Russian troops seized the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukranian after overnight shelling caused a fire near one of the reactor's.
The world leaders condemned the reckless attack on the plant, the largest nuclear facility by capacity in Europe, after a projectile struck an auxiliary training building just 490 feet from one of the plant's reactor units.
According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, firefighters successfully put out the fire, with no damage reported to the reactor or safety systems. The Ukrainian state inspectorate for nuclear regulation said in a statement that employees continued to work on the site after it was captured by Russian forces. Three soldiers were killed and two were wounded in an attack.
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The stable operation of nuclear facilities is ensured by the staff of the plant.
The Zaporizhzhia plant is located in southeastern Ukraine near the city of Enerhodar and it produces enough energy to supply 4 million households with electricity.
Concerns have been raised about the security of the remaining nuclear power plants in the country after the attack on the plant. The Ukrainian state inspectorate for nuclear regulation has warned that the loss of the ability to cool down nuclear fuel will lead to significant radioactive releases into the environment.
I would like to appeal to the Russians: How is this possible? Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a televised address on Friday that they fought together against the Chernobyl catastrophe. The White House said that Biden called the Ukrainian president early in the morning to discuss the situation at the plant. The Russian government was urged to stop military activity around the area and allow firefighters and emergency responders to enter the plant.
Some experts think that it could be a mistake to make close connections between Zaporizhzhia and the Chernobyl disaster.
Large parts of the Chernobyl exclusion zone have been closed off since the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded in 1986. Two explosions inside the reactor flipped its 2,000-ton lid like a coin, blanketing the surrounding 1,000 square miles with radioactive dust and reactor chunks. The reactor was sealed off after the nuclear fire and the area was deemed uninhabitable by humans for the next 24,000 years. The zone was occupied by Russian forces after fighting broke out there last week.
Nuclear scientists say that Zaporizhzhia's reactor is much safer than the ones at Chernobyl. Unlike Chernobyl, Zaporizhzhia uses a pressurized water reactor, which requires less fuel in the reactor core, thus limiting the chance of a runaway chain reaction. The reactor is surrounded by two layers of protection, a steel inner vessel and a concrete outer containment unit. The layers are designed to resist earthquakes. In the event of an emergency, pressurized water reactor shut down automatically.
A professor of materials physics at Imperial College London said that a direct shell hit to the outside of a reactor could still be dangerous. A lot of dangerous material would be released if the Zaporizhzhia reactor were to explode.
The pressure vessel is not designed to survive an impact from a bomb.
Despite being much safer than Chernobyl, Zaporizhzhia's reactor core still contains a lot of highly radioactive fuel, and this is not the only source of concern. Nuclear experts and environmentalists have long warned that the spent nuclear fuel rods in the plant could cause catastrophic airborne radiation if struck by a missile or shell.
The Russian troops broke through the barricades set up by the local residents and employees of the nuclear plant on the day before the fire.
Edward Obbard, a nuclear engineering program coordinator at the University of New South Wales in Australia, said that the greatest impact of the attack is the loss of electricity to the Ukrainian people and the likelihood of more fighting.
The availability of nuclear power is vital to energy security in multiple European States and particularly in Ukraine.
It was originally published on Live Science.
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