One of the most sinister and foreboding early developments of the Russian invasion of Ukraine had to do with the invading hordes suddenly finding themselves in charge of Chernobyl – the site of the world’s most dangerous nuclear disaster.
The site, whose incredibly dangerous radioactive fallout is being contained and maintained behind a hulking concrete sarcophagus, will need to be monitored and tended to for centuries to come, lest the world wish to be irradiated by its astronomical atomic dangers.
Now, as Russia continues their genocide in Ukraine, power to the site has been lost, conjuring fears of a new disaster to come.
Ukraine appealed to Russia for a temporary ceasefire on Wednesday to allow repairs to be made to a power line to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, warning that there could be a radiation leak if the electricity outage continued.
Ukraine’s state-run nuclear company Energoatom said fighting between Ukrainian and Russian forces made it impossible to immediately repair the high-voltage power line to the plant, which has been captured by Russian forces.
Their pleas had an air of desperation about them.
Energoatom said radioactive substances could be released if the plant cannot cool spent nuclear fuel, and Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said reserve diesel generators can power the plant for only 48 hours.
“After that, cooling systems of the storage facility for spent nuclear fuel will stop, making radiation leaks imminent,” Kuleba said on Twitter.
“I call on the international community to urgently demand Russia to cease fire and allow repair units to restore power supply.”
Nothing about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been all that efficient, and we can only hope that they can get it together before they poison the whole of Europe.
