Pripyat Today
Every year about 6,000 tourists visit the city of Pripyat where Chernobyl is located, now a ghost town, frozen in time since that distant April 25. The Chernobyl Tour, not authorized by the relevant authorities, has enjoyed considerable success, to the point that the Ukrainian government itself has officially endorsed it because Chernobyl has become one of the most visited places in Ukraine.
If one does not linger long around Chernobyl, the radiation risk is not high. The radiation levels have greatly decreased but it is important to take the right precautions, such as not touching anything and not leaving the designated area. Whether called horror tourism or memory tourism, Pripyat today opens up to the other side of the coin, inviting reflection and remembrance.
Visiting Chernobyl
The Chernobyl tour is also a small money-making machine. The cost of the visit, lasting about 4 hours, ranges from 400 dollars per person to 160 dollars per capita if in a group. Some private companies organize the visit. Tour2Chernobyl is one of them. Details of the Chernobyl tour are available on the company’s website, complete with images, videos, useful information, calendar, and online booking. The Chernobyl disaster, still an open wound.
Five decades have passed since that April 26, 1986 when the Chernobyl nuclear power plant suffered an accident revealing the full vulnerability of the atomic complex.
Even today the nuclear plant requires new interventions, and radiation levels, despite all these years, remain high though controlled.
In recent months, the memory of that terrible day and the period that followed was sadly recalled, not only because it marked an important anniversary (25 years since the tragedy), but also because another plant, this time in technologically advanced Japan, at Fukushima, revealed fragility after a devastating earthquake. In Italy, meanwhile, the nuclear debate has become very current, although the risk has always been high because some nuclear plants in neighboring countries were built, for who knows what reason, right on our borders.
