The Chornobyl-Tour bus arrives at the abandoned Soviet city of Pripyat on June 18.
Photographer: Vincent Mundy/BloombergChernobyl Emerges From Oblivion for the Streaming Generation
The world nearly forgot about its worst nuclear disaster. Now HBO’s hit drama is bringing visitors to the site of the tragedy.
Olha Kyselova wasn’t born when the Chernobyl power plant exploded in 1986, yet the disaster has always been in her life. Her parents were “liquidators,” sent in to brave the radiation and help clear the area of deadly materials. Then they charted hotspots for more than a decade.
But it wasn’t until she sat with them in their Kiev apartment and watched HBO’s hit dramatization of the world’s worst nuclear catastrophe that she finally decided to see the place with her own eyes. So she booked onto Chornobyl-Tour and joined 44 other tourists getting a close-up.