Chernobyl Sarcophagus (Shelter Object)

Lore & Background

Design work started on 20 May 1986, 24 days after the disaster, and construction took 206 days, from June to late November of that year. Radiation was so high that bolts could not be tightened or seams welded directly, so the work was done remotely wherever possible, and the seams could never be fully sealed. The work went through eight stages, beginning with clearing and concreting the ground around the unit and ending with the installation of a ventilation system.

More than 400000 m3 of concrete and 7,300 tonnes of metal framework went into the structure, which enclosed 740000 m3 of heavily contaminated debris. A helicopter crashed during the clean-up on 2 October 1986. The structure has over 60 bore holes that allow the interior of the core to be observed, with filtration to stop radioactive material escaping.

Reader's Guide

The sarcophagus rests largely on the damaged reactor building, and that has always been its weakness. A beam supporting the roof sits partly on the west wall, which was cracked by the accident. By 1996 the structure had deteriorated enough to need numerous stabilisation measures. A steel support structure 63 m tall was added beside it, and in December 2006 it was extended until 50% of the roof load had been moved onto it.

A further danger is the upper biological shield of the reactor, a disk 17.7 metres across weighing 1000 tons, which the explosion threw upwards and which now rests nearly upright on debris. It is nicknamed Elena.

Its replacement, the New Safe Confinement, is designed to protect the environment while the sarcophagus is demolished and the clean-up continues.