Chernobyl Diaries

by Maxine Bates

Lonely Planet describes a visit to Chernobyl as ‘the world’s weirdest day trip’ – I suppose it’s up there with Auschwitz and Fray Bentos in terms of morbid curiosity – but five of us became ‘extreme tourists’ and made that trip on Easter Sunday 2012. We had booked flights with Wizz Air from Luton to Kiev as soon as they went on sale six months previously. At that time the Ukrainian government had closed the exclusion zone to visitors so we'd booked knowing it was going to be a Kiev city break with the possibility of a day trip to Chernobyl. In mid-December 2011, the exclusion zone was re-opened and we booked places on the trip through a UK-based agent called Lupine Travel. The cost was £129 each and I imagine much of that was the processing of permits to enter the zone. These need obtaining at least ten days in advance, so it’s no good arriving in the city and hoping to book onto a last minute tour. Passports were checked upon boarding the coach in Kiev and again on entering the exclusion zone. The drive is around two hours from Kiev and the whole day lasted from 9am to 6pm. On the coach we watched, in silence, a film about the Chernobyl disaster.

As is to be expected, the landscape around Chernobyl is quite bleak with a whole village bulldozed and now buried under the ground. The checkpoint is 22km from the reactor sites. Our first stop was a building where we had a presentation and were able to view photos and maps on the walls. Then we were taken to a view point where all four reactors could be seen. Number 4 was the cause of the disaster on 26 April 1986. Numbers 1 and 2 had been closed down a couple of years previously due to accidents that didn't make the headlines. Numbers 5 and 6 were never completed. The big accident 26 years ago was actually caused by a failed safety test, due to a combination of inexperienced workers and bad reactor design.

Pripyat is a nearby town constructed to house workers at the nuclear power plant and their families. Due to Soviet secrecy at the time, residents were not made fully aware of the extent of the disaster until 36 hours after it occurred, thus reducing their chances of survival. The first firefighters to arrive at the scene were not fully equipped and consequently died of radiation. They had to make their own radiation protection suits that didn't work well. There is now a monument to these brave men. The hundreds of ‘liquidators’ brought in to clear the disaster area also died over the following years.

We took a walking tour of Pripyat including abandoned housing, supermarket, leisure centre, hotel, restaurant, kindergarten and a funfair that had been due to open only a few days later. The rides were never ridden. Everything just sits decaying. Quite eerie.

Lunch was served in the work canteen as there are still workers at Chernobyl, mostly at a concrete batch mixing plant. These workers receive regular health checks. 130 residents refused to move out of the exclusion zone; they are all aged 70s-90s and given health checks too. Lunch was brought in from outside the zone: soup, salad, chicken, potatoes, a chocolate éclair type of dessert and two juice drinks.

Our final stop on the tour was around 300 metres from reactor 4 and the sarcophagus that now surrounds the crumbling reactor. This is the nearest visitors are permitted to go. The Geiger counters went crazy then! Though, saying that, we were told the level of radiation was equivalent to one transAtlantic flight and not dangerous, otherwise we would not be allowed to be there. We had to pass through detection machines upon exiting the exclusion zone. Apparently only one tourist has ever set them off - a Dutch photographer who wandered off into the woods for too long. We were told to walk on concrete and try to avoid treading on any moss or grass, and we had to stomp our feet before boarding the coach again. We were also obliged to cover arms, legs and not to wear sandals. This was not a problem in April.

I have no idea how many tourists visit, or are allowed to visit, Chernobyl, but we were the only coach there on Easter Sunday. All in all it was a unique and thought-provoking day trip.

Kiev in itself is quite interesting. Currently there is lots of building work and street repairs in preparation for hosting the Euro 2012 football tournament. Andrew’s Descent is described in guidebooks as a quaint cobbled street, but all we saw were soil, pipes, diggers and concrete mixers! Food and museum fees were very cheap. The Chernobyl Museum was approximately £1 to visit. You can’t get the currency in the UK and we couldn’t exchange it back at the airport so if anyone is planning a trip to the Ukraine and would like some hryvnias, please get in touch. I would say: do not book accommodation via Hostel World as ours was closed down when we arrived despite email re-confirmation a few days previously! In darkness, gate locked, the phone number was not working. It is somewhat of a problem finding five beds for the night when it’s already 8pm! Luckily we ended up with a nice three bedroom apartment and a very late Ukrainian buffet dinner.

Cue the debate about visiting disaster zones…

First published in VISA 103 (June 2012)