On April 26, 1986, the Chernobyl nuclear plant in Ukraine released a plume of radiation that eventually blanketed an estimated 77,000 square miles of Europe and Eurasia. While the worst of the contamination occurred near the plant — an area still closed to human habitation, now referred to as the exclusion zone — the effects are still seen further afield as well. Radioactive wild boars roam German forests, and radioactive mushrooms grow in Bulgaria.

Now, an international team of experts warns that Europe could receive fresh doses of Chernobyl radiation from forest fires.

Radioactive isotopes of cesium, strontium and plutonium take decades to millenniums to decay. The contaminants remain in soil and in plants that, once on fire, can release them into the air.

Climate models predict that rising temperatures combined with stable or declining precipitation will increase the risk of wildfires in the already fire-prone Chernobyl landscape.