Chernobyl protective shield stopped working, can’t confine radiation after February drone strike: IAEA

Chernobyl safety containment damaged

According to the IAEA, which conducted an inspection of the steel confinement structure last week, it found that the drone impact had degraded the structure.

The New Safe Confinement (NSC) at Chernobyl was built in 2019 to replace the reactor destroyed in the plant’s 1986 meltdown, which resulted in the worst nuclear disaster the world has seen so far.

Chernobyl nuclear disaster

Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, which is located in the Vyshhorod Raion, Kyiv Oblast of Ukraine, was one of the world’s biggest nuclear plants at the time was a major power source in the then USSR.

But it became the scene of the world’s worst nuclear disaster in April 1986 when one of the reactors malfunctioned, releasing huge amounts of radioactive material across Europe.

Around 30 people were killed in the disaster, and the entire region has been abandoned ever since due to radioactivity.

The Soviet Union had built a concrete “sarcophagus” over the meltdown reactor to contain the spread. It was replaced with the Europe-funded protective shield in 2019, which is now damaged.

The structure, which took around nine years to complete, was designed to last 100 years.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the formation of Ukraine, the Chernobyl plant and the exclusion zone came under the newly formed country.

Chernobyl caught in the Russia-Ukraine war

The safety of Chernobyl was a major concern in the initial days of the invasion of Ukraine, as the nuclear plant and the surrounding exclusion zone were captured by Russia. Following the failed attempts to capture Kyiv, Russian troops withdrew from the area, including Chernobyl, in April 2022.

Chernobyl was in the spotlight again in February this year when the containment structure was hit by drones. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had blamed Russia for the drone attack.

The IAEA, in a statement last week, said the drone strike hit the NSC, sparking a fire and damaging the protective cladding around it.

The Nuclear watchdog has recommended a major renovation of the huge steel structure.

“Limited temporary repairs have been carried out on the roof, but timely and comprehensive restoration remains essential to prevent further degradation and ensure long-term nuclear safety,” IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said.

Grossi, however, added that there had been no permanent damage to the NSC’s load-bearing structures or monitoring systems.