NationStates Jolt Archive

I stumbled across this fascinating photo-essay (http://englishrussia.com/?p=293) whilst browsing teh interwebs, and I have to say that I'm pretty moved.

Most people think that Chernobyl blew up, or was bulldozed, or don't think about it as being anything other than the rubble of a large nuclear plant. But the things is, it's still there. Every building, every item. Poisoned with radiation, yes, but there nonetheless.

Imagine what it would be like to wander those streets. To see the once-busy boulevards overgrown with weeds. To walk into a long-abandoned nursury littered with bits of trash and baby dolls. To enter an empty classroom, with the day's lesson still written on the chalkboard, books still on the floor where children dropped them in panic.

It's fascinating and haunting experience...

The loneliest place in the world is inside my head

/emo

They should take its cancer and sell it on the world market.

Oh, do I feel like an ass.

I wouldn't want to go to Chernobyl. I think I would probably have a nervous breakdown with how eerie it would be.

Wow... that's very eerie...


Have you watched Chernobyl Heart, btw?

It is haunting, I remember seeing a picture of a child's toy right next to a respirator......probably staged but it was still amazing...

What also makes you think is the sheer number of people who lost their lives there. and how close we came to destroying ourselves.

This site: http://www.kiddofspeed.com/ has some more pictures of the surrounding area as well.

I've always loved reading and looking at pictures in and around the exclusion zone. I want to go there myself one day...it would be a very interesting place to live, if you're like me, and like desolation.

I've always loved reading and looking at pictures in and around the exclusion zone. I want to go there myself one day...it would be a very interesting place to live, if you're like me, and like desolation.
May I suggest the middle of Nevada? Same desolation without the radiation. ;)

This site: http://www.kiddofspeed.com/ has some more pictures of the surrounding area as well.
There is no way I could go there alone at night. No. Way. I would be scared ****less. Just imagine: You're outside a creaky Soviet schoolhouse that's been abandoned for twenty years. It's midnight. There's not another human being around for miles, and the air is full of poison... *shiver*

EDIT: Holy crap, I just saw the picture of the butcher shop in the dead of night. So take all I said above, but replace the schoolhouse with a building full of rotting, decades-old meat and rusty knives... Chernobyl would be the perfect place for a horror movie or a survival horror video game.

I've always loved reading and looking at pictures in and around the exclusion zone. I want to go there myself one day...it would be a very interesting place to live, if you're like me, and like desolation.
...and cancer...

That's amazing. I mean, all the stuff has been untouched for twenty years... It's like a ghost town...

That's amazing. I mean, all the stuff has been untouched for twenty years... It's like a ghost town...

The tipped over inkbottle mesmerized me, it's like a snapshot in time.

Yeah, it's weird to see everything just abandoned like that, just waiting for the people to come back.

*scissors-breaking snip*

Similar thing in Pennsylvania about a town built over a coal mine. Coal fires forced evacutations, and now all that remains is the occasional house and all of the street signs. Creepy as hell.

Yeah, it's weird to see everything just abandoned like that, just waiting for the people to come back.
And the people won't come back, most likely. The radiation will make it uninhabitable for centuries to come, and in the unlikely event that humanity survives that long, it will probably be converted into a permanent memorial or reserve.

Similar thing in Pennsylvania about a town built over a coal mine. Coal fires forced evacutations, and now all that remains is the occasional house and all of the street signs. Creepy as hell.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia%2C_PA

May I suggest the middle of Nevada? Same desolation without the radiation. ;)

Yeeeeah, but...I like the whole urban decay and cuddle factor involved in an irradiated city. I should move to L.A. (Hey, I had to say it before someone else did)

And yes, Cancer can be Cuddly.

Similar thing in Pennsylvania about a town built over a coal mine. Coal fires forced evacutations, and now all that remains is the occasional house and all of the street signs. Creepy as hell.
Centralia, PA.
The Silent Hill in the film version was based on it...
May I suggest the middle of Nevada? Same desolation without the radiation. ;)
...You know they had a bunch of nuclear weapons tests there, right?

Wasn't The Hills Have Eyes set in Nevada?

That's amazing. I mean, all the stuff has been untouched for twenty years... It's like a ghost town...
Go over to Bodie or some of the other ghost towns (the real ones) they're worse.

There's a house in Bodie that's set up for a breakfast about 100 years ago that was never served.

...You know they had a bunch of nuclear weapons tests there, right?

Wasn't The Hills Have Eyes set in Nevada?
Yes, at the Nevada Test Site, which is a. in Southern Nevada. B. Closed off to the public.

Central Nevada though is radiation free.

I loved the last two or three pictures: the forest creeping back and re-carpeting what was once taken from it. A forest-city. It made me think of how quickly nature takes back its own - and what the whole settled world will look like only numbered years after we vanish.

It would be interesting to do a biological/ecological study of the species that have re-exploited the niches around Chernobyl. maybe adaptive radiation will even result with time!

National Geographic did a story on it a few months back--one of the creepiest stories they've ever done.

Wow, I wonder how long the radiation is going to last.