[:RU]I will start my story about Crimea with an unfinished nuclear power plant, which is located near the city of Kerch. It was this nuclear power plant that could play an important role in the life of the entire Crimean peninsula and become a cheap source of energy for future production facilities that were planned to be located on the peninsula. Alas, now nuclear power plants have become just a good source of metal, and, most likely, for foreign manufacturers.

By chance I met a man who took an active part in the construction of the station. I forgot to ask his name, his story was so interesting, but I managed to take a photograph of him.

Crimean NPP

“Like after the war, but there was such beauty,” the elderly man uttered this phrase several times during our conversation. They planned to turn Crimea into a paradise for tourists, and provide local residents with work in new industries. It was planned to launch trolleybuses from the city of Kerch all the way to Sevastopol (now they run between Yalta and the nearest villages). To implement all these plans, a sufficient amount of electricity was needed. In 1975, they began to build a nuclear power plant, having previously prepared the satellite city of Shchelkino.

Crimean NPP

By the way, the construction was completed, they even managed to start the reactor, and a polar crane was installed in the building for the installation of heavy equipment. The launch of the station was planned for 1989, but... The 1986 disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant left its mark. Only this imprint was left not so much on nuclear energy, but on the already undermined economic situation in the country. Here a huge “thank you” must be said to Mikhail Sergeevich, who received the Nobel Prize for the collapse of the country and now lives happily behind the cordon.

Crimean NPP

Then the history of the most expensive nuclear power plant in the world went downhill. From 1995 to 1999, the “Republic of KaZantip” festival was held on the territory of the nuclear power plant. Then the East Crimean Energy Company began selling off the power plant equipment. It is not clear why the company was called “Energy Company”.

They would have called themselves honestly - “Company for the sale of metal left behind by the Soviet Union.” The remains of the nuclear power plant were transferred to the Council of Ministers of Crimea and, it seems, should be sold in order to invest money in the city of Shchelkino. But signs with the inscription “private property” make you wonder whether a private owner needs to invest money in the city of Shchelkino?

Also, during construction, a unique tower crane was used, one of the largest in the world, with a lifting capacity of 240 tons. It stood until the mid-2000s, after which it was sold for scrap. This is the tallest crane in the photo. By the way, please note that the engine block attached to the reactor block was built in the structures, but it is currently completely destroyed.

And this is a real steam generator: They didn’t have time to install them at the Crimean nuclear power plant, as well as the reactor. They were brought and laid on the grass.

So they lay there until 2005, when two people came with an autogen and turned the reactor into scrap metal in a few days.

In 2005, the reactor was cut up with an autogenous saw, then transported to ferrous metal. All equipment was also removed from the control rooms and handed over for ferrous metal production. It feels like in a couple of years there will be nothing left of the station at all.

The station has an almost complete twin - the abandoned, unfinished Stendal nuclear power plant, 100 km west of Berlin in Germany, built according to the same Soviet project from 1982 to 1990. By the time construction stopped, the readiness of the first power unit was 85%. Its only significant difference from the Crimean NPP is the use of cooling towers for cooling, rather than a reservoir.
The location where the reactor was to be installed.

Currently, this type of reactor is the most common in its series - 31 operating reactors (out of 54 VVERs), which is 7.1% of the total number of power reactors of all types operating in the world.
The entrance to the hermetic zone - the hermetic door has been gone for a long time.

If anyone is planning to go there, be sure to take a flashlight and look under your feet, there are a lot of through technical holes in the floor.

Technical openings for cables and communications. Previously there was equipment here.

A crane is used for dismantling, and earlier, for construction, another crane was installed - a polar one. It was one of the tallest cranes in the world with a lifting capacity of 240 tons, its height was almost 2 times higher than the crane in the photo. The crane was dismantled and sold for use.

At the beginning of 2005, the Representative Office of the Crimea Property Fund sold the reactor compartment of the Crimean NPP for 1.1 million UAH ($207,000) to a legal entity whose name was not disclosed. Currently, work is continuously underway at the station to dismantle and remove parts of the unit for ferrous metal.

The Crimean nuclear power plant was included in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's most expensive nuclear reactor.

From 1995 to 1999, discos of the “Republic KaZantip” festival were held in the turbine department. The ad read: “Atomic party in a reactor.”

It was planned to use the Aktash reservoir as a cooling pond, on the banks of which the station was built.

The station was to have 2 VVER-1000 reactors with a rated power of 1000 MW each.

A railway gateway designed primarily to replace nuclear fuel at nuclear power plants.

Looking up from the airlock. A large crane is visible, which was once able to move in a circle and lift everything right up to the reactor itself.

A place for a reactor, which was never brought here.

Some kind of mobile transformer, apparently.

Reactor pit.

View up. The faucet and stainless steel walls are visible

One of several boilers of unknown purpose, most likely part of the reactor cooling system.

Again, stainless steel

Splash pools.

Crimean NPP

Crimean NPP

Crimean NPP

Crimean NPP

Crimean NPP

Crimean NPP

Crimean NPP

The first design surveys were carried out in 1968. Construction began in 1975. The station was supposed to provide electricity to the entire Crimean peninsula, as well as create a foundation for the subsequent development of industry in the region - metallurgical, mechanical engineering, chemical. Design capacity is 2000 MW (2 power units) with the possibility of subsequent increase to 4000 MW: the standard design provides for the placement of 4 power units with VVER-1000/320 reactors on the station site.

After the construction of a satellite city, a reservoir embankment and auxiliary farms, construction of the station itself began in 1982. A temporary line was laid from the Kerch branch of the railway, and at the height of construction, two trains of building materials arrived along it per day. In general, construction proceeded without significant deviations from the schedule with the planned launch of the first reactor in 1989.

The unfavorable economic situation in the country and the disaster at the fourth power unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant on April 26, 1986 led to the fact that by 1987 construction was first suspended, and in 1989 the final decision was made to abandon the launch of the station. By this time, 500 million Soviet rubles in 1984 prices had been spent on the construction of the nuclear power plant. Approximately another 250 million rubles worth of materials remained in the warehouses. The station began to be slowly torn apart for ferrous and non-ferrous scrap metal.

No fuel was imported and does not pose a radiation hazard.

Prospects for using the nuclear power plant site and developing a satellite city

In 2006, the territory of the former nuclear power plant was selected as one of the possible sites for creating a pilot project for an industrial park. In 2008, preparatory work began on the implementation of the Shchelkinsky Industrial Park industrial park project; the city council transferred ownership of some of the objects located on this land plot to the Shchelkinsky Industrial Park.

• The Crimean nuclear power plant was included in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's most expensive nuclear reactor. This is due to the fact that, unlike the Tatar NPP and the Bashkir NPP of the same type, which were stopped at the same time, it had a higher degree of readiness at the time construction was stopped.

• A solar power plant was built nearby. Near it, on the eastern part of the shore of the Aktash reservoir, there is also an experimental wind power plant YuzhEnergo, consisting of 15 wind turbines with a capacity of 100 kW each. Not far from it there are 8 old non-working experimental wind turbines of the East Crimean Wind Power Plant, installed back in Soviet times.

• A little-known fact: the station has an almost complete twin - the abandoned, unfinished Stendal nuclear power plant (German) 100 km west of the city, which was built according to the same Soviet project from 1982 to 1990. By the time construction stopped, the readiness of the first power unit was 85%. Its only significant difference from the Crimean NPP is the use of cooling towers for cooling, rather than a reservoir. Currently, the Stendal nuclear power plant (2009) is almost completely dismantled. A pulp and paper mill now operates on the territory of the former station; the cooling towers were dismantled in 1994 and 1999. With the help of excavators and heavy construction equipment, the dismantling of the reactor shops is being completed.

• The Crimean Nuclear Power Plant is mentioned in the song of the punk rock group “Cockroaches!” “Who will sleep with me now?”:

The southern sun and shallow sea took her from me. The dead reactor and the room in the valley took her from me. Port wine and a dude from a rock band took her away from me. Stupid girlfriends and DJ loops took her away from me.

> Abandoned Nuclear Power Plant in Crimea

This abandoned facility is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the most expensive nuclear reactor in the world. Which remained unbuilt.

Construction of the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant began in 1975 and it was supposed to provide electricity to the entire Crimea. In 1984, it was even declared an All-Union Komsomol construction site. At the height of construction, two (!!!) echelons of building materials were being processed per day.
But in 1987, a famous fur-bearing animal settled in these places. There are two reasons - the disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and the unfavorable economic situation in the USSR. The readiness of the station at that time was almost 80%...
I will give more detailed information at the end of the post, after the pictures. In the meantime, look what is happening with one of the biggest unfinished projects in the USSR today

2. We approach the station. Administrative building and observation tower

3. There are broken bricks and concrete crumbs everywhere. In the background are the first power unit and the engineering building

4. Station engineering building. Satellite dishes hint that there are people here

5. And here we have the first power unit. There is also a unique giant crane here. Only he no longer builds the station, but destroys it.
I want to stop here for a moment. The fact is that during construction, a unique polar crane was already installed in the reactor building of the first power unit - the Danish Kroll K-10000. With the help of this crane, further lifting and transport and construction and installation operations inside the reactor compartment were to be carried out. It was the tallest crane in Europe. In 2003, the State Property Fund sold it for... 310 thousand hryvnia with a starting price of 440. Even sold for scrap it would have cost more.
Before its dismantling, the high-altitude crane was used for base jumping. The jumps were carried out from the lower (80 m) and upper (120 m) booms of the crane.
Today, a similar crane is installed here, but smaller in size, for dismantling the station. You can appreciate its size against the background of the standing “nine”.

6. And this is what this station is needed for today... Powerful equipment, looking like a toy against the background of a concrete monster, paints its body, extracting metal reinforcement from there. We'll come back here later, but for now let's go to the reactor room.

7. We enter the power unit. The scale and thickness of the walls with shutters is impressive

8. Transport corridor of the power unit

9. Entrance to the reactor zone. Metal as thick as your arm.

10. There, thick cables go inside the reactor and cutting sounds are heard. There's a lot of metal being cut out there.

11. The reactor control panels are at the end

12. And there was the reactor itself... We look at it from the lower corridor. The ends of the cooling pipes are visible

13. Bolt found here. Obviously not from a children's construction set. I was surprised by the almost complete absence of corrosion over so many years - only an oxidized surface

14. Let's return to the tap.

15. Cabin

16. Rollers. Under each pair there is a narrow-gauge railway

17. Pipes are cut like sausage. Just not on the table, but on the metal

18. One of the pipes was adapted into a change house

19. There is a lot of technology. She's in demand

20. But this old thing has clearly been standing here for a long time

21. The cylinders here are like replaceable batteries in a TV remote control

22. Destroyed external passage from the engineering building to the power unit

23. What remains after the work of the “metalworkers”

24. They built with shock, they break with shock

25. Somewhat reminiscent of the chimneys of stoves in Belarusian villages burned by the Nazis

26.

27.

28. Panorama of the site under the engineering building. Everything is cut out here

29. Panorama of the metal cutting site

Some information from Wikipedia:
By the time construction of the station was stopped, 500 million Soviet rubles in 1984 prices had been spent on the construction of the nuclear power plant. Approximately another 250 million rubles worth of materials remained in the warehouses. The station began to be slowly torn apart for ferrous and non-ferrous scrap metal. There is evidence that in the early 90s, surveys were carried out, the purpose of which was to “adjust” additional geological justification for the closure of the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant. However, this was only a formal reason - by the end of the 80s, the situation in the USSR economy worsened so much that almost all major construction projects were curtailed, both in the energy sector and in industry, transport, and urban planning.
From 1995 to 1999, discos of the “Republic KaZantip” festival were held in the turbine department.
In 1998-2000, the subsidiary enterprise East Crimean Energy Company, created on the basis of the nuclear power plant, sold the station’s property for 2.204 million hryvnia. By February 1, 2003, only the special building, workshop block, reactor department and oil and diesel facilities remained on the balance sheet of the Eastern Crimean Energy Company.

In 2004, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine transferred the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant from the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Fuel and Energy to the Council of Ministers of Crimea. Further, the Council of Ministers of Crimea had to sell the received property of the nuclear power plant, and the money had to go to solve the social and economic problems of the Leninsky district of Crimea, and in particular the city of Shchelkino.
After this, the remaining parts of the Crimean NPP were to be sold: the reactor compartment, the block pumping station, the workshop building, the cooler at the Aktash reservoir, the dam of the Aktash reservoir, the supply canal with a water intake tank, the station’s oil and diesel facilities, and a diesel generator station. Further, it is known that at the beginning of 2005, the Representative Office of the Crimean Property Fund sold the reactor compartment of the Crimean NPP for 1.1 million UAH ($207,000) to a legal entity whose name was not disclosed.
There is evidence that the VVER-1000 reactor, which was never installed in the room prepared for it, was cut into scrap in 2005
The nuclear power plant has been featured in many films, the most famous of which was “The Inhabited Island” by F. Bondarchuk, which was filmed there in 2007.
Nuclear fuel was not imported here, so the nuclear power plant does not pose a radiation hazard.

A little-known fact: the station has an almost complete twin - the abandoned, unfinished Stendal nuclear power plant, 100 km west of Berlin in Germany, built according to the same Soviet project from 1982 to 1990. By the time construction stopped, the readiness of the first power unit was 85%. Its only significant difference from the Crimean NPP is the use of cooling towers for cooling, rather than a reservoir. Currently, the Stendal nuclear power plant (2010) is almost completely dismantled. A pulp and paper mill now operates on the territory of the former station; the cooling towers were dismantled in 1994 and 1999. With the help of excavators and heavy construction equipment, the dismantling of the reactor shops is being completed.

80%, the second - 18%).

History of construction

The first design surveys were carried out in 1968. Construction began in 1975. The station was supposed to provide electricity to the entire Crimean peninsula, as well as create a foundation for the subsequent development of industry in the region - metallurgical, mechanical engineering, chemical. The design capacity of the Crimean NPP is 2 GW (2 power units of 1 GW each) with the possibility of subsequent capacity increase to 4 GW - the standard design provides for the placement of 4 power units with VVER-1000/320 reactors on the station site.

In November 1980, the construction of the nuclear power plant was declared a Republican shock Komsomol construction project, and on January 26, 1984 - an All-Union shock construction project. After the construction of the satellite town of Shchelkino, the reservoir embankment and auxiliary facilities, the construction of the nuclear power plant itself began in 1982. A temporary line was laid from the Kerch branch of the railway, and at the height of construction, two trains of building materials arrived along it per day. In general, construction proceeded without significant deviations from the schedule with the planned launch of the 1st power unit in 1989.

A unique polar crane has already been delivered to the reactor building of the first power unit and installed at the design site.

With the help of this crane, further lifting and transport and construction and installation operations inside the reactor compartment were to be carried out:

• during the construction of a nuclear power plant: operations for moving and storing equipment (reactor parts, steam generator housings, pressure compensator, main circulation pipelines and pumps, etc.), and then installing them at design sites.
• after the launch of the station: carry out transport, technological and repair work to maintain the nuclear reactor.

According to the director of the Rosenergoatom concern, the construction of a new nuclear power plant on the peninsula is futile, and energy can be generated by wind, solar and non-nuclear thermal power plants. It is impossible to restore it from the current state of the Crimean NPP site. It also used a project from the 1960s, whereas now the construction of nuclear power plants is carried out according to projects from the 2000s. Building a completely new nuclear power plant may be more cost-effective than rebuilding an old one, but there are currently no architectural designs for small- and medium-sized nuclear power plants. On the other hand, a nuclear power plant, especially in the context of constant attempts by the Ukrainian authorities to economically block Crimea, would reliably ensure energy autonomy for Crimea.

In February 2016, it was announced that a new industrial park would be built at the site of the nuclear power plant. The State Council of the Republic of Crimea for Property and Land Relations gave consent to the local Ministry of Property to write off the unfinished Crimean nuclear power plant from the balance sheet “through demolition.” At the same time, the construction materials obtained as a result of dismantling the facility are planned to be used for the construction of a transport crossing across the Kerch Strait.

• The Crimean nuclear power plant was included in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's most expensive nuclear reactor [ ] . This is due to the fact that, unlike the Tatar NPP and the Bashkir NPP of the same type that were stopped at the same time, it had a higher degree of readiness at the time construction was stopped.
• In 1986, an experimental (the first in the USSR) solar power plant SES-5 was built nearby. Near it, on the eastern part of the shore of the Aktash reservoir, there is also an experimental wind power plant Yuzhenergo and eight old non-working experimental wind turbines installed back in Soviet times. Not far from it is the East Crimean Wind Farm, consisting of 15 wind turbines with a capacity of 100 kW and two with a capacity of 600 kW each.
• The nuclear power plant has an almost complete “twin” - the abandoned, unfinished Stendal nuclear power plant, 100 km west of Berlin in Germany, built according to the same Soviet project from 1982 to 1990. By the time construction stopped, the readiness of the first power unit of the Stendal NPP was 85%. Its only significant difference from the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant is the use of cooling towers rather than a reservoir for cooling. By 2010, the Stendal nuclear power plant was almost completely dismantled. A pulp and paper mill was opened on the territory of the former nuclear power plant; the cooling towers were dismantled in 1994 and 1999. With the help of excavators and heavy construction equipment, the dismantling of the reactor workshops is being completed.
• The nuclear power plant has been featured in many films, the most famous of which was “The Inhabited Island” by F. Bondarchuk, which was filmed there in 2007 ( photo of the station in a film frame (undefined) (unavailable link). Archived from the original on September 29, 2015.).

Information about power units

see also

Notes

1. This geographical feature is located on the territory of the Crimean Peninsula, most of which is an object

Crimean Nuclear Power Plant is an unfinished nuclear power plant located near the city of Shchelkino on the shore of the salty Aktash reservoir, its cooling reservoir

The station was built according to the same plan as the currently operating Khmelnitsky NPP (Ukraine), Volgodonsk NPP (Russia) and Temelin NPP (Czech Republic). The almost completed nuclear power plant was abandoned after the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant (the readiness of the first power unit was 80%, the second - 18%). The first design calculations were carried out in 1968. Construction started in 1975. It was planned to provide electricity to the entire Crimean peninsula, as well as to lay the basis for the further development of the Crimean industry - metallurgical, mechanical engineering, and chemical. Design capacity is 2000 MW (2 power units) with the possibility of further increase to 4000 MW: the basic design assumes the location of 4 power units with VVER-1000/320 type reactors on the station site.

After the creation of the satellite town of Shchelkino, the embankment of the reservoir and household facilities, construction of the station itself began in 1982. A separate line was stretched from the Kerch branch of the railway, and on the hottest days of construction, two trains of materials arrived here per day. The photo shows the village of Shchelkino:

In general, construction proceeded without major deviations from the schedule with the expected launch of the first reactor in 1989. The shaken economic situation in the country, along with the tragedy in Chernobyl, led to the fact that by 1987 the project was first suspended, and in 1989 they finally abandoned the launch of the station. By this time, 500 million Soviet rubles in the equivalent of 1984 had already been allocated for the construction of the nuclear power plant. Another 250 million rubles worth of materials were stored in warehouses. The station began to be gradually taken away for ferrous and non-ferrous scrap metal. Witnesses say that in the early 90s, research was carried out to justify the closure of the Crimean nuclear power plant from a geological point of view. However, and this was just a simple reason - by the end of the 80s, the situation in the USSR economy became so bad that almost all large-scale construction projects in all areas were closed

After construction stopped, the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant quickly fell into disrepair, almost everything was dismantled and taken away. Here are the events worth noting:

• From 1995 to 1999, discos of the famous electronic music festival Kazantip were held in the turbine hall (turbine department)
• In September 2003, the Property Fund sold the unique Danish Kroll crane, brought for the installation of a nuclear reactor, for 310 thousand hryvnia, with a starting price of 440 thousand hryvnia. Before it was sold, the huge crane was used for base jumping. We jumped from the lower (80 meters) and upper (120 meters) booms of the crane. A similar Kroll crane was used in the construction of the 4th power unit of the Khmelnitsky NPP in the city of Netishin; previously, the same cranes helped build the buildings of the Zaporozhye NPP and the South Ukrainian NPP

• In 2004, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine transferred the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant from the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Fuel and Energy to the Council of Ministers of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea. Then, the Council of Ministers of Crimea had to sell the resulting property of the nuclear power plant, and the money had to be spent on solving the social and economic problems of the Leninsky district of Crimea, especially the city of Shchelkino
• The remaining parts of the Crimean NPP were to be sold gradually: the reactor compartment, the block pumping station, workshops, the cooler at the Aktash reservoir, the dam of the Aktash reservoir, the supply canal, the oil and diesel facilities of the station, and the diesel generator station. It is also known that at the beginning of 2005, the Representative Office of the Crimea Property Fund sold the reactor compartment of the Crimean NPP for 1.1 million UAH ($207,000) to a legal entity whose name is not advertised.
• There is evidence that the VVER-1000 reactor, which was never placed in the room intended for it, was cut into scrap metal in 2005.
• The nuclear power plant has been featured in many films, among which the most famous was Fyodor Bondarchuk’s “Inhabited Island” filmed here in 2007 (pictured is a scene from the film)

• No fuel was delivered to the station, so it does not pose a radiation hazard.

Interesting facts about nuclear power plants:

• The Crimean Nuclear Power Plant was included in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's most expensive nuclear power plant. The reason is that, unlike the Tatar NPP and the Bashkir NPP of the same type, which were stopped at the same time, at the time construction was stopped, it had the highest degree of readiness for start-up
• A solar power plant was built nearby. By and large, this station was only experimental: its power was 5 MW. During the operation of this station many difficulties surfaced. One of them, the reflector guidance system, almost completely (95%) consumed the energy generated by the station. There were also difficulties in cleaning mirrors. Soon this station ceased to exist and was also plundered. Near it, on the eastern side of the shore of the Aktash reservoir, there is also an experimental wind power plant YuzhEnergo, which includes 15 wind turbines with a capacity of 100 kW each. Next to it there are 8 old experimental wind turbines of the East Crimean Wind Power Plant, installed in Soviet times and currently not working
• A little-known fact: the station has an almost identical twin - the abandoned, unfinished Stendal nuclear power plant, 100 km west of Berlin in Germany, built according to the same Soviet project from 1982 to 1990. By the time construction completely stopped, the readiness of its first power unit was 85%. Its only key difference from the Crimean NPP is the use of cooling towers rather than a reservoir as a cooling system. Currently, the Stendal nuclear power plant has already been almost completely dismantled. A pulp and paper mill now operates on this site; the cooling towers were dismantled in 1994 and 1999. Using excavators and heavy construction equipment, the dismantling of the reactor shops has almost been completed.

What is a dead station like at present? A few photos from shelkino.com

Engineering block of a nuclear power plant with a collapsed external passage to the reactor

The hatch above the transport entrance through which containers with uranium were supposed to be lifted

The reactor cooling system, or rather what’s left of it

Main reactor control panel of the Crimean NPP

The insides of the station are mercilessly carved out by severely impoverished local residents.

On the dome of a nuclear power plant. Freshwater lake Aktash from which cooling channels are dug

6 water sumps

Water supply system for nuclear power plants

Crane with lifting capacity 300 tons

People live here and even ride horses

Whether it is good or bad that there is no nuclear power plant in Crimea is difficult to judge. We all remember the Chernobyl disaster and its consequences, and it’s probably for the better that it was never possible to build a nuclear power plant on the peninsula. Meanwhile, Shchelkino did not turn into another ghost town due to its favorable location near the sea. Every summer, crowds of vacationers come here and storm the remains of the great Soviet construction site, which are melting before our eyes - the scrap metal is cut so quickly here.

For those who wanted to get into the hermetic zone of the station, several parting words were published from the organizers of the KaZantip festival (90s)

• • 1. Don't ever do this.
  • 2. We understand that you are unlikely to follow the first advice, therefore:
  • a) properly lace up your Martens, or whatever shoes you wear in very bad weather, take warm, not very expensive things;
  • b) charge new batteries into your flashlight;
  • c) take a few more crazy people with you, no more than five people, as well as food and water for a couple of days.
  • 3. Be sure to find an experienced stalker among the local residents - he probably knows many ways to penetrate the hermetic zone without breaking his back.
  • Many people are afraid of radiation. She is not there. But you have every chance of not returning home, so when you go on this journey, say goodbye to your loved ones and relatives.
  • Since the station was almost completed, constantly look under your feet - there are many unclosed openings.
  • Do not touch the wires - some of them are still live.
  • Climbing numerous stairs and holding on to railings is also not recommended, because many of the structures here are temporary. But in general, the containment zone is quite reliable, since it is designed to withstand a direct fall from an enemy aircraft. In this sense, you are completely safe.

The story of Andrey Manchuk (Newspaper in Kievsky) about the campaign in the Hermozone:

“ Having received a modest bribe, the guards give us a large flashlight with backup batteries and open one of the doors to the huge building of the power unit, which is popularly known as the “reactor.” Strictly speaking, the reactor stuffing has not been here for a long time - everything was sent back to Russia in the late eighties. However, all other surroundings of the hermetic zone remained in place - although over the past years various businessmen have torn thousands of tons of valuable metal and cables from the ruins of the nuclear power plant. Fortunately for fans of industrial giants, monolithic reactor structures made of super-strong alloys cannot be cut by any autogenous agent. There is no need to guard them - the guards, as a rule, make sure that visiting young people do not climb here. After all, this threatens with accidents and very often with an extremely sad outcome. However, these functions are usually performed by guard dogs.

There is impenetrable darkness in the ten-story building of the power unit. The flashlight beam constantly picks out deep holes in the floor underfoot. Wandering through endless corridors, where the remains of some complex equipment still lie, we approach the containment zone - the heart of the nuclear power plant. It is a huge all-metal cylinder, which was supposed to protect against radiation even in the event of a reactor accident. To get inside, we climb through two huge round doors - the guards estimate their weight at seven tons - and climb the stairs to where the reactor industrial site was supposed to be located. The insides of the power unit have a completely unique appearance - something similar can only be seen in the computer toy "Half Life". The dome over the containment zone was never lowered, and therefore at night you can contemplate a magnificent picture of the southern starry sky in the round crater of the nuclear volcano. Traveling here with a local nuclear scientist - a failed nuclear power plant worker - you can find out where the reactor core would have been, where the uranium rods would have been dropped, and what level of gamma radiation would have been where people walk around freely today. Anyone who has been to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and understands what hellish forces are contained in such objects will appreciate this story.

Climbing onto the roof of the power unit, we enjoyed the Azov landscape, the swans wintering here, the remains of experimental solar and wind power plants, as well as the Sivash oil production platform, located two miles from the coast - you could sail here by chartering a fishing boat or... a border boat for fifty dollars . “Acid” graffiti is everywhere – in 1995–1999, the legendary rave festival “KaZantip” was held here, which made these regions famous throughout the former USSR. “