Chernobyl disaster

Period

1986

Region

Europe

Category

Science

On 26 April 1986, reactor 4 of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, located near Pripyat in the Ukrainian SSR of the Soviet Union, exploded. The accident resulted in dozens of direct deaths and a major release of radioactive material into the environment, causing widespread health effects and requiring the establishment of the Chernobyl exclusion zone. The response involved more than 500,000 personnel and cost an estimated 18 billion rubles. It remains the most destructive nuclear disaster and the most expensive disaster in history, with an estimated cost of US$700 billion. It is one of only two nuclear accidents rated at the maximum severity on the International Nuclear Event Scale, the other being the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan.

Sources: Wikipedia — Chernobyl disaster · CC BY-SA 4.0