Chernobyl nuclear disaster zone deemed too hot for tourists
By Jayne Clark, USA TODAY
30 November 2011 A Ukrainian court has banned tourists from the site of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear plant meltdown less than a year after government officials declared the region safe and opened it for tours. Officials had said the 18-mile “dead zone” around the site of history’s worst nuclear accident was returning to normal and numerous animal species had repopulated the area. A London Telegraph reporter who took the $163 daylong tour earlier this year described it as bleak but fascinating. Nevertheless, the tours ended without explanation in late June. And on Friday, a court in Kiev, 70 miles south of Chernobyl, formally declared tourist visits would be halted, reports the Voice of Russia radio website reports. […]
