Chornobyl - Living in the Exclusion Zone

A journalist has taken a series of photos featuring a man who stayed to live in the Exclusion Zone

A 90-year-old Ivan Shamanok lives in the Belarusian village of Tulhovychy in the Exclusion Zone. The old man says his longevity secret is not to leave the place where you were born, even if it is contaminated with radiation.

The 30th anniversary of the Chornobyl disaster will be marked on April 26. On the night of the accident, the fourth Chornobyl reactor exploded and the release of radioactive particles in the northern part of Ukraine, and Belarus, the Baltic States, Poland, Sweden, Finland and a number of other countries. The power of the explosion is comparable to three hundred Hiroshima explosions.

The Chornobyl Exclusion Zone, which was called the 30km zone in 1986-1987, was an area with restricted access. It is heavily polluted with radionuclides due to the accident at the Chornobyl nuclear power plant. Now the Exclusion Zone covers about 260,000 hectares.