A massive nuclear power plant in Ukraine sustained heavy damage early Friday after Russian troops attacked the facility, with officials warning it could lead to a nuclear disaster with drastic consequences.
Located in the southern Ukrainian city of Enerhodar, the Zaporizhzhia facility is the largest power plant in all of Europe, according to Ukraine interior minister adviser Anton Gerashchenko, who described the area as the country’s “capital” of energy workers. Videos on social media showed projectiles striking the facility as the fire raged.
Hours after the attack began, a spokesperson for the plant said the facility had not sustained critical damage, although its power-generating ability had been compromised. The International Atomic Energy Agency also tweeted that the fire at the nuclear power plant “has not affected ‘essential’ equipment, plant personnel taking mitigatory actions.”
US Department of Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm also tweeted that the plant’s reactors “are protected by robust containment structures and reactors are being safely shut down.”
Ukrainian officials had been urging Russian troops to stay away from the plant, warning that shelling the power station could result in a nuclear disaster.
“If it blows up, it will be 10 times larger than Chornobyl!,” Ukraine’s foreign affairs minister Dmytro Kuleba tweeted, referencing the 1986 disaster at the Chernobyl atomic power station in Ukraine. When a reactor at that plant exploded, more than 30 people were killed and the spread of radioactive material contributed to many more deaths and illnesses. Over 350,000 people were eventually evacuated from contaminated areas in the years following the disaster.
Source: https://www.buzzfeed.com/skbaer/nuclear-power-plant-ukraine-fire
