A compelling history of the 1986 disaster and its aftermath presents Chernobyl as a terrifying emblem of the terminal decline of the Soviet systemThese days, European travel agencies offer trips to Chernobyl for as little as €500. Tourists are promised safety, comfort and the ghoulish thrill of visiting the site where, at 1.23am on 26 April 1986, an explosion at the nuclear plant’s reactor No 4 created the largest peacetime nuclear disaster in history. The adjacent city of Prypiat, which grew up around Chernobyl, is a latter-day Pompeii. It has remained uninhabited since the Soviet authorities belatedly ordered the evacuation …read more
Source: The Guardian
