Report - Chernobyl, Zone & Pripyat Sept 2010 - Part 2 - Chernobyl Town & Moscow Eye

[Ric]

Part 2 - Chernobyl Town & Moscow Eye

I was surprised with the town of Chernobyl, a lot of people forget that Chernobyl isn't the plant itself but the town slightly to the south.

Due to winds when the explosion occurred Chernobyl Town escaped most of the contamination, however, most people still decided to leave.

However there are quite a few people still living here, there are quite a few shops, places to eat as well as many recreational places

Monument for the firefighter which died after the explosion

Shortly after the accident, firefighters arrived to try to extinguish the fires. First on the scene was a Chernobyl Power Station firefighter brigade under the command of Lieutenant Volodymyr Pravik, who died on 9 May 1986 of acute radiation sickness. They were not told how dangerously radioactive the smoke and the debris were, and may not even have known that the accident was anything more than a regular electrical fire: "We didn't know it was the reactor. No one had told us."

A monument in Chernobyl town, i'm unaware what its representing unfortunately

Some of the vehicles used in the evacuation and movement of troops during the disaster, placed as a monument in Chernobyl Town

Nature has taken over in Chernobyl Town, there are endless roads like this, houses peeking through the trees which have engulfed them over the last 25 years

A water pump in one of the houses

Scales in an old green grocers

Undisturbed items in a old porterhouse

I actually nearly walked into this gas mask, it didn't half scare the crap out of me

A cache of gas masks in a house

Moscow Eye:

Information is sketchy on this place, its basically a massive secret radar/radio antenna based well within the red forest.

Our guide had managed to get us unheard access within the compound of the army base, but when we arrived due to the size of our group they declined, therefore only pictures of the outside!

Next up, Post 3 - Pripyat