5. Share your notes about the text. Ask several questions to your deskmate to check the understanding of the text. What questions would you like to ask to learn more about that disaster? Write them down. Use the internet to find the answers. Tell your classmates about your findings.

Notes:

• Chernobyl was a city in northern Ukraine, near the border with Belarus.
• The government evacuated the city in 1986 after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.
• The power plant was about 14.5 kilometres from Chernobyl.
• Many power-plant workers lived in Pripyat.
• Today Chernobyl is mostly uninhabited, although a few people live there.
• Before the evacuation, about 15,000 people lived in the city.

Questions for a deskmate:

1. Where was Chernobyl located?
2. When was the city evacuated?
3. Why was Chernobyl evacuated?
4. Where did the power-plant workers live?
5. How many people lived in Chernobyl before the evacuation?

Questions and answers about the disaster:

1. When did the accident happen? It happened on 26 April 1986.
2. What caused the disaster? A reactor accident occurred during a safety test at Unit 4 of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant.
3. Why were people evacuated? Radioactive substances contaminated the area and created a serious danger to human health.
4. What is the exclusion zone? It is the restricted area around the power plant where access and residence are controlled because of radioactive contamination.
5. What happened to Pripyat? Its residents were evacuated, and the city has remained largely abandoned.

Short report: The Chernobyl disaster happened on 26 April 1986 during a test at the nuclear power plant. The accident released radioactive material into the environment. The authorities evacuated nearby residents, including the people of Pripyat and Chernobyl. Today the area is known as the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. It is mostly uninhabited, but it is visited by scientists and officially authorised tourists.