A break in the fighting around Europe’s largest nuclear power plant allowed firefighters a chance to put out an inferno at the Ukrainian facility rocked by a fierce battle between Russian and Ukrainian forces early Friday morning.
Ukrainian and U.S. officials issued assurances that no elevated radiation levels had been detected, and Ukraine’s State Emergency Service posted to Telegram to say that around 5:20 a.m., roughly 40 firefighters “responded to the fire at the training building of the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant.” An hour later, the “fire at the Zaporizhzhia NPP training building in Enerhodar was extinguished. There are no dead or injured,” the emergency service said in another statement reported by CNN.
Ukrainian authorities also reported that Russian military forces had occupied the plant.
While a nuclear catastrophe appears to have been averted, earlier in the morning, following reports of Russian forces shelling the facility, a Zaporizhzhya representative warned that a “nuclear accident” could take place at “any moment.” The spokesman, Andriy Tuz, told CNN that multiple buildings were “damaged and on fire,” and while only one of six reactors was operational, all six contained nuclear fuel.
The International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog, reported that Ukraine’s nuclear regulator said no rise in radiation levels had been recorded. IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi spoke with Ukrainian officials and made an urgent appeal for stopping the use of force, warning of “severe danger” if the reactors get “hit,” according to a tweet from his agency.
Ukraine told the IAEA that the fire at the site had not affected “essential” equipment and that plant personnel were taking “mitigatory actions,” the U.N. agency said, adding that the IAEA’s Incident and Emergency Centre was being placed in “full 24/7 response mode” due to the “serious situation” at the plant.
A week into the Russian invasion, Ukrainian officials said Russian forces were attacking from “all sides” of the nuclear facility located in eastern Ukraine. “Fire has already broke out. If it blows up, it will be 10 times larger than Chornobyl! Russians must IMMEDIATELY cease the fire, allow firefighters, establish a security zone!” blared a tweet from Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba early Friday morning local time.
“This is closed circuit video of the nuclear power plant in Zaporizhzhia in southern Ukraine. It is the largest in the country with six nuclear reactors.” @andersoncooper reports on the ominous news of a nuclear power plant in Ukraine now on fire, according to the town’s mayor. pic.twitter.com/BwwTLC8ZNQ
— CNN (@CNN) March 4, 2022
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called on world leaders to stop Russia “before this becomes a nuclear disaster” and referred to the 1986 Chernobyl accident in which a Soviet nuclear plant, located north of Kyiv, exploded, bringing about the world’s worst nuclear disaster. Russian forces took control of Chernobyl just days into the current war.
“No country besides Russia has ever fired upon an atomic power plant’s reactors. The first time — the first time in history,” Zelenksy said in a Facebook post, according to CNN. Russian tanks were “shooting at the atomic blocks equipped with thermal imagers. They know what they are shooting at. They’ve been preparing for this (attack),” he added.
The White House said President Joe Biden spoke with Zelensky about the situation at the power plant, which is located in the town of Enerhodar in eastern Ukraine
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“President Biden joined President Zelenskyy in urging Russia to cease its military activities in the area and allow firefighters and emergency responders to access the site,” the White House readout of the call says. Biden also spoke with the Department of Energy’s undersecretary for nuclear security and the head of the National Nuclear Security Administration to receive an update on the situation, according to the White House.
Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm said in a tweet Thursday night that she spoke with Ukraine’s energy minister and announced that the United States had activated its Nuclear Incident Response Team. “We have seen no elevated radiation readings near the facility. The plant’s reactors are protected by robust containment structures and reactors are being safely shut down,” she said, adding, “Russian military operations near the plant are reckless and must cease.”
