As the HBO miniseries Chornobyl comes to a conclusion tonight, viewers will have been taken on a dramatic trip back to 1986, experiencing the horror and dread unleashed by the world’s worst-ever civil nuclear disaster. Thirty-three years ago, on April 26, 1986, a series of explosions destroyed Chornobyl’s reactor No. 4, and several hundred staff and firefighters tackled a blaze that burned for 10 days and sent a plume of radiation around the world. More than 50 reactor and emergency workers were killed in the immediate aftermath. The workers and emergency responders were not the only ones to risk their lives—a handful of photographers went to the scene as well, managing to capture images of some of the chaos and acts of heroism that took place in the weeks and months that followed.
Chornobyl
The Atlantic: Photos from the 1986 Chornobyl disaster
Picture taken from a helicopter in April 1986 shows a general view of the destroyed 4th power block of Chornobyl's nuclear power plant few days after the catastrophe. A reactor at Chornobyl blew up on April 26, 1986 in the worst nuclear accident in history. It burned for some 10 days, sending radiation across a large swathe of Ukraine, Russia and Belarus.
