The Soviet Union's Chernobyl nuclear power station complex, consisting of four graphite-moderated 1,000-megawatt (MW) reactors built since 1972 (with two more in preparation) and situated some 140 km north of Kiev in the Ukraine, was the scene of the world's worst-ever nuclear accident, commencing on April 26, 1986, when explosions severely damaged the No. 4 reactor and killed two technicians.
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The ensuing protracted fire took two weeks to bring under control. The immediate danger of a meltdown of the reactor's radioactive core had apparently been averted by mid-May, but the rescue services had to work in extremely hazardous conditions in their efforts to smother the reactor with sand and cement, and many suffered radioactive contamination. Official figures stated that 299 were hospitalized and that the death toll from the effects of high radiation doses had reached 24 by June 5 (ie in addition to the two killed in the initial explosions). The dead included 14 of the 19 people who had received bone marrow or foetal liver transplants in Moscow hospitals.
Contamination of the surrounding area necessitated the evacuation of about 100,000 people, this apparently being done promptly in the immediate area but not set in motion until one week later in the wider area up to 30 km from the reactor. There was widespread criticism in the West of the slowness of the Soviet response and of the reluctance of the Soviet authorities to make adequate information available promptly (the first outside information on the disaster coming from Swedish radiation monitoring). There were varying estimates of the effects of the disaster on the incidence of cancer over the coming decades.
The Chernobyl disaster gave rise to radioactive fallout across much of Europe.
The problems were reportedly most serious in Poland and Romania, although radioactivity well above normal levels was monitored as far away as the United Kingdom, Israel and Japan, with traces detected even in North America. In Western Europe several governments (notably in Switzerland and Austria, and in West Germany--) banned or at least advised against the sale of milk from grass-fed cows and the sale of leafy vegetables; there were cautions against drinking rainwater, and in some instances warnings against children being allowed to play outside.
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