Selfies from the disaster zone: how TV show changed Chernobyl tourism

The hit TV series "Chernobyl" has attracted a new generation of tourists to the nuclear disaster zone but guides say that many are more interested in taking selfies than learning about the accident.

"They do not need information anymore, they just want to take a selfie," said Yevgen Goncharenko, an official plant guide, at the site of the worst nuclear accident in history.

The hard-hitting mini-series recreates the April 1986 disaster, when one of the reactors at the Soviet Union's Chernobyl plant, in what is now Ukraine, exploded during testing.

A tourist buys souvenirs in the stall on the checkpoint. AFP

The blast spewed radiation over a vast swathe of Europe and a 30-kilometre (19-mile) exclusion zone remains in place around the plant, although a small part of it is open to a growing number of tourists.

The abandoned site had already become a "dark tourism" destination in recent years, even before the eponymous TV show that has picked up 19 Emmy nominations.

Mutants

Louis Carlos, a 27-year-old visiting from Brazil, said he didn't know much about the disaster before watching the TV series but was motivated to travel to Ukraine to find out more.

Tourists look at a New Safe Confinement (NSC). AFP

"If people come here to understand what happened and try to learn, it's a good thing," Carlos said, as a friend took a photograph of him next to the nuclear power station.

"It's history," he added.

Tourist numbers have steadily increased every year, and last year 72,000 people visited Chernobyl.

The tour operators' association working in the region said it expected the number to jump to 100,000 this year.

Journalists are taking in kayaks along the Uzh river in the Chernobyl exclusion zone. AFP

Zone guide Goncharenko, who accompanies groups of tourists on visits organised by private companies, said he'd experienced such booms before.

Some, like Slovenian tourist Jan Mavrin, insisted they had come to pay tribute to those who had lost their lives in the disaster.

"You've got to have some sort of respect towards this kind of place," Mavrin said, taking a photo of the Ferris wheel at Pripyat's abandoned amusement park.

Tourists take pictures at New Safe Confinement (NSC). AFP

"You should be modest, you shouldn't just walk around picking (up) stuff," he added.

Souvenirs on eBay

Visitors — both those on official tours and so-called "stalkers" who break in illegally — have been known to take objects out of the exclusion zone as souvenirs, according to Syrota, of the Chernobyl information centre.

Tourists crowd on the checkpoint of a 30-kilometer (19-mile) Chernobyl exclusion zone around the plant. AFP

"Even we, Pripyat natives, do not allow ourselves to pick up our own things from there," he said.

"And then we are surprised when we see them on eBay," he added.

Syrota said that it was "hard to imagine" where the government's plans for more tourism at the site could lead and stressed that space was limited.

"We have no experience of what this can turn into," he says.