when people think about the chernobyl disaster they imagine the abandoned ghost city of pripyat
the decrepit sarcophagus and the famous fallout zone in ukraine but what very few realize however
was that just over the border with belarus radioactivity traveled and arguably caused
even more damage and although the baylor russian zone is not nearly as sensationalized
it presents a genuine picture of how nuclear fallout ravages humanity today we learn about
chernobyl's baylor russian fallout zone i'm your host ryan socash and you're watching it's history
chernobyl most and famously known for the catastrophic nuclear disaster that almost wiped
out europe occurred in northern ukraine and it's most associated with the nearby town of pripyat
which was built for power plant workers and their families but evacuated and left as a
ghost town due to the radioactive fallout however a country that is rarely mentioned when discussing
the disaster is the republic of belarus north of ukraine which all the same shares an exclusion
zone just as eerie on the night of the chernobyl disaster the wind was blowing north and carried
huge amounts of radioactive fallout into belarus seventy percent of the radioactive particles
emitted by the plant during the accident ended up in belarus contaminating almost a quarter of
the country's territory and the consequences were brutal birth defects skyrocketing cancer rates and
other radioactive linked horrors affected baylor's as profoundly as ukraine yet no one heard about it
the fallout was so bad that between 1985 and 2000 life expectancy in the regions affected dropped
by five years as a result in the early years of baylor russian independence the government
invested over 20 percent of the national budget in tackling the problems of the disaster usa today
documented some compelling first-hand quotes that paint a striking picture of the situation
starting with a 35 year old art teacher who said many of us in the area have cancer or diabetes
and at least two-thirds of the kids where i teach can't do physical exercise because if they fall
down it's a very real possibility that they will break a leg or worse he said our lives are not
good and it's the same for all the regions affected and in belarus it's a secret that
everybody knows as he spoke he placed one hand on the bike to help keep upright he said he did
not know how many people were ill from chernobyl and that the government never spoke about it other
than to say everything was normal but the teacher did not think everything was normal we're in this
position because of chernobyl but what can we do about it he said even after all these years we
know nothing now although the teacher feels people are uninformed what we do know about the effects
of the chernobyl disaster in belarus is very bad a large increase in thyroid cancer happened amongst
individuals who were adolescents and young children living during the time of the accident
and residing in the most contaminated areas of belarus high levels of radioactive iodine were
released in the environment from the chernobyl reactor after the accident and accumulated
in pastures which were then eaten by cows the cows produced contaminated milk which was later
consumed by children and is the most likely reason for the rise in radiation-induced thyroid cancer
within two years of the disaster the baylor russian government had designated the most
toxic areas along the border with ukraine as a fallout zone creating a state radiological reserve
similar to that of chernobyl and pripyt you can actually take a tour here and see the effects
on the zone first hand the reserve established in 1988 now covers an area more than 800 square miles
and it's divided into three regions before the disaster this largely agratorial region was home
to more than 22 thousand people spread across 95 villages now it's home to deer lynx bison as well
as 48 of belarus's 189 species of endangered plants no one officially lives in the reserve
though 746 people do work there including 42 scientists other reserve employees work as
border security in forestry or fire prevention for the most part the zones buildings are bare tables
chairs occasionally an abandoned boot or book but none of the ghoulish decorations such as graffiti
or arrangements of headless dolls and gas masks that characterize the tourism in the ukrainian
zone you can find an occasional deserted school with toys propped upright on shelves a scattering
of gas masks a book of fairy tales that have been left open besides maps and globes however this is
not a presentation of historic insight although it happens rarely in baylor roose it's staged many of
the visitors there have a code they don't want to touch things or move them around themselves
but they want that viral photo to post on social media so some of the local guides have created
that apocalyptic still life for good marketing but in belarus it's extremely frowned upon ukraine's
chernobyl tourism industry is already committed to this type of sensationalism but in belarus it's
really about preservation they want to use the fallout zone for research and sharing of knowledge
to preserve and respect its authenticity but they recognize that dolls and gas masks are
where the money is the conflict here being that the authorities want to attract more tourists to
the zone but have not agreed upon a strategy yet the exclusion zone officials have stated that they
don't want more than 10 groups per month and that they detest the idea of the zone being trivialized
by tourism the evacuation that took place back in 1986 has been considered a mistake by many
as villagers were moved into the city these people lived their whole life in villages working at
collective farms and then they were relocated to apartments called chernobyl houses just east
of minsk a lot of these people died young many became depressed and started to drink they simply
could not deal with or work in city life so the second wave of people who were resettled from the
edges of the zone were given houses and villages instead the government apparently learned from
their mistakes now alarmingly much of the baylor russian zone has been converted back into farmland
aside from corn and cattle there are fields of freshly mowed grass used to make hay for the
horses that are bred in the region these horses are sold for riding and farming logging is also
active in the fallout zone huge quantities of lumber are sent to lithuania a country famous
for manufacturing at large scale and for known producers including ikea another contrast to the
ukrainian zone is that the belarusian radiological reserve lacks a solid border or markings and this
is a very different situation than that of ukraine where police are standing on by with kalashnikovs
watching over checkpoints it would be easy for anyone to ignore a warning sign and just walk
straight in so why don't they do it because the penalties are severe for anyone caught trespassing
however once a year on the weekend after easter the citizens of belarus are given free reign to
drive their own vehicles into the zone and visit their former homes and the graves of loved ones
children can even go and while visitors are expected to carry identification they are not
required to pass through any radiation control later one local declared that people don't steal
metal or enter the more contaminated areas which are strictly off limits he quotes because they
know it's bad to get caught and that the penalties are even worse for foreigners
i find it fascinating that the punishment for illegally visiting the zone is so bad that very
few would dare to do so yet wood from the zone can be exported to the european union belarus is one
of the former post-soviet countries that in many ways upholds the old-school authoritarian approach
to government so i believe that the consequences for breaking the law there could be very bad
with that being said let's just hope that they have not also retained the soviet approach of
containment of radiation because the reasons will be obvious for at least another 24 000 years