Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Chernobyl

I have always been interested in Chernobyl. I like all that apocalyptic stuff. I'm going to find some more pics and do a large post on it soon. But to whet your appetite, here is a map of the radioactive zones as they were measured in 1996. One interesting fact is that wildlife has rebounded amazingly in the Denied Zone, with species that are gone from all the surrounding areas for years thriving there. For those of you not paying attention, that means even nuclear meltdown is less harmful to the natural world than living near our cities and towns.
Nice thought.


2 comments:

  1. I believe the total absence of the main predator (humans) in the region is also an important factor. Also it is likely that many of these animals, as their humans counterparts in the region, have mutations and birth defects, as a result of the elevated radiation levels they are experiencing through generations. Very interesting blog by the way.

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  2. I think it was a couple years back, but some scientists(?) found a sort of fungi/mushroom (can't remember which) that actually seemed to thrive better in areas of high-radiation. The fungi was noticed growing near the reactor(s?) and when experimented and compared with another sort of fungi, this rad-fungi actually grew better when exposed to radiation in comparison to its counterpart which showed no boost in growth regardless of radiation exposure.

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