Chernobyl radiation levels spike nearly 17 times as forest fires burn in exclusion zone
Chernobyl exclusion zone's radiation levels increased nearly 17 times more than the normal reading on Sunday, April 5, according to the head of Ukraine's ecological watchdog. The reason behind the dramatic spike in the radiation levels is believed to be forest fires blazing nearly 12 miles into the Chernobyl disaster area.
Ecological inspection chief Yegor Firsov, in a Facebook post written from the affected region, wrote: "There is bad news. At the center of the fire, radiation levels are high ... readings are 2.3, when the normal level is 0.14." Firsov, along with the post, also included a video of the readings made on a Geiger counter, a device used to measure radiation levels.
The increase in radioactivity was found only in the center of the fire, according to the ecological inspection chief. Firsov, in a post later on April 5, wrote that nuclear specialists had marked no increase in radiation levels in the capital, Kyiv, which is only about 60 miles from the Chernobyl exclusion zone.
The fire, which engulfed an area of over 250 acres over the weekend, was likely caused by human negligence, according to Ukrainian authorities. Firsov said that the blaze was possibly the outcome of someone setting fire to grass, which gradually grew and spread to nearby trees.
The Ukrainian Emergency Services Ministry later released a statement, saying that the fire in the region had been extinguished and that the radiation levels in the are within normal limits.
According to the ministry, Ukraine sees an increase in human-caused forest fires annually, and such fires are more dangerous around Chernobyl as the flora and fauna in the region are still irradiate from the nuclear disaster in 1986.
Firsov, through his Facebook post, called for an increase in fines for sparking forest fires in the region as the current fine for committing arson stands at nearly $6.50.
"This can't continue. The fine must go up 50-100 times," the inspection chief wrote on Facebook.
Ukraine's emergency services head, Andrii Vatolin, also slammed those responsible for causing the fire, branding them as criminals. "My indignation is in the fact that the firefighters who are forced to work in the exclusion zone are not liquidating the consequences of an accident, but the consequences of human negligence and criminal acts," he said, according to NBC News.
The worst known nuclear power accident sent shockwaves across the world in 1986. The workers of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, near Pripyat in Soviet Ukraine, were conducting a technical test on the night of April 25, 1986, to check security measures at the plant by simulating a station blackout due to a complete power failure. However, a combination of flaws in the process led to uncontrolled reactor conditions. One of the staff members panicked and pushed the emergency stop button and, within nine seconds, the reactor in the fourth block which held almost 200 tonnes of radioactive fuel exploded, emitting large amounts of radiation into the atmosphere.
Although the immediate death toll of the disaster was only 31, experts state that an additional 4,000 people might eventually die due to radiation exposure.