WATCH: Eerie Drone Footage of Abandoned Chernobyl

A drone equipped with a camera has unveiled the eerie post-nuclear degradation of a Russian town that was abandoned  following Chernobyl's nuclear power plant  exploded in 1986.

Documentary maker Danny Cooke travelled to Pripyat, just a few miles from the power plant, which was once home to 50,000 people. It was evacuated soon after the disaster His video, Postcards from Pripyat, Chernobyl, marks the first time the area has been seen from the air. 

Check out the eerie video below

The Chernobyl disaster was a catastrophic nuclear accident that occurred on April 26, 1986 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine (then officially the Ukrainian SSR), which was under the direct jurisdiction of the central authorities of the Soviet Union. An explosion and fire released large quantities of radioactive particles into the atmosphere, which spread over much of the western USSR and Europe.

The Chernobyl disaster was the worst nuclear power plant accident in history in terms of cost and casualties, and is one of only two classified as a level 7 event (the maximum classification) on the International Nuclear Event Scale (the other being the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster in 2011). The battle to contain the contamination and avert a greater catastrophe ultimately involved over 500,000 workers and cost an estimated 18 billion rubles (18 billion $USD). During the accident itself, 31 people died, and long-term effects such as cancers and deformities are still being accounted for.


The town remains, to this day, abandoned.

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