to more than just the excitable newscast to gather information….please do more research before condemning a proven safe form of power generation…..just remember these power plants were designed 40yrs ago to survive an 8.2 earthquake and they surpassed that surviving a 9.0, only to be taken out by a tsunami!!
From me:
you are creepy. don’t hope you get cancer like marvin but stop being a sick creep and glamorising this sort of disaster
From Joe Young:
No glam here just figured that once all of the Tree hugging anti capitalist is done this world will need something to create energy.
After all the ban on oil, coal, and natural gas will give us with glass houses to harvest the suns energy so we can light our houses with the mercury filled french-fried curly Q light bulbs. Then we will all have wind turbines in our back yard to charge our super sized lead filled car batteries.
Let’s think about this
Germany uses Nuclear for 60% of its energy
United States uses Nuclear for 19% of its energy
UK uses Nuclear for 19% also
France well they would half to surrender all modernization if they give up the 78% of its Nuclear energy
So if you have a viable energy source let’s here about it; keep in mind I don’t mind fossil fuels, after all they are more cost effective when compared to windmills and solar panels.
From blank:
you must have some serious issues if you are able to just stand there and smile dumbly, in front of the ruins of the reactor that caused God knows how many people’s death…
From x_007:
JP is now Chernobyl on steroids. Tokyo may not be the capital anymore. The radiation is huge. I do not think the liquidators and firemen that are now deceased would want people to go ‘tour’ Chernobyl.
* Don’t follow the official story and lies – no wonder the JP people are pissed off (rerun) – like Joe Young says.
Marvin has something, perhaps emotive, yet very valid to say.
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