It is a ghost town deserted by its inhabitants for 35 years. Pripyat, is located three kilometers from Chernobyl in Ukraine, site of one of the biggest nuclear disasters. To enter the area, you have to be patient, the place has become very popular with tourists. Each visitor shows their passport, signs a simple discharge and receives a Geiger counter to assess the amount of radiation observed. A day in the middle of the ruins of Chernobyl costs 135 euros. Such a success in 2019, the site welcomed more than 120,000 tourists, up 30%. “It is the only place in Ukraine where you feel like you are in the atmosphere of the Soviet Union of the time”, underlines Viktoria Brojko, a guide.
In Pripiat, before the incident, 50,000 people lived there, mainly employees of the nuclear power plant. On April 26, 1986, a reactor exploded and pulverized part of the building diffusing radioactive elements. Since then a sarcophagus has been installed on it and tourists can visit the control room where the disaster occurred. You don’t have to stay very long anyway. Ukraine relies on tourism in Chernobyl. The government has requested that the site be listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The JT
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