The Chernobyl structure that was hit on Friday is a huge arched refuge that covers the remains of the paralyzed reactor. The shoulder strap lived radiation in the atmosphere and contaminated an area of 18 miles around the plant that the residents were forced to leave.
The protective structure, reminiscent of a Heromobile Hangar, was completed in 2016. It covers another structure known as the sarcophagus that was built immediately after the disaster.
The exploding drone violated the external shield but did not damage the old internal containment structure, Leontiy Derkach, a radiological engineer on the site, said in a telephone interview.
The explosion sprayed the splinters in the space between the two structures, damaging both, he said, but did not spread radioactive materials. The emergency crews responded around 3 in the morning, he said, while the fire is still burnt.
The first people approached the site were the workers with radiation counters, to ascertain if the radiation were losses, he said. “We are not suicide bomber to go immediately to the danger area,” he said.
The air samples determined that no radiation was losing, said Derkach. Ukrainian military chemists and radiation specialists are still working on the site to obtain a fuller picture of the damage. Around noon, he said, the crews had not yet entered the external containment structure for a more close view.
The drone, he said, had hit about 60 IARDE from where the protective plates covered highly radioactive debris from the 1986 accident. If he had been hit in that position, he said, the drone that exploded could have spread the radiation at least to the interior of the external containment structure.
The emergency crews, said Derkach, were evaluating how to repair the hole. “The Russians caused us great damage,” he said. “The whole world built this refuge and the Russians destroyed it in a second.”
Greenpeace, the conservation group, issued a declaration on the strike on the Chernobyl plant, stating that it was “a further escalation of the threat to Ukrainian nuclear power plants and must be condemned and punished”.
Chernobyl was among the first places targeted in the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, while the Russian army captured and occupied the disused plant and used the site as a base for attacks in Kyiv, to the south.
Radiation levels have increased for several days, most likely by columns of heavy weapons that mix dust. During the occupation of one month of the site, the Russian soldiers dug trenches in the irradiated soil and electricity in a cooling pool for nuclear waste was briefly reduced, raising alarms.
The International Atomic Energy Agency said that staff members on the former nuclear power plant site listened to the explosion at night.
The strike on Chernobyl, about two hours north of the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, and the recent increase in military activities around the Zaporizhzia nuclear power plant in an area occupied by Russia “underlines the persistent risks for nuclear security,” said Rafael Grossi , General Manager of the Agency, the General Manager of the Agency.
Ivan Nechepurenko and Maria Varenikova have contributed to relationships.