Chernobyl is to be laid to rest at last. The radioactive mess at the site of the world鈥檚 worst nuclear accident 鈥� which last week was named as one of the 10 most polluted places on Earth (see opposite) 鈥� will be encased in steel and made safe.
On 26 April 1986, one of the four reactors at the Chernobyl power plant in northern Ukraine exploded. A concrete sarcophagus was hastily built over the wreckage, but it is starting to crumble and has been leaking radioactivity. Now President Viktor Yushchenko of Ukraine has signed a $505 million deal with the French construction firm Novarka to encase the whole lot in a massive steel vault to halt these leaks.
The arched structure, called the New Safe Confinement (NSC), will be 150 metres long and 105 metres tall 鈥� big enough to allow the existing sarcophagus and the wrecked reactor to be dismantled and permanently entombed.
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At the signing ceremony on Monday, Yushchenko said: 鈥淲e will be able to say frankly to the nation and the international community鈥� that there has been a response to the problem of building the NSC at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.鈥�
