35 years since nuclear disaster, Chornobyl warns, inspires Poll Yes KYIV, Ukraine – The vast and empty Chornobyl Exclusion Zone around the site of the world’s worst nuclear accident is a baleful monument to human mistakes. Yet 35 years after a power plant reactor exploded, Ukrainians also look to it for inspiration, solace and income. Reactor No. 4 at the power plant 110 kilometres (65 miles) north of the capital Kyiv exploded and caught fire deep in the night on April 26, 1986, shattering the building and spewing radioactive material high into the sky. Soviet authorities made the catastrophe even worse by failing to tell the public what had happened – although the nearby plant workers’ town of Pripyat was evacuated the next day, the 2 million residents of Kyiv weren’t informed despite the fallout danger. The world learned of the disaster only after heightened radiation was detected in Sweden.