Chernobyl...18 Years Later

abysmilliard writes "A young Ukrainian woman has posted a photo journal of her motorcycle rides through Chernobyl and the area surrounding it. Included are pictures of the now-emptied city, maps of current radiation levels, and a discussion of how the area has changed. While the english is quite broken, it's often rather surreal, as well, with quotes like, 'I don't know how sound the silence to those tourists that they can not stand it, but to me after hitting a red line on my bike tacho it sound like all those ghosts cursing 1100cc kawasaki engin.'"

Great thing about driving through Chernobyl

[by Anonymous Coward]

You don't need to run any lights at night.

Friendly public reminder

[jensend (71114)]

TMI was nothing like Chernobyl. Going to the dentist for an x-ray gives you more dangerous radiation than just about anybody got from TMI. Nobody died because of TMI.

Three Mile Island

[corngrower (738661)]

The situation at TMI was pretty serious. Although no one died, the fuel rods in the core of the reactor did melt. That's how hot it was. There was a lot of contamination inside of the containment building (it served its designed purpose) and it took a long time to clean it up.

Engrish rules.

[The Human Cow (646609)]

"The word CHERNOBYL scares holly bijesus out of people here."
Holly Bijesus? Is it just me, or would that make a *great* bisexual porn star name?

Re:Engrish rules.

[ktakki (64573)]

Holly Bijesus? Is it just me, or would that make a *great* bisexual porn star name?

The Passion of the Bijesus?

k.

An anglefire site

[digitalgimpus (468277)]

Guess how long that will take to /. the bandwidth out of?

I'm saving a mirror now, if necessary, I can mirror.

Re:An anglefire site

[LostCluster (625375)]

For the record, a free Angelfire site presently gets 1 GB of monthly bandwidth on which to serve up to 20 MB of content. Which means, when /. finishes off this site's bandwidth allowance, this site's gone for the month.

If somebody were to give this unfortunate person Angelfire's highest "element plan" [lycos.com], it would cost $15 for the setup and $14.95 for the first month, and give her 30 GB of monthly traffic. That might be enough to survive a slashdotting.

Gamma World

[BWJones (18351)]

The essay was absolutely amazing. The surreal description is perfect, reminding me of apocalyptic movies of the 80's and describing what I imagined the world looking like in the RPG Gamma World. Abandoned buildings as people left them, houses falling apart, yet seeing scenes of prezwalski looking horses crossing a stream.

Re:Gamma World

[MBCook (132727)]

After reading you comment and thinking about it, it reminds me of that little short story. I can't remember quite what book it's in (it's in a book of fiction).

It's about a little automated house with no one living there. It told about how it would make breakfast, and clean it up with little mechanical sweeper mice, and the house eventually burns down. The house is in a town that is empty because of a nuclear blast and the only "people" left there is a "shadow" of someone left on a wall from the nuclear blast. Interesting and sad story. The place was just as if everyone had suddenly vanished from the face of the Earth. Everything else was left.

I want to say it was in "A Brave New World" but it could have been a H2G2 book.

Re:Gamma World

[sparrow_hawk (552508)]

The story in question is Ray Bradbury's "There Will Come Soft Rains," which is part of the _Martian Chronicles_. And yes, both it and Chernobyl are extremely, extremely spooky.

Re:Gamma World

[Safety Cap (253500)]

Someone posted the story and an analysis [earthlink.net], too.

Re:Gamma World

[Have Blue (616)]

There Will Come Soft Rains.

Re:Gamma World

[BeBoxer (14448)]

That's the weird thing about the place. It's considered basically uninhabitable by humans. Yet nature as a whole seems entirely unfazed by the radition and is thriving in the absence of humans.

On the other hand, it really isn't that weird. The "nature preserve" aspect is only disturbing in relation to the empty roads and buildings. Without those features to provide the desolation aspect, nothing would seem amiss. Plus, nobody is keeping track of the average lifespan of those horses, which is almost certainly below average.

Still, a fascinating photo-essay either way. And I think it's funny that her Kawasaki probably would have been worth as much as a whole town in that part of the world in 1985.

Re:Gamma World

[lone_marauder (642787)]

Yeah, no doubt, man. A hot chick on a motorcycle cruising through radioactive ruins pursued by marauders has 80's postapocolyptic action flick written all over it.

By the way, I disclaim any responsibility for marauder activity in that area. As the name suggests, there is only one of me, and I am not there. Thank you.

one phrase...

[flynns (639641)]

I read this, and I look at the pictures, and all I can think, numbly, is "...holy shit..."

Re:one phrase...

[Nf1nk (443791)]

I felt the same way. and at the same time it reminded me of the ghost towns in the sierras that I have visited. there too you feel unnerved by the silence and the items just left sitting there unmoved for decades, and the odd decay that they undergo.

Sad graffiti...

[0m3gaMan (745008)]

There's another site out there with pictures of the abandoned buildings. Something about it is incredibly compelling and sad; almost like looking at a modern-day Pompeii. People who were children back when this happened go back there and spray-paint messages to former classmates on the walls of their elementary schools, trying to contact them or just to say they're still still around.

I also saw on a :60 Minutes segment a few years ago that the gov't pipes music into various parts of the city, where apparently there are still some people working--this is to keep them from going insane from the silence.

Re:the playground is scary

[Hard_Code (49548)]

If you want to watch a good movie on the threat of vast radiation poisoning, watch the BBC movie Threads. I got this tip from another Slashdot post a while ago, and am passing it no. I had to go to my library to find it.

It is about how the "threads" of society essentially unravel within a generation after a nuclear attack, in the face of massive homelessness, starvation and of course widespread and incurable radiation sickness.

Lovely stuff.

Re:the playground is scary

[Jellybob (597204)]

[Shudders]

Shit... I watched that film in science at school... everyone spent the week beforehand getting all excited, because another class had seen it, and told us about how crazy it was.

For the second half, we had no teacher, because she'd gone to do anything but watch it... I don't think anybody ate that lunch time.

It's some scary, scary shit, but if you can handle that, well worth watching.

There was also one recently by the BBC about smallpox, which was disturbing, but not in quite such an extreme way.

Like the American southwest

[BWJones (18351)]

This comment in the essay: This is highest building in town and in April 26-27, 1986 after reactor exploaded, people gathered on the roof of this building to watch a beautiful shining that rised above APP. They didn't know this was shining of radiation. they learned it on next day when evacuation began reminded me of talks I had with some of my patients some years ago that either lived in southern Utah and Nevada, or were in the military. Whole families would gather on high mountains to watch the pretty lights from the atomic bombs being tested in the open air and I had one old army guy tell me that soldiers who were gathered at the exercises, if they were not issued goggles, were told to look away and cover your eyes with your hands. When the bomb went off, you could actually see the bones in your hands from all the X-rays that were emitted from the bomb.

Amazingly scary.

Re:Like the American southwest

[cybercuzco (100904)]

When the bomb went off, you could actually see the bones in your hands from all the X-rays that were emitted from the bomb. True, but not for the Reason you stated. I dont care how bright the light is, you cant see X-Rays with your eyes. however, with a sufficiently bright light your hand becomes translucent and you can see the outline of your bones. Try this: With a very powerful flashlight (like a Maglite) go into a dark room and let your eyes adjust for a minute or two. Then hold your hand so the palm completely covers the flashlight part, dont let any light escape. Turn the flashlight on and you should be able to make out the outline of your bones, if the light is powerful enough. But you still cant see X-rays.

Re:Like the American southwest

[MrP- (45616)]

The radiation caused a mutation in their eyes and they got x-ray vision.. They also became able to fly, and they flew away never to be seen or heard from again.

Re:Like the American southwest

[Muhammar (659468)]

The observed shining was caused by white-hot burning graphite.

Cherenkov radiation is not observed in air (you need particles with mass traveling with speed higher than the speed of light in given medium , and the optical density of air is low (close to vacuum), the particles would have to travel at speeds near to c - which are difficult to obtain because of relativistic effects. (You can get that from accelerators, but not from fission)
You can see Cherenkov typicaly in water - the blue shine around immersed fuel rods or intense radioisotope source.

There is similar-looking bluish shine/flash around extremely strong sources, like criticality accident with Pu, U, or in nuclear explosion (the mushroom has bluish envelope). This shine is caused by intense ionisation of air molecules by radiation, mostly X-ray. The recombination of ions produces excited states whis give away the surpluss of energy by emission in UV/vis , which also appears bluis white.

Facinating

[MBCook (132727)]

The site is quite facinating. In a way Chernobyl is the largest time capsule in the world. Amazing to see that you could just go into homes and offices and see EXACTLY what life was like there in 1986. If it wasn't for the plants and animals and such, things would be almost completely identicle. It would be very cool if some archiologists could get some NASA space suits or something like that (to protect them from the radiation) to go in and photograph all those places and things.

The MOST interesting thing in the article to me though was the "deafening silence" that is mentioned. The author said that many companies have investigaed doing things like 2 hour tours but the tourists complain and want to go home after 15 minutes because it's so quite it's like being deaf. I wouldn't think that it would be so bad (go to wheat feild in the middle of the US and it's silent too), but I guess it's the combination of all the buildings and normal city sights (with the exception of the fact that there are no people) and the silence that makes it so eerie and spooky.

I bet it's spooky as hell there.

Re:Facinating

[AmiNTT (539586)]

Not only is it a time capsule, it is a great chance to watch how nature reclaims the land and how the wildlife adapts - obviously all of the animals haven't died. I wonder if there are any scientists watching for radiation caused progressive mutations?

I've been in a few places in Algonquin park [algonquinpark.on.ca] that 75 years ago were there used to be towns, hotels and whatnot. If you aren't keeping your eyes open and looking for it, you will miss the signs.

Now obviously, this isn't going to be the case here, but it will still be interesting to see what can be learned - for example, how are the roads holding up? With almost no wear and tear, the area could serve as an excellent testbed for environmental effects on road surfaces (hot and cold damage, etc).

Pompei

[tverbeek (457094)]

Her comparison (on page 15) of the area to Pompei mirrored my own impressions from her site. Spooky.

(She - apparently by mistake - skipped page 16, which you can access by modifying the URL manually.)

Radiation exposure in Kiev

[titaniam (635291)]

She mentions that the radiation exposure in Kiev during the first few days was equivalent to about a year's worth of radiation at Chernobyl now. The bastards did not inform the populace until the wind blew into Europe and radiation alarms started going off, igniting international alarm. My wife, a child at the time, was belatedly rushed out of town along with all the children in Kiev a week later. I can't prove a link, but the fact is my wife had cancer surgery just last week. I'm sure that coal and gas are worse for the environment, and I support nuclear energy as a cleaner alternative, but a freak accident combined with a stupid reaction of a government made matters much worse than they should have been. People will be suffering due to Chernobyl for decades and centuries to come.

Hidden page

[bgeer (543504)]

There is another page of pictures [angelfire.com] that you won't see clicking on the links, she has page 15 going directly to 17 by accident. This page shows the swimming pool.

Re: Hidden page

[by Anonymous Coward]

You have to get the ladder from the janitor's closet. Break the lock with the crowbar you found in the parking garage (assuming you came in that way and made it past the zombie guarding the ticket booth.)

Before anyone starts trolling...

[ZuperDee (161571)]

I realize this might be slightly off-topic, since I don't think this article really discusses the any of the dangers/merits (or lack thereof) of nuclear power in the first place. However, I know that all the same, some people are going to try to bring it up, so before anyone starts trolling about how dangerous nuclear power is, I just thought I'd point out:

1) Chernobyl was based on very old technology. Nuclear power is much safer today.

2) France gets >80% of its power from nuclear sources. Nuclear power is one of the cleanest sources of energy in the world. (I have nothing against fossil fuels, either--at the moment NOTHING has proven as economical. But I do think ultimately, we will have to find alternatives, and nuclear power is certainly a viable option.)

3) It is my opinion that the worst part of Chernobyl was the way the communist regime tried to keep it a secret, until they found out that it was just so big they simply couldn't keep it a secret anymore. Sure, many other governments in the world (and I am NOT naming any ones in particular) have also been forced to fess up to things later, but that is NOT an excuse. The Russian government was truly evil, and I will not retract that statement, as long as I live.

An irony

[rffmna (734875)]

Many people think the Chernobyl area is just like a desert. It's true, there are no people, but there ARE animals. Researches have found rats living there. When they tested those rats, which are living healthily, the scientists found that DNA of rats changed as fast as it had in last 20 million years. That's right, the radiation caused mutations (or evolution) in 20 years, at rate equal to 20 million years.
The rats aren't mutilated or anything, they just happen to adapt.

I Have to say

[SomeOtherGuy (179082)]

That this was the most eye opening thing I have seen linked on /. in a long time. Really makes all the SCO and Ipod stuff seem kinda small. I mean that was one of the most surreal things I have experienced in a long time.

Many more pictures here....

[Derling Whirvish (636322)]

Here [gunsnet.net] is a site with many more pictures of the military vehicle graveyard there.

I have mirrored it.

[Vilim (615798)]

Chances are, because it is on an Angelfire page, it will go down within the next 45 seconds. In anycase I have mirrored it at

http://ryans.northernwatercolour.com/chernobyl

I also included page 16 which she mistakenly skipped in the linking, it shows a swimming pool.

There is something sad and beautiful

[azav (469988)]

There is something sad and beautiful about being to look into a land that has been poisoned and shut down from the other side of the world.

It is eerie that a beautiful young woman would be our guide. Eerie that she would chronicle this deadened scene for us to view while enjoying the freedom it gives her, well aware of the danger and of those who died and still suffer the effects of the worst nuclear disaster the world has ever known.

As I slouch back in my chair, well aware of the life around me in this chilly San Francisco evening, it becomes clear that sometimes the internet offers us too much.

Safe passage Lena.

Re:It's a lesson

[by Anonymous Coward]

I can't believe some girl's photo album was the single greatest link I have ever read off slashdot. And it wasn't even M$ or SCO related. Incredible.

Re:It's a lesson

[shadowbearer (554144)]

Yeah, amen.

That is one brave girl. Smart, too, to have a dosimeter along.

SB

Re:It's a lesson

[mooman (9434)]

Another photographer has put together a whole book that looks very much like her site... I've flipped through it.. hundreds of ghostly images..
Here's a link to it from Amazon:
Robert Polidori: Zones of Exclusion: Pripyat and Chernobyl [amazon.com]

Re:It's a lesson

[jimhill (7277)]

Insightful, but wrong...as with most nuclear anything-related posts on /.

The RBMK reactors have a positive void coefficient. The rod control mechanisms had been manually disabled for the turbine coast-down experiment (because they kept ramming in the rods, something which should have served as a Big Clue to the operators that what they were doing was a bad idea). When the cooling water began to boil, the reactivity jumped due to that positive void coefficient and the power level spiked 3-4 orders of magnitude in some milliseconds. That flashed the cooling water into steam, which exploded and blew the top off the roof. The 3,000+ degree graphite moderator was now exposed to open air and burst into flame and it was good night, Gracie.

Read Medvedev's book. Hell, read _any_ book.

What's even more scary...

[Chordonblue (585047)]

Is what's left behind there - a big crumbling concrete tomb no one seems to want to take responsibility for. Someone had better goddamn well do it or else EVERYONE will suffer again.

There isn't a hole deep enough to bury this demon in. Chernobyl is the kind of thing that gives me real nightmares. Part of me wishes I never read that book. What a horrible, HORRIBLE disaster.

Re:angelfire?

[Bonker (243350)]

This is a site worth mirroring. It's a history lesson. 50-100-500 years from now, people will be referring to archives of that sight to give people an impression of what Chernobyl did.

Slashdot Effect? No...

[Saeed al-Sahaf (665390)]

linking to a 10+ page site full of photos on angelfire? yeah, that'll last long...

Naaa, this is Slashdot. The story has nothing to do with games, SCO, the latest video card benchmark, or esoteric science. Therefor, it should last fairly well.

Re:I've been to Ukraine...

[BrainInAJar (584756)]

Chernobyl Reactor 2 was shut down in 1991 after a fire, Reactor 1 was shut down in '96 to scam money out of the EU, and reactor 3 (the last one standing) was shut down permanantly in December of 2000.

However, the cement structure encasing reactor 4 (the one that went boom) is starting to show signs of wear and about 10% of it is cracked.

Scientific types are warning about structural failure happening sooner rather than later. The real issue here is repairing that, because when it comes tumbling down we're going to be in a world of trouble again... and what with the no-soviet union anymore, good luck convincing anyone to go to ground 0 and clean it up (rather than forcing them to do it at gunpoint.)

Re:Radiation levels variations?

[Jeremi (14640)]

Why is the level of radiation so dramatically different on roads?

My guess would be that asphalt absorbs less radiation than dirt/dust/mud/plants do.... whenever it rains, more radioactivity is washed off of the road and onto the areas around the road.

Do you have any evidence?

[mangu (126918)]

The sheer calous lack of regulation of these pollutants by governments world-wide is unbelievable. Even your fabric-softener can have mercury put in it.

Wow, welcome to the 1940's. Where have you been in this last half century? I'd say the furious over-regulation by governments world-wide is unbelievable. For instance, I now have to recycle the few micro-grams of mercury contained in fluorescent lamps and batteries. Do you know what's the biggest cause of cancer in humans due to chemicals? Salt. Sodium chloride, that is. Do you know what's the biggest cause of cancer due to radiation? Sunshine. Do you know what's the second biggest cause of cancer after tobacco? Obesity. Don't believe my words, ask any oncologist. No, the biggest environmental threat to humans isn't either radiation or chemicals, it's ignorance, stupidity, and paranoia.

Re:Makes you think...

[mesocyclone (80188)]

There is another of that design under construction in Cuba.

The graphite moderator reactor has a positive temperature coefficient, so it is inherently unstable. The fact that the graphite burns isn't too neat either.

Mayak - another nightmare that lives on...

[Chordonblue (585047)]

"The whole "what do we do with nuclear waste" thing is way overblown."

No, it's not overblown at all. I can deal with a lot of things but this is one that I don't want in MY backyard!

It doesn't take much of this radioactive shit to cause a serious disaster. I agree with using something like Yuca Mt. to store it all in but even this has problems.

1) Transportation. Getting it there will be more than half the fun. What if there's an accident on the way in? Which town along the way will become the next Chernobyl?

2) Possible environmental consequences. Things like water table contamination are a real concern.

3) Natural disasters. A sudden earthquake or volcanic activity could certainly ruin your day.
Can you predict the future for 10,000+ years? That's how long a site would need to remain stable.

Of course, where it's all stored now is a bigger nightmare because it can hardly be protected - particularly from terrorists. Then there's the waste of the plants themselves. I haven't heard any real info on what to do with a decomissioned plant yet other than just 'leave it lay'. Not good at all.

I'm not nuke-phobic, but I am realistic about man - an imperfect being handling something that you simply CANNOT make a mistake about.

The sad thing is, this is hardly the first time this sort of thing has happened. I don't usually support Greenpeace, but check this info out about the city of Mayak since a nuclear disaster. These people still LIVE THERE! Some of the pictures in their image gallery are quite disturbing:

http://archive.greenpeace.org/mayak/index.html

Russian Bike

[n2505d (759637)]

Seems you were programmed well during the duck and cover days. I own a Russian motorcycle here in the US (named same as the river on the rad map) and find it very tough and reliable.
Don't believe all that you were fed, go there and hang out (not necessarily this place) and you will find some of our propaganda was true but a lot was/is not.

Riding through there does seem tempting!!

Re:Quiet Town?

[Surazal (729)]

> Also, I'm on the page now where you can see a city, but it's so QUIET that people wat to get out ASAP after being there a few minutes. I totally want to go see this!

Can you say, "giant paintball game"?

For the love of all that is good and holy, man! There are some subjects never meant to be broached. Like paintball in an abandoned radioactive town.

The potential for evil is purely delicious. Horrible! I meant to say horrible!

Re:IN SOVIET RUSSIA...

[mindriot (96208)]

Sorry to say this, but the fact that on such a story -- which is highly interesting and moving at the same time --, the first five comments are (+5, Funny) ones, makes me feel rather sad.

Anyway, these are great pictures. Most people have forgotten about Tchernobyl now -- I bet practically everyone thinks that life is just going on there normally by now. The pictures show us the dangers of working with nuclear energy -- one small mistake, and the whole region is doomed for a long time, far beyond the lifetime of a single human. If this doesn't teach us a lesson about safety and security, I don't know what will.