Russia Sits Under Potential Radiation Cloud


Worthy News Asia Service

Made from the Measurements of Pollution in the Troposphere sensor on NASA's Terra satellite, this image reveals the amount of carbon monoxide in western Russia from August 1st through August 8th, 2010. The highest levels of carbon measured are shown in red. Areas where the sensor could not reach due to cloud cover are gray. Released from the forest and peatland fires, carbon monoxide can pose serious health risks to people. Image by NASA.

MOSCOW, RUSSIA (Worthy News)– Fires in Russia have scorched forests contaminated with radiation from the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Ukraine, but it was unclear how dangerous the toxic smog might be according to Russian officials, Worthy News monitored on August 12.

For the past three weeks, Moscow has been blanketed by smoke; however a thunderstorm accompanied by strong winds cleared the cloud of toxic smog on Wednesday.  Some young Russians rejoiced in the rains, dancing in the downpour and cheering the thunder and lightening.  However, weather forecasters say the smog could return as soon as today.  They warn that sweltering temperatures of at least 34 degrees Celsius (93 degrees Fahrenheit) will continue through the end of the week

The area of burning forests in Russia has been almost been cut in half over the past 24 hours to 927 square km (358 square miles) from 1,740 (676 square miles), and that nearly 166,000 people were fighting the more than 600 fires, the Russian Emergency Ministry stated.  Nevertheless 612 fires were still ablaze, up from 557 reported on Tuesday.

On Wednesday, the Emergency Situations said experts have yet to find any increase in radiation levels from soil already contaminated by radioactivity from the Chernobyl catastrophe.  However, on Thursday Russian Emergency Minister Sergei Shoigu said, “if the fires spread” that they may “re-release nuclear contamination from the Chernobyl disaster” into the air and a “new contaminated area will appear.”

This image shows the full scale of the smoke plume spreading 1,860 miles (3,000 kilometers). The photo was taken by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer Photo by NASA on August 4, 2010.

Environmental groups, including Greenpeace, have warned that radioactive particles from the 1986 disaster could be re-released into the atmosphere again by the wildfires and blown into other areas by the wind.

“We’re not talking about a repeat of the Chernobyl catastrophe, but the danger is not insignificant either,” says Vladimir Chuprov, head of Greenpeace Russia’s energy program. “The worst scenario is the continuing spread of radioactive particles through the area. The danger is first of all to firefighters and local people, but the contamination can spread with smoke to new areas.”

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