Chernobyl. Three Decades After the Nuclear Disaster

On the night of 26th, on April 1986, a safety system test was carried out at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant (NPP), then the accident happened. As a result, of the explosion, in the active zone of the Unit 4 reactor, a large part of the technological equipment and building structures were destroyed, including safety barriers and systems, releasing large quantities of radioactive contamination into the environment. In 1986, just after the accident, the area of the 30 km Exclusion Zone was set up around the Chernobyl NPP and is still in place today. After the disaster, all the residents from the towns and villages were urgently evacuated, allowing them to take only the necessary documents and a very small part of the most important things. Now, almost nobody lives here and a new ruler prevails in the abandoned places – nature, reclaiming the territory and increasingly taking over the places that were once established for life.

The author of the book Dr. Laimutė Kurienė was born in Kaunas, Lithuania. Now she lives in the Hague and works at the Dutch Authority for Nuclear Safety and Radiation Protection (ANVS) as a coordinator-inspector for nuclear safety. The greatest passion of life – traveling was an inspiration for photography. Two very exciting and memorable private visits to the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone in June 2017 and in February 2022 led to the realization of this book.

This book will help you to understand better the current situation in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. The book presents carefully the author's selected photos, supplemented by many interesting facts.