Todays Chernobyl.

reply to post by Agit8dChop


very good, very interesting and yet no one has mentioned that the pics show man made objects etc ruined yet naturally occuring and growing things thriving? What wildlife did you encounter? Birds,insects, for instance? I am interested to know did you encounter any?

Thank you for posting. I was glad you included a picture of the park before the disaster. I can image people getting up on the tall building to get a good look. Sad they were not warned of how dangerous that was. I also thought it was interesting that radiation can pool inside of buildings, that there are so many workers on site building the new sarcaphogus, and the amount of radiation that is in the ground water. If the aquifer gets contaminated, it would be horrendous. I had a freind who traveled there and was told that the snow is radioactive & should not be eaten. I think Fukishima will produce the same thing. I think they will need to build covers there also, but it's so close to the ocean, it will be more difficult

Thank you for all your effort. If you are not a professional writer/photographer, you very well could be. Your writing ability, and photos, made me feel as if I was there. Reminds me of the History Channel program, "Life After People".

I am a Photographer so i loved this set.

Way to push the envelope with eating the radiated berries lmao.

Nice work man and keep up the adventure.

lucky you get to go on a nice little adventure, through a former meltdown zone. Yea radiation and all that jazz. I hope your geiger counter was accurate.


Its good to see within a life time you can see damage reversing . I was happy to see the geiger number low except for soil area. But thats another story lol.


When i go to places i sometimes like to close my eyes . nd feel the differnce in "silence" in areas. That silence is more then noise , the riniging in yoru head from the bombardment of electo magetic radition.

The place looks like its doing better , giver another few hundread years and shes good for a restart. With plants coming up back even tougher and hopefully some new strains but benifical ones lol.

4:20 then reading this awesome story made my day!, thanks dude hope you got more pictures

Thank you very much! That was probably the most interesting post on ATS in a long time.

The peanut gallery earnestly requests another interesting post from you sooner then later

GREAT travel log. Well done.

What is most interesting is the lack of destruction. plant life seems okay, and most everything but the man made abandoned stuff seems no worse then say, mount saint helens after the blow out - humans just can't live there which also seems fine because they simply ruined it for themselves.

I can honestly say this ranks among the best threads I've read since first discovering ATS. If there is ever an ultimate 'Hall of Fame' established for permanent status to the best threads, this one ought to easily have earned it's place. This almost reads like a commercial article!


Now I do have one question and I got a real sick feeling looking at all those photos because of this. What happened to everything??? I'd heard reports about furniture and household goods left in place from the evacuation and too contaminated to recover..so still THERE. The photos all show what looks like berserk looters stripped the place down to the wiring or piping in the walls.

Please say you heard things while there about this all being done deliberately for some reason (?) and not being the work of criminal looters stripping Pripyat for whatever they could get. That would suggest that stuff has been spread all over and could be a part of who knows how many new constructions or remodels. Yikes...

Great post! Here's a touching clip..

And to think that is what may become of the area close to Fukushima in 2020-2030...

S&F, loved your thread.

I remember sitting in the still of night, 3am, I was like 15 or 16 years old. I was online looking at what I could find of Chernobyl, it was my first time learning of it. I had just heard the word uttered in school at times and had learned of a nuclear disaster but never knew what it looked liked. From the swimming pool, to the ferris wheel. It all paints such a radioactive portrait, both eerie, yet beautiful. I wouldn't be able to imagine how creepy it would be to walk through Pripyat at nightfall. Still, I would go if I could.

Sorry mods! I screwed up this post of a kinda double! please delete or disrregard,

Originally posted by murkraz
And to think that is what may become of the area close to Fukushima in 2020-2030...

S&F, loved your thread.

I remember sitting in the still of night, 3am, I was like 15 or 16 years old. I was online looking at what I could find of Chernobyl, it was my first time learning of it. I had just heard the word uttered in school at times and had learned of a nuclear disaster but never knew what it looked liked. From the swimming pool, to the ferris wheel. It all paints such a radioactive portrait, both eerie, yet beautiful. I wouldn't be able to imagine how creepy it would be to walk through Pripyat at nightfall. Still, I would go if I could.

My greatest worrries right now is that I can't trustfully, reley on any statistics frome Fukushima!

I am generally worried about those hot particles.

Nice pics! I wouldn't recommend eating the fruits there though.

reply to post by Agit8dChop


I would definitely like to take a journey across Europe and see how everything goes. This looks like a great journey of a lifetime you undertook and in the end, you will look at it as a life changing experience. What an excellent thread, my friend, and its great to see that you got back safe.

Great thread!

Fantastic thread -- thanks for all those great photos. The gas masks were chilling.

Originally posted by Unvarnished
reply to post by Agit8dChop

 

I would definitely like to take a journey across Europe and see how everything goes.

Kinda frightens me that you might think that Chernobyl is somehow typical for Europe or something

Anyway, yes i remember when it happened...and assuming that MOST of you guys here are American you might probably not understand what a HUGE impact this accident had in Europe - even if most of the Western European countries where 1000s of miles away from where the accident happened.

The weather at that time brought all that #### down with the rain, i try to remember how it was..but i think Finland and northern Europe was affected the most, but that #### also rained down as far as Germany. RADIOACTIVE RAIN, so to speak!

I remember actually joking about this back in the days, we were out in a park and it started to rain. The next day we heard on the news that on this particular day the measured levels of fallout or whatever was in the rain were very high in particular. And this was in Germany, 900 mls from Ukraine.

There were also other effects, like people were told not to eat certain plants, mushrooms etc..etc..

I also want to point out that people really need to realize this was only ONE accident, and how many people died in the wake of this...and what ramifications this has and STILL has including dangerous radiation level which can be measured now, 25 years after this one single accident.

Such an accident happening anywhere in the States or Western Europe it would be an incredible catastrophe.

I was also shocked to learn that some Americans did NOT know what happened there (for example my ex who had no clue what Chernobyl is)....which is ironic knowing that MANY nuclear plants in the states are in very dense populated areas...or close to them. I think many really do not realize the *potential* dangers...

reply to post by Agit8dChop


I've seen pictures like this before from other people's incursions into the zone. It is truly bizzare, yet so intriguing. There was one really interesting thing said about that night it happened. Please correct anyone if I am wrong because I remember this from like 10 years ago. But I remember reading that the people saw a blue light eminating from the reactor. I can't remember if the article said that those who saw it died or not. I do remember reading that one side of the hotel you can't go into the rooms because those were facing the reactor and are much more radioactive than the other side... but again I may be wrong.

Thank you for taking the time and sharing these facinatings photos for us. I wonder if scientists continously monitor the soil and land? It will give us a better understanding should this ever happen again.

Thank you for posting this. What an exciting trip this must have been. Kudos for the photos!