Ghosts of Chernobyl: Abandoned town of Pripyat
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27 years on from the Chernobyl disaster. The Ukrainian town of Pripyat has been abandoned since the Chernobyl nuclear reactor on April 26, 1986. The town - which was built to house workers at the Chernobyl plant - was home to around 49,000 people before the disaster; afterwards, it became part of the contaminated
Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, with its entire population evacuated and the town left empty.
43 people were killed immediately in the Chernobyl disaster, while an estimated 10,000 more subsequently died from the effects of radiation.
In the years since the meltdown, however, radiation levels in Pripyat have declined to safer levels, allowing visitors to safely enter the town for short periods.
These pictures of Pripyat's hastily-abandoned buildings were all taken within the past few years
These haunting pictures show what was left behind.
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