This is the Kiev district of Ukraine in Eastern Europe.
Once part of the mighty Soviet Union, it became a world of ghost towns and abandoned cities.
It’s one of the most radioactive regions on the planet, with over 2 and a half thousand square kilometres deemed uninhabitable.
The results of one of the world’s worst engineering failures.
Welcome to Mind-Blowing Facts!
In this episode, we are learning about the mighty New Safe Confinement.
In 1986, a routine safety test went devastatingly wrong at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant,
and a series of explosions spread clouds of deadly radiation across Europe and beyond.
Safety teams rushed to cover the reactor with a rapidly constructed concrete box.
The emergency measure was a temporary fix to contain the danger.
But now 30 years on, the structure around the damaged reactor is at serious risk of failure,
threatening the whole of Europe once again.
So some of the greatest engineering minds around the world
have come together to create a unique and incredible solution.
It’s the largest movable man-made structure ever built and
a machine designed to facilitate one of the most important ongoing engineering projects in history.
The New Safe Confinement is a structure built to confine
the remains of the number 4 reactor unit at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine.
At a cost of 2 billion euros, it towers 108 meters high,
Capable of covering St Pauls Cathedral in London,
Or if you are from Italy…The Colosseum,
AND New York’s Statue of Liberty.
It's truly one of a kind, and it’s the largest movable man-made structure ever built.
It's 257 metres wide and 160
meters in length,
Big enough to park eight jumbo jets!
But this is more than just a building, it’s a machine designed to facilitate
one of the most important ongoing engineering projects in history:
Dismantling and cleaning up the destroyer reactor. A task that could take up to 100 years.
The old infrastructure was created within 6 months of the disaster at Chernobyl.
But because of the radioactive environment,
the people who worked on it could not use traditional construction methods,
so it was never a stable structure.
So, to be able to dismantle it, the old building had to be completely covered and secured,
because a whopping 96 percent of the lethal radioactive inventory is still sitting inside that very building.
The structure of the New Safe Confinement relies on the arch.
The metal framework is made of up a series of 16 arches standing at over 100 meters high.
The steel arches have no welding on them.
They are all bolted together. Over 600,000 bolts were used to hold it all together.
But unlike other building projects, failing to complete this one puts lives at risk.
Looking deep into the old reactor complex where the heart of the disaster was,
you get to the control room where
the workers of Chernobyl
lost control of the reactor which caused it to explode.
A haunting place that reminds you of the importance of doing things safely.
Designing this structure is one thing. But building it in a nuclear disaster zone is another!
The biggest challenge of course being radiation.
It's the world's most contaminated place.
The first thing they had to do was clean the site.
Most importantly, they had to make sure there were support facilities in place
to enable the workers to work in a radiated place.
Radiation levels differ depending on where you go on site,
And being around it for extended periods can be fatal.
The solution to this was to build the structure away from the reactor in a safe zone,
then move it over once completed.
But even then, the time that workers were allowed on site was limited.
They decided to construct the roof at ground level.
But this caused the engineers a problem…how to lift it.
The heaviest section was around 8000 tonnes and using cranes would just not work.
They designed and fabricated these special lifting towers.
With stand jacks positioned on top of the lifting towers, high strength cables were run down to the roof section.
When powered, the jacks pulled the cables, lifting the 8000-ton section of roof off the ground.
A computer-controlled system made sure that this manoeuvre was pin point accurate.
The next section of the arch was attached to the roof using giant hinges and the whole thing was jacked up even higher.
Topping it at 108 meters.
It's a unique piece of engineering.
The timing was critical to get the arch in place because there were concerns
that the original structure would collapse and release more clouds of radiation from the reactor.
But they also needed a material to clad the structure that could last 100 years,
and was capable of containing some of the most lethal materials on earth.
87,000 square meters of stainless steel
is used on the cladding of the structure
both on the outside and on the inside.
But sandwiched between that are multiple
layers of other materials all carefully
chosen to help contain the radiation
Perhaps the most important part of the creation of the New Safe Confinement was moving it.
If the new structure disturbed the old one, it would have catastrophic consequences.
The structure weighs 36 thousand tonnes,
That's three times the weight of the Eiffel Tower!
Skidding beams are used to slide the structure towards the reactor,
Hydraulic jacks were used once more to push horizontally and perpendicular to the structure.
It took a whole seven days for the monster structure to reach the old reactor building.
Carefully designed cut outs ensured the
end wall stayed clear of all protrusion from the reactor roof.
Once in position, they were able to complete the enclosure after 7 days of painstaking skidding.
But how do you dismantle the most radioactive building in the world?
Inside the structure, on the roof, are two bridge cranes
that go forward and backward across the whole length of the arc.
Hanging from them are three tool
platforms that can move too,
this enables tools to be moved anywhere in and around the old reactor.
The tools can cut, grind, grab, vacuum
and do many other things needs to safely dismantle the old structure.
It will take up to one hundred years to complete.
The New Safe Confinement has been constructed on one of the most contaminated places on the planet.
It’s a monument to what a team of international people
can do when they all pull together with a shared objective.
What do you think about this amazing piece of engineering?
Do you think that it will last the 100 years it will take to dismantle the collapsing structure at Chernobyl?
Let us know in the comments,
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