Chernobyl Then And Now: 28 Haunting Images From Nuclear Disaster

In the following seven months massive effort was made to decontaminate affected areas...


Military hardware working in the Chernobyl disaster area undergoes decontamination at the special point.

...and erect a metal and concrete shelter over Reactor 4.


The building of the sarcophagus around the fourth reactor of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant after its explosion is seen in this 1986 file photo.


Liquidator team ready to climb the Chernobyl nuclear reactor top after the disaster.

Ukraine, Russia and Belarus sustained the most damage, although increased radiation was detected far across Europe.


While Reactor No. 4 was damaged beyond repair, other parts of the power station remained functional. Shut down in the wake of the blast, Reactors 1, 2 and 3 were restarted between October 1986 and December 1987. Chernobyl continued producing nuclear power until December 2000.


A worker at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant checks the radiation level in the engine room of the first and second power units in this June 5, 1986 file photo.

Fallout from Chernobyl continues to wreak havoc to human health, almost three decades on from the disaster.


Olga Derzhutskaya, 6, undergoes medical observation after an operation for thyroid cancer at the ra diation medicine center in Gomel, April 9, 1996

Emergency workers who tackled the disaster died and suffered massive damage to their health.


A worker of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant gives way to emotion during commemorations at the station marking the 10th anniversary of the explosion in the station's fourth reactor in Chernobyl April 26, 1996

There are also more cancer risks and a huge expulsion zone in the middle of Europe.


A father feeds his child in the Belarus capital of Minsk special hospital, which deals with radiation related illnesses April 23, 1996. A small amount of radiation escaped at the Chernobyl nuclear power station on the eve of the 10th anniversary of the world's worst nuclear disaster it was reported April 25, 1996

Pripyat and a handful of old villages near Chernobyl plant are ghosts, although a few evacuated residents decided to return in defiance of the danger still posed by radiation.


While living in the exclusion zone is not the best idea, radiation levels have dropped low enough for short visits to be safe. Chernobyl is an interesting destination for scientists and adventurous tourists now.


A man looks at the New Safe Confinement (NSC) structure at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant April 23, 2013.

The project was expected to be completed by October 2015 costing some 1.54 billion euro.