The Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Grossi, has described the Russian drone strike on the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant’s confinement structure as a “very serious incident.” He warned that nuclear safety in Ukraine remains under severe threat.
Grossi said this in a statement on the situation in Ukraine, Ukrinform reports.
“This was clearly a very serious incident, with a drone hitting and damaging a large protective structure at a major nuclear site. As I have stated repeatedly during this devastating war, attacking a nuclear facility is an absolute no-go, it should never happen,” Grossi said.
He expressed particular concern over the incident, given the intensifying military activity around the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant.
“The IAEA remains committed to doing everything we can to help prevent a nuclear accident. Judging by recent events, nuclear safety remains very much under threat,” Grossi added.
He said that IAEA experts at the Chornobyl site are working with Ukrainian specialists to restore the integrity of the sarcophagus. However, repair efforts are being complicated by adverse weather conditions and ongoing fires caused by flammable materials in the roof cladding.
“Ukrainian firefighters have been working around the clock in freezing weather to completely extinguish small fires that still shoulder after Friday’s drone strike on the building containing the remains of the reactor destroyed in the 1986 Chornobyl accident. […]The team was informed that the plant plans to install additional sensors for measuring dose rates and aerosol concentrations near the area impacted by the drone. However, this task cannot be carried out until the remaining fires are totally eliminated to avoid damage to the sensors,” Grossi said.
According to him, the IAEA team members observed that a large area had been affected by the impact of the drone strike and the subsequent blaze. The team confirmed that both the outer and inner cladding of the NSC arch had been breached, causing a hole measuring approximately six meters in diameter and also damaging some equipment as well as electrical cables. However, the structural support beams did not appear to have suffered major damage.
The IAEA team was also shown some of the drone debris remaining at the site, including parts of the wings. The damaged drone had been removed by Ukrainian specialists and taken away for further analysis.
Notably, Grossi’s statement did not explicitly mention that the drone was Russian or that it was launched by Russian forces against the nuclear plant.
Ukrinform reported earlier that a Russian attack drone carrying an explosive warhead struck the Shelter Structure above the destroyed fourth reactor of the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant on the night of February 14.
Immediately after the incident, Ukraine called on the IAEA to urgently mobilize international efforts to prevent Russia from targeting nuclear facilities.
Source: Repair efforts at Chornobyl NPP hindered by weather and fire hazards – Grossi
