Chernobyl in pictures: 30 years on

Apr 26, 2016

Image: REUTERS/Gleb Garanich

Joe Myers

Writer, Forum Stories

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In the early hours of 26 April 1986 a reactor exploded at the Chernobyl nuclear power station. The disaster at the Soviet plant remains the worst nuclear accident in history.

An exclusion zone, which has a radius of 30km and covers an area roughly the size of Luxembourg - remains in place around the site in Ukraine. Although largely uninhabited by humans, there are signs that animal life is returning.

This collection of striking photos offers a glimpse inside the exclusion zone.

A child's gas mask and a shoe at a kindergarten in the abandoned city of Pripyat. Image: REUTERS/Gleb Garanich

A wolf crosses a road in a forest in the 30 km (19 miles) exclusion zone around the Chernobyl nuclear reactor. Image: REUTERS/Vasily Fedosenko

The abandoned city of Pripyat, near the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. Image: REUTERS/Gleb Garanich

A piano in a kindergarten in the abandoned town of Pripyat. Image: REUTERS/Damir Sagolj

An amusement park in the centre of the abandoned town of Pripyat. Image: REUTERS/Damir Sagolj

Wild boars walk in the forest of the state radiation ecology reserve in the 30km (19 miles) exclusion zone around the Chernobyl nuclear reactor. Image: REUTERS/Vasily Fedosenko

Newspapers from March 1986 left in an empty building in the abandoned town of Pripyat. Image: REUTERS/Damir Sagolj

A raven stretches its wings as it sits on a post inside the 30 km (18 miles) exclusion zone around the Chernobyl nuclear reactor. Image: REUTERS/Vasily Fedosenko

A cross with a crucifix is seen in the deserted Ukrainian town of Pripyat. Image: REUTERS/Anatolii Stepanov

The sarcophagus covering the damaged fourth reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. Image: REUTERS/Gleb Garanich

A picture of Soviet state founder Vladimir Lenin is seen through wild flowers inside a hospital in the abandoned town of Pripyat. Image: Damir Sagolj/REUTERS

A white-tailed eagle lands on a wolf's carcass in the 30km (19 miles) exclusion zone around the Chernobyl nuclear reactor. Image: REUTERS/Vasily Fedosenko

A worker measures radiation levels at a cemetery for contaminated equipment used during the Chernobyl catastrophe. Image: Damir Sagolj/REUTERS

The sarcophagus covering the damaged fourth reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant is seen behind a building decorated with a graffiti. Image: REUTERS/Gleb Garanich

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