Chernobyl Today

“Pripyat, ghost city abandoned after chernobyl catastrophe, has grown to a forest. nature takes over and invades and collapses human creations the views remind some apocalipthic films like I am a Legend; Views from highst building in town, a former Hotel“.

In the zone of alienation in northern Ukraine, Kiev Oblast, near the border with Belarus.  Its population had been around 50,000 prior to the accident. Today, the only residents are deer and wolves along with a solitary guard.

Prypiat used to be proud for being home to the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant workers. But something happened on 26 April 1986…

It took three days before all permanent residents of Chernobyl and the Zone of alienation were evacuated due to unsafe levels of radioactivity. People from around the Soviet Union were forced to come and work here in order to liquidate the danger and evacuate the residents. Many of the workers died or had serious illness from radiation. My father was also recruited for this operation, but he bribed corrupt local officers with some good sausages which were rare and a valuable item at those times, so he’s fine an alive today.

Let the story be told by these magical pictures taken ~20 years later after the accident.

All the texts put in the quotation-marks are mostly the quotations of comments made by the authors of the photos.

Schools

“Gym class”

“Children will never run here again.”

Left: “One of the five schools of Pripyat, each teaching about 1000 children. The schools have remained relatively intact considering the problems with looters eight years ago. I guess books don’t hold much value to the poor. “

Right:”At a 20th anniversary Chernobyl exhibit on Capitol Hill.”

“Deserted secondary school near Chernobyl, Illinsty, Ukraine. Dec 1995 0.96.07.01.19”

Kindergarten

“Nursery in the creche/kindergarten”.

Hospital

“Hospital corridor”.

“Found just outside the surgery in the hospital. This hospital received many of Reactor 4′s first victims for treatment immediately after the explosion. The hospital itself however was already exposed to huge amounts of radiation.

Every rescue worker who attended the initial explosion was killed by radiation poisoning.”

Pripyat funfair

“Pripyat funfair was due to be opened on May 1st. The Chernobyl disaster happened April 26th.

No one ever managed to ride the ferries wheel. It remains one of the most irradiated parts of Pripyat since the disaster, making it still dangerous today, 22 years on.”

“Bumper car ride in the amusement park in central Pripyat, it was to be opened on the May 1st celebrations of 1986, five days after the accident”

“Ferris wheel control or ticket booth in the amusement park .. I’m sure the plush teddy bear was placed there later by someone looking for an emotional photo, but it’s interesting also to document the later attempts of using the accident to achieve certain media goals.”

Swimming pool

Others

“After the explosion at Reactor 4 the people of Pripyat flocked on the railway bridge just outside the city to get a good view of the reactor and see what had happened.

Initially, everyone was told that radiation level was minimal and that they were safe. Little did they know that much of the radiation had been blown onto this bridge in a huge spike.”

They saw a beautiful rainbow coloured flames of the burning graphite nuclear core, whose flames were higher than the smoke stack itself. All of them are dead now – they were exposed to levels of over 500 roentgens, which is a fatal dose.

P.S.: note that the photo above is made from 2 different photos (top photo of the reactor and bottom photo of the bridge in Pripyat joined together)

Main square

/Leena