Best of Ukraine
Title: Chornobyl Zone
Address: http://bestofukraine.com/ukraine-travel-center/north/kyiv/regions-attractions/chornobyl-zone.html
Printed on  06.10.2024



Chornobyl Zone

Memorial to firefighters in Chornobyl, who died in the accident
Memorial to firefighters in Chornobyl, who died in the accident

Chornobyl is a city in northern Ukraine, Kyiv oblast, near the border with Belarus. This city was evacuated in 1986 due to the Chornobyl disaster at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant, which is located 14.5 kilometers (9 miles) north-northwest. On April 26, 1986, Reactor #4 at the Chornobyl' Nuclear Power Plant near Prypyat', a city larger and closer to the power plant, exploded. Prypyat' was a homecity for the power plant workers.

Nowadays, due to the radioactive contamination caused by the Chernobyl nuclear reactor accident, the north-western end of the Kyiv oblast is a part of the zone of alienation. Chernobyl and Prypiat cities, so called ghost towns, are abandoned. There are just a small number of inhabitants, who live in houses marked with signs "Owner of this house lives here", also workers on watch and administrative personnel.

Prypyat
Prypyat

Shortly after the Chornobyl nuclear disaster, the city of Slavutych was built specifically for the evacuated population of Chornobyl' and Prypyat'. There is a memorial in the city to remember all victims of this disaster, and especially those who lost their lives immediately after the event from radiation-related diseases. Slavutych is situated on the left bank of the Dnipro river, 45 kilometers from Prypyat, 50 kilometers from Chornobyl, 40 kilometers from Chernihiv and 200 kilometers from Kyiv. While geographically it looks like Slavutych is a part of Chernihiv Oblast, administratively it belongs to Kyiv Oblast, being an administrative exclave. This city doesn't belong to any district (raion).

These days Chornobyl Zone is a very popular tourist destination. Several companies in Ukraine offer tours to the contaminated area.

Read more about Chornobyl

Alyosha rocks Eurovision with her song Sweet People

Alyosha (real name Olena Kucher, born on May 14th, 1986 in Zaporizhzhya), Ukraine’s participant in the 2010 Eurovision Song Contest, successfully presented her song Sweet People. She rocked the place with a powerful expressive covering a range of no less than four octaves vocal performance of her melancholic song, the key message of which is environmental protection.

Alyosha’s official video clip for the song Sweet People was shot in the town of Prypyat, which is the closest to Chornobyl. Prypyat was evacuated in the course of the Chornobyl disaster and has since then been abandoned due to high radiation level. The director of the clip mentioned, that everything in the video was real, nothing was shot in an artificial set.



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