The radioactive basement of Pripyat Hospital, a very dangerous place where it is still 1986

Today, urban exploration has become a very common practice, and one that sometimes involves very extreme risks.

The radioactive trains at Yaniv station in the Chernobyl exclusion zone
This is the Dead Zone of Belarus: the most restricted of all those around Chernobyl

An example of this can be seen in the incursions that some explorers make into the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, which includes the areas most contaminated by the serious nuclear accident that occurred on April 26, 1986, in what was then the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, part of the USSR. That accident led to the evacuation of the city of Pripyat, built in 1970 to house the workers of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. The first people injured in the accident, specifically firefighters and nuclear power plant personnel, were treated at the Pripyat Hospital, officially designated Medical Unit No. 126.

The clothes worn by the injured were highly contaminated with radioactive dust. Mere contact with these garments caused skin burns to the hospital staff. The clothes were stored in the building's basement; they are still there. In the 2000s, an urban explorer discovered this basement and recorded a video of his exploration, which he later posted online. That video sparked a series of incursions by other explorers into the extremely dangerous basement, unaware of the great risk they were taking.

The problem with these incursions reached such a point that the Exclusion Zone authorities decided to fill the basement with sand to seal it. However, the amount of sand poured was not enough, as it is a very large basement, and there are still reckless people who continue to take a deadly risk by entering it.

A few days ago, Alex, a Ukrainian scientist working in the Exclusion Zone, posted a video on the YouTube channel Chornobyl Family, showing images of that basement recorded years ago by one of the workers in charge of periodically inspecting it, inspections that shouldn't be done (employees have to go down wearing special suits and CBRN protective masks) but are done because of the incursions of urban explorers:

In the video, Alex explains the enormous risks of entering that basement, pointing out that, in radioactive terms, the site is still stuck in 1986. Outside, radioactive dust dissipates with the wind and rain, but inside the basement, it remains untouched, including alpha particles from the nuclear fuel that are undetectable by most Geiger counters used by urban explorers. This video should serve as a call to responsibility: explorers who illegally enter the site not only risk their own lives but also the lives of others, which is why the area needs to be checked regularly.

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Main image: Chornobyl Family.