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Morning News

Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant Shuts Down

Aired December 15, 2000 - 10:11 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: And from a history-making election here in the U.S. to a history-making moment in Ukraine. With the flip of a switch, the Chernobyl nuclear power plant has been shut down. Some 14 years ago, you might remember, the plant was the site of the world's worst nuclear accident ever.

CNN's Jill Dougherty joining us now from Chernobyl with the latest.

Jill, hello.

JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Daryn.

Well, with that last working reactor shutdown now, they say it's going to take about 24 hours for it actually to cool down, but that is nothing compared to the rest of this station. Some experts say that it could be as much as 100 years before all the very highly radioactive nuclear fuel is taken out and eventually buried.

The official word, the official time came for the closing as Ukrainian President Kuchma gave the order from Kiev, the capital. And then here in Chernobyl, an engineer turned a key and that last working reactor shut down.

Ukraine tried to keep the station open as long as it could. Essentially, it said, it needed it for power. It has a severe energy shortage. It also said it could not afford the expense of shutting it down.

Nevertheless, the West, including Europe and the United States, put quite a bit of pressure on Ukraine to shut it down. And they are the ones who ended up footing most of the bill for this. Conservatively, it will be about $750 million. But some experts predict that it ultimately could be as much as $1 1/2 billion.

So as the world breathes a sigh of relief now that Chernobyl is at least on its way to being completely phased out, the people who work here -- and we've been talking with a lot of them today -- say that they are very concerned. They consider it a tragedy. They say they are panicked because, although many of them say they wish they could get a new job, they won't be able to. They are realists in this economy that they will not be able to. And although they say the government continues to say they will have some help, they do not believe that and they're very pessimistic. A lot of concern from those workers working here at Chernobyl -- Daryn.

KAGAN: The tragedy goes on for those people as well. I'm curious about the facility itself. How dangerous is it as it stands there? And is someone like you putting yourself in danger just by being so close?

DOUGHERTY: Well, the really only dangerous area, if you want to put it that way, is the fourth reactor that blew up. Now, that is protected by what they call a sarcophagus. It's metal and concrete. And presumably, that is keeping most of the radiation in here. But there are other areas that, in fact, we were out to today that were covered with radioactive dust. And that will be around for a long time. They're highly dangerous. We did not go into those particular areas. But they are going to be dangerous. And one town closed down literally forever. People will never go back to the town that's located just about two miles away from here -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Jill Dougherty joining us from Chernobyl, Ukraine, thank you very much. You be careful out there. Thanks for that report.

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