In capturing Ukraine’s largest nuclear power plant, Russia literally played with fire. The technical staff implored the attackers to stop the shelling immediately.
Clouds of smoke emerge from a building in the entrance area of the Zaporizhia nuclear plant on Friday. A reactor building was also damaged.
The conquest of the Ukrainian nuclear power plant in Zaporizhia by Russian troops on Friday apparently took place under even more dangerous circumstances than previously known. The power plant management feared for the safety of the plant so much that they begged the attackers to stop firing immediately. This emerges from a video from the control room of the nuclear power plant published by the “New York Times” on Saturday. “Stop shooting immediately, you are endangering the safety of the whole world!” an unidentified worker said over the radio in Russian. He warns that central operations of the power plant could fail. “We will not be able to restore them.”
“Stop firing” staff at Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant pleaded with Russian soldiers as they directed fire on buildings.
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The Zaporizhia nuclear power plant near the city of Enerhodar is the largest in the country with six 950-megawatt reactors. Russian units had reached the area on Thursday and also used artillery during the conquest on Friday night. A large fire broke out, but apparently not in one of the reactors. Video footage showed blazing flames on a building and a column of tanks advancing near it.
The Ukrainian nuclear power regulatory authority announced on Saturday morning that the radioactivity measured at the plant was within the norm. However, security personnel are on alert. Since the outbreak of war, five of the six reactors have been shut down; three of them are currently being cooled and shut down, another only supplies electricity for the system itself. According to the regulator, Friday’s fire destroyed a training center. Artillery shells also damaged a reactor building and hit the area of the spent nuclear fuel storage facility.
The video that has now been released shows the interior of the control room, in which operations were apparently able to continue undisturbed. Based on Ukrainian information, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) confirmed that the safety system of the power plant was not affected. However, she made it clear that Russia had broken an unwritten law with its military attacks on the reactor site. The United States accuses Moscow of violating international law.