CHERNOBYL IN WARTIME

Although the war has been raging for more than two years, I have not stopped visiting the Chornobyl Exclusion Zone. In April 2022, just three days after its liberation from Russian occupation, I was waiting at the checkpoint in Dytiatky for its official opening. In addition to my camera (more often the smartphone), I had brought with me more than 20 tons of household cleaning products, food and medicine. With my organization Pro Futurum and the Fundacja Potrafię Pomóc, we spent more than a week delivering these products to the residents of Chornobyl and the surrounding villages, as well as to the employees of the nuclear power plant and the many organizations connected to it.

Of course, as a photographer who has spent more than a dozen years documenting the aftermath of the disaster and the changes taking place in the exclusion zone, I couldn’t help but take advantage of that time to photograph the devastation caused by the Russian aggression and more than a month of occupation. My photo essay from that time is HERE

Currently, I try to spend at least a few days in Chornobyl during every aid mission to Ukraine. Each time, I bring several tons of supplies with me.

THE ZONE – a nature reserve

Due to the ongoing war and the risk of a renewed Russian attack from the Belarussian side, the Chornobyl Zone is operating under a military regime and is closed to tourism. Instead of tourists, there are soldiers, military equipment, fortifications and additional checkpoints. For security reasons, I cannot publish any of the photos I took of them until the war is over.

In the meantime, I will show what the Exclusion Zone and its last inhabitants look like and how they have changed. The absence of tourists – in the years before the Russian aggression, more than 120,000 visited annually – means that the area now resembles a nature reserve where all of the changes have been caused by nature, not people.

Pripyat, a ghost town once teeming with life, is now once again witnessing the strength and perseverance of nature, which inevitably strives to reclaim that which once belonged to it. The trash left behind by visitors is gone, and the trails they used to travel are overgrown. Silence reigns in the abandoned buildings, only broken by the sound of the wind and the chirping of birds. Trees tall and slender as spires have taken over the empty streets and squares. They have devoured the abandoned buildings that once towered above the ground. Massive branches and boughs have broken through windows and roofs, creating new canopies under the sky. Plants have taken over every corner and crevice, bursting through the walls of buildings. The boundary between what was created by man and what by nature is slowly blurring.

As I photograph the aftermath of the Chornobyl Disaster, I am constantly coming across portraits of Lenin and propaganda slogans, posters and murals that make the past more real and vivid. One of them commemorates the Russian soldiers who liberated the Chornobyl region from the German occupation in 1943. For their efforts, they were awarded the Hero of the Soviet Union medal, the highest honorary title in the USSR. Despite the passage of time and the peeling paint, their names are still visible on the wall. I have seen this mural many times, but it took on a new meaning for me only recently and prompted deeper reflection: the Russians went from being liberators to being occupiers. They once freed this area from Nazi occupation and then, 80 years later, they tried to “liberate” Chornobyl for the second time under a similar pretext. Good thing they didn’t succeed this time.

THE SAMOSELS – the last guardians of a deserted land

The war has, however, taken its greatest toll among the samosels. These are the elderly, ailing residents of the Exclusion Zone who refused to heed the orders to leave and live there to this day. They survived the Great Famine, World War II and the disaster at the power plant, so they fear nothing anymore. However, the harsh realities of their lives, the lack of care and material support, have mercilessly left their marks on them.

The first to pass away was Valentina Sachenok, formerly a resident of Pripyat, where she worked at the city hospital, and a Chornobyl liquidator. After the explosion in the reactor, she treated irradiated firefighters who put out the fire at the power plant. She lived the last years of her life in the village of Teremci, located right by the Belarussian border. Before the war, visiting her only involved driving several kilometers down an ordinary dirt road. Later, after the bridge was blown up, one needed to take a more circuitous route that was several times longer and go part of the way by boat.

During the war, I visited Valentina many times to deliver material aid to her and the other villagers. I enjoyed listening to her stories about the past and the disaster. She was disabled and spent most of her time at home knitting. She even knitted a small tablecloth that she wanted to give me on my next visit. Unfortunately, she was never able to do so. Valentina died on 22 February 2023 at the age of 76. This unique memento was given to me several months later by her daughter, who took care of her during her last days.

Less fortunate, if you could say such a thing, was the elderly Maria Sushchenko of the village of Kupovate. She didn’t have anyone to care for her. When I visited her, she always cried and lamented her fate. She had problems with her legs that made difficult for her to move, making cleaning and preparing food arduous task. Her final months were filled with suffering. The medicines and ointments I brought her were of no help. During my final visit to her last summer, the pungent smell of urine wafting through the cottage betrayed the fact the babushka was unable to take care of herself. Dozens of kilograms of partially spoiled or rodent-infested food lay covered by a blanket in the middle of the room. Maria required medical attention and constant care. Unfortunately, no one in the village had the strength or willingness to help her. A search for a helper among the inhabitants of the village of Orane, which borders the Exclusion Zone, was also unsuccessful. Here, too, no one wanted to take care of the babushka, even if they were paid. A few weeks later, Maria died. She was 79 years old.

A no less tragic fate befell Yevdokiya Beznoshenko, the last resident of the village of Paryshev, who everyone called Babushka Dusia. Since she lived a considerable distance from Chornobyl, a short distance from the Belarussian border, and due to the bridge being blown up, delivering aid to her was always the most difficult. Additionally, several weeks before my last visit, she lost her home and all of her belongings in a fire. Only the metal gate and her bed survived. As a result, Dusia moved to another abandoned cottage nearby. When I brought her another substantial batch of supplies shortly thereafter, I half-jokingly asked if she were not afraid of wolves living in this wilderness. She replied that she wasn’t, since she looked like a wolf herself. Babushka Dusia was always a very merry and cheerful person despite having experienced so many difficulties and misfortunes. Her penetrating gaze, though, revealed the wisdom and experience of someone who had lived through a great deal. That was the last time I saw her.

Dusia had already been promised a move to the village of Kupovate, which was closer to Chornobyl and where several other samosels lived. It would certainly have been much easier for her there, as she would be closer to other people. There was also electricity there and it was easier to find help. Unfortunately, all of the better-preserved cottages were occupied by soldiers stationed in the village, and the residents of Kupovate were not very keen to take her in. They said that they already had it hard enough, and it would be too hard to take in another elderly person. Dusia did not move and died a few months later alone, on the edge of the Chornobyl Exclusion Zone. She was 78 years old.

This is how the last residents of Chornobyl are passing away. Only a few are still alive in the abandoned villages of the Chornobyl Zone. They accept each day gratefully and are living testaments to the perseverance and indomitability of the human spirit in the face of tremendous adversity. Once living in the shadow of a reactor that threatened the world and now living in the shadow of war, they are fighting for survival. Their presence in these abandoned corners of the Zone is a reminder of the past, which is still alive in their souls and in their cottages, where time stopped the day of the disaster.

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Previous reports from Chernobyl and Fukushima:

2023 – FUKUSHIMA DAIICHI TOUR
2023 – CHERNOBYL DURING THE WAR
2022 – HELPING THOSE CUT OFF FROM THE WORLD
2021 – THE SARCOPHAGUS’S LABYRINTH
2020 – LOST HERITAGE
2020 – REMNANTS OF THE CHERNOBYL DISASTER
2019 – OVER THE HORIZON
2019 – SARCOPHAGUS AND OTHER MOST RADIOACTIVE PLACES IN CHERNOBYL
2019 – FUKUSHIMA 8 YEARS ON
2017 – ZAPOVEDNIK – BELARUSIAN EXCLUSION ZONE
2016 – FUKUSHIMA: A SECOND CHERNOBYL?
2015 – FUKUSHIMA
2015 – THE ZONE IN 4K II
2015 – WINTER IN THE ZONE
2014 – THE ZONE IN 4K
2014 – OFF THE BEATEN TRACK 2
2013 – OFF THE BEATEN TRACK 1
2013 – ALONE IN THE ZONE 2 – BEHIND THE SCENES
2013 – ALONE IN THE ZONE 2 – PREMIERE
2013 – LONG WEEKEND IN THE ZONE
2012 – HEROES OF A NON-EXISTANT COUNTRY
2011 – REACTOR 4
2011 – LITTLE REACTORS
2011 – ALONE IN THE ZONE 1 BEHIND THE SCENES
2011 – ALONE IN THE ZONE 1 – FILM
2010 – ALONE IN THE ZONE 1
2010 – VICTORY DAY
2010 – CHERNOBYL 3RD EXPEDITION
2009 – CHERNOBYL 2ND EXPEDITION
2008 – CHERNOBYL 1ST EXPEDITION