
In 1986, Reactor 4 at Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant exploded, resulting in the horrific deaths of a still unknown number of people.

Photographer Michael Huniewicz was just two years old and living in nearby Poland when the disaster struck and was given a shot of Lugol's solution in a bid to stop him developing cancer.

He has visited Chernobyl 29 years later, where an enormous new safe confinement is being built next to the reactor as the existing Sarcophagus continues to crumble. His breathtaking photographs reveal the haunting remains of catastrophic nuclear disaster.

When 29 years ago a mile-tall blue flame shot high into the sky, burning a hole in the ozone layer, the eyes of the world focused on the human-made volcano - Soviet Reactor 4 of the Chernobyl Nuclear Plant - spewing 400 times more radioactive load than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

It was the Cold War, so American satellites were zooming in on the plant, now with a glowing red spot, much like a fresh gunshot wound on Earth's surface, bleeding plutonium.

'We did not know that death could be so beautiful,' said those who saw it from the model Soviet town of Pripyat, built specially for the employees of the plant, clean and church-less.

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Nuclear hell on earth: Many of the disasters victims were taken to Pripyat hospital, where the levels of radiation are still high today

Operating room: Michael says that despite much of the equipment being stolen, you are still able to tell Pripyat hospital is a hospital

The basement of the hospital in Pripyat is the most contaminated easily accessible place in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone today

Dormitory: If you go into the basement of the hospital wearing a hazmat suit, you'd be exposed to 375,000 times more radiation than you are normally

Medicine bottles lie around and there are still rust hospital beds in Pripyat hospital, where radiation levels are still rather high

You'd imagine a nuclear plant to be a silent work of art, but the local inhabitants were actually so used to loud noises - cannonball-like booms occasionally coming out of the plant - that they were not even scared.

Many walked to the bridge between the city and the plant to see it better - and they paid a high price. The bridge has since been known as the Bridge of Death. But the bees knew, apparently. The bees just stayed in their nests, as if they could sense something was not quite right.

But in the plant itself, things were much less peaceful. The employees, some certain that they had been bombed by the Americans, others that it must have been an earthquake, unaware of what actually happened, were frantically running around trying to assess the damage and helplessly struggling to restore control.

Some were sent to inspect the reactor and returned completely tanned - that was no ordinary tan, however. It's nuclear. It doesn't care what you're wearing, you'll get tanned all over.

Protection: The Sarcophagus was built to contain what was left of Reactor 4 and is referred to as the pyramid of the 20th century

Sacrafice: Employee Aleksandr Grigoryevich Lelechenko spared his younger colleagues from overexposure and told them to go home

The photographer describes the plant building as perfectly socialist in style which reminded him of the school where his parents worked. Here, engineers continue to work on the clean up

Disaster: When the reactor exploded, some employees thought they had been bombed by the Americans, others that it was an earthquake

Controls: On the day, employees were frantically running around trying to assess the damage and helplessly struggling to restore control

Haunting: A corridor in Chernobyl Nuclear Plant lies almost empty 29 years after Reactor 4 exploded and a blue flame shot high into the sky

Some said radiation felt like pins and needles and others said you got a strange metallic taste in your mouth, which would never go away

The walls were so contaminated that they're covered by panels to minimise exposure, making the corridors dark and claustrophobic

Michael says most of the 30km area around the plant has been decontaminated, albeit not perfectly - so your dosimeter does go off

A friend of photographer Michael Huniewicz is pictured on a bridge connecting the plant administration building and the reactors

What's worse, it doesn't care about your skin either, so your internal organs are going to be burnt, too. And yet, people said, as all hell broke loose, there was this wonderful smell of freshness - that was ozone from the reactor, the exact same smell you experience after the storm, when rain brings ozone down from high up in the atmosphere. But what does radiation feel like?

Some people said it's pins and needles as radioactive tentacles are licking at your face. Others said it was that strange metallic taste in your mouth, that even if you managed to survive, was never going to go away. Others felt a terrible, impossible to describe excitement at the limit of their nerves - what someone called the nuclear fury of the nervous system.

The walls of the plant were so contaminated, that when you visit it today you'll notice they're covered by panels to minimise your exposure, making the corridors dark and claustrophobic.

The plant has strict, Soviet-style security, and there is no messing around with the serious guards, rather like the former headquarters of the KGB in Moscow. The building is perfectly socialist in style and reminded me of the high school where my parents used to work as teachers. Same huge windows, same door handles, and you're meant to wear slippers.

A big, white and red chimney still towers over the plant.

'When they were done with the clean up, three men were sent to climb that chimney and put a red Soviet flag on top of it,' says our guide. 'The radiation levels were still high, but they went. Do you know what their rewards was?' We shake our heads.

'A bottle of Pepsi and one day off.' Due to the high radiation levels the flag wasted away, so they sent another three.

Most of the 30km area around the plant has been decontaminated, albeit not perfectly - so your dosimeter does go off every now and then. But normally it's just quietly chirping like an insect, and you feel just fine. That's until you visit the Pripyat hospital.

Despite loads of equipment having been stolen, you can easily tell it's a hospital with all the medicine bottles lying around, hospital beds, and the creepy operating room.

That's where your guide tell you that the firefighters, the first men to answer the call for help from the plant, were taken here afterwards, showing the horrible symptoms of ARS - acute radiation syndrome.

Nauseous, burnt and weak, they'd immediately be shaved and undressed, as their hair and clothing was now highly contaminated, caked with deadly dust, shooting lethal rays and particles of radiation. The doctors and nurses would get burns on their hands just from touching the firefighters, and some would later die.

'Do you know what happened to the firefighters' shaved off hair, clothing, equipment?' The guide points down. It's still here, right beneath our feet, in the basement. That's right, the basement of this hospital is still a nuclear hell on earth, but unlike the reactor, it's not closed off.

If you were to go in, you'd get 60 mSv (millisiever) per hour, and that's assuming you'd be wearing a hazmat suit. That's 375,000 times more than you are being exposed right now, and while you would not get ARS, 100 mSv is empirically enough to increase your chances of getting cancer.

'What happened to the firefighters?' we ask. The worst cases were taken to Moscow Hospital 6, which specialised in radiation poisoning. But even they could not handle the scale of the disaster, so eventually the proud USSR asked its nemesis, the US, for help.

The livers of stillborn or aborted babies were used to provide bone marrow for transplants when other stocks of the precious tissue ran out

The morgue: A dissection table in the hospital is a grim reminder of the death wreaked on that day. Doctors and nurses would get burns on their hands when touching the firefighters - the first men to answer the call for help from the plant

The firefighters were nauseous, burnt and weak when they arrived at the hospital and they were immediately shaved and undressed

Radiation: Some people said it feels like pins and needles as radioactive tentacles are licking at your face while others felt truly terrible

One room Michael entered was interesting as it contained soil samples that were somehow left alone. His guide said: 'Go back, now! That room is full of plutonium'

The US sent doctors and some equipment. From them we know that for most severe cases, bone marrow transplants were needed, and when they ran out of bone marrow, the livers of stillborn or aborted babies were used to provide the precious tissue. To be sure there were enough abortions at the time, the authorities made women have them for the fear of countless birth defects in children. Regardless of the frantic efforts to help, many of the firefighters and other so-called 'Liquidators' died.

Our guide tells us the story of Aleksandr Grigoryevich Lelechenko who, in order to spare his younger colleagues from overexposure, told them to go home, while he walked a knee-deep through radioactive swamp of debris in order to switch various systems on or off to minimise the scale of the disaster.

After receiving first aid, he returned to the plant and worked for several more hours. No one at Chernobyl received a higher radiation doze than him, and he later died in a Kiev hospital.

And the state would not return the bodies to their families. They belonged to the state now. Entombed in sealed zinc caskets, under cement tiles, the radioactive heroes of the USSR were buried at the Mitino Cemetery in Moscow, among them some of those who were present at the plant during that faithful night, their family members regularly abused by passers by. 'Your son nearly destroyed the world!'

If you were drunk before becoming exposed to the radiation it would supposedly help according to photographer Michael Huniewicz's guide

One has to wonder, would it be any different these days, with all the technological advancement? As it turns out, yes. Although there are radiation levels at which your body is beyond repair (10 Sv per hour), there is an intelligent drug now available, called DTPA (Diethylenetriamine pentaacetic acid). DTPA binds to particles of the radioactive elements plutonium, americium and curium, which then leave the body in your urine.

They did not have it available back then, so people had to improvise. One recipe was (from Ukraine): a spoonful of goose shit into a bottle of vodka. Or another one (from Poland): 90% alcohol, grapefruit juice, honey, juniper fruit, tabasco, artemisia. I wouldn't bother writing it down - it doesn't work.

However, we were told by our guide that if you were to get completely wasted (the type of alcohol doesn't matter) before the exposure, that would actually help, as your cells, when in the state of dealing with alcohol contamination, are supposedly less susceptible to radiation damage.

I was two years old when it happened, and have no recollection of this, but I was apparently given a shot of Lugol's solution (that's elemental iodine and potassium iodide in water) in the middle of the night, my parents watching half awake, not sure why their child was receiving such treatment, and neither were the people administering it. But I drank it, and supposedly it protected me from thyroid cancer, while the cases of that disease in the less fortunate children of Belarus who did not receive the solution soared.

Entrance to Duga-1:The enormous metal skeleton of Duga-1, well above the lines of trees, was an over the horizon (OTH) radar

Secret: Chernobyl Duga-1, an array built as an early warning system to nuclear attack, is 90 metres tall and to man it, a secret town called Chernobyl-2 was built - not explicitly marked in any maps

Duga-1 could watch the States across the northern polar coverage to early detect ballistic nuclear missiles launched from the US

The equipment would mean the USSR could immediately retaliate and show off their own arsenal if ballistic nuclear missiles were launched

If firefighters' hair had to be shaved off, what about the pets' fur then? When the people where evacuated from the Zone, parents told their children they would soon return to pick up their cats and dogs and turtles that had to be left behind. But they never did, and indeed what followed the human exodus was the slaughter of the animals people used to keep. Very few of them survived, and you might see some of their descendants roaming the Zone today.

They're not alone, because nuclear disaster or not, the Zone has become a wildlife sanctuary, now that the humans are gone. There are even Przewalski horses, as it was decided that the area could be a new home for that endangered species.

They do not fear radiation, as radioactive monsters belong in the works of fiction, but they do have a good reason to fear people, some of whom come to hunt them. You might be lucky enough to see the horses on your way to the plant across the fields and forests, peppered with yellow and red radioactivity signs.

Every now and then, you can see the traces of a village that might have existed there for hundreds of years, but had to be completely abandoned, and is in the process of being devoured by nature.

And so are the human-planted trees and bushes. As you walk the eerie streets of Pripyat, you realise that once well-taken care of vegetation planted for human pleasure did not stand a chance against unleashed and unencumbered mother nature, and it gave way to parasitic plants and foliage, helpless without the protection of the gardener.

Powerful: Duga-1 was so powerful that the radio waves it emitted would disrupt radio and TV shows worldwide with a repetitive staccato

It resulted in thousands of complaints from all around the globe and the noise it produced earned it a nickname - the Russian Woodpecker

It grows everywhere. It grows inside of buildings. It's not true that the Zone feels like the people have just left. With broken windows, nothing is stopping rain and snow from getting inside, and growing plants slowly crack and demolish the walls and ceilings.

There are no family photos left, no cutlery, no spectacles, almost no furniture... One room we entered was interesting as it contained soil samples that were somehow left alone. I will never forget the quick whisper of my guide 'Go back, now! That room is full of plutonium!'

It turns out that a lot of what was left behind was stolen; I suppose someone wanted a radioactive souvenir at home... I remember the story of one Liquidator who, despite instructions to burn all Chernobyl gear, brought back his hat for his son to wear with pride, and the son was later diagnosed with a brain tumour.

But there is one thing that has not been stolen despite many attempts. A former secret Soviet wonder, hiding behind an inconspicuous name of Chernobyl-2, and disguised in maps as a kindergarten - the monstrous steel construction called Duga-1, a remnant of the Cold War, stands now exposed and largely forgotten.

For many years, its real purpose remained a mystery. 'The purpose of it,' some would say, 'is to spread communist propaganda', 'No, no, it's to control weather', others would say. 'It's to control minds.'

Radiation: Photographer Michael Huniewicz's radiation dosimeter pictured showing a normal reading because the area was decontaminated

Black Bird of Chernobyl? In early April 1986 there were reports of people near the plant experiencing strange events revolving around sightings of a strange creature

The letters on this building in model Soviet town of Pripyat, which is now all but empty, read: 'Let the atom be a worker, not a soldier'

While 97% of the nuclear material was not ejected from the plant in 1986, it's still there and, of course, it's still radioactive (and will be for thousands of years)

Duga-1 was powerful and inconsiderate. In fact, it was so powerful that the radio waves it emitted would disrupt radio and TV shows worldwide with a repetitive staccato, resulting in thousands of complaints from all around the globe, all of which were ignored. The noise it produced earned it a nickname - Russian Woodpecker.

At the time, after all, both the USSR and the US lived in a constant fear of nuclear warfare, and as the standoff continued for decades, technology was employed to alleviate one's paranoia while aggravating that of the enemy.

The enormous metal skeleton of Duga-1, well above the lines of trees, had an important role to play in that big game - that of being an over the horizon (OTH) radar, meaning to watch the States across the northern polar coverage, to early detect ballistic nuclear missiles launched from the US, so that the USSR could immediately retaliate and show off their own arsenal, the two countries thus resetting our progress back to the stone age. Such were the rules of mutual assured destruction, conveniently abbreviated as MAD.

Luckily for everyone on this planet, the destruction never happened.

Contaminated product was sold in shops after the disaster - and although some people bought more expensive items, it was no more safe

The state would not return the bodies of the employees to their families - they were entombed in sealed zinc caskets, under cement tiles

Michael says it's not true that the Zone feels like the people have just left. With broken windows, nothing is stopping rain and snow from getting inside

Contaminated in the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, decontaminated, the radar burped its last in 1989 and went silent forever. If you enjoy conspiracy theories, there is one claiming it was the Americans or the Israelis blew up Chernobyl in order to silence the ever-annoying Duga. Or another saying that it was Duga that caused the nuclear meltdown in the first place.

Regardless, the USSR soon fell, the Russians left their military toys scattered around the world and returned home, and the truth about Duga's purpose finally came out. Even so, it was only in 2011 - nine years after the Zone was opened to tourists - that they allowed people to go and see the Duga.

It still stands there, getting old and rusty. Allegedly, it cost twice as much as the plant, but it's nowhere near as popular - despite having been featured in two well-known video games. It's not much more than a monument to the Soviet defeat now, just pointlessly being there, silent and abandoned. Nobody wants it, it just stares at the world.

You can climb it if you want, but even though they gave it a good washing, no decontamination process is perfect, so it could be dangerous especially if the rough surfaces were to cut your skin, and besides, it is Soviet steel you're walking on. Perhaps nothing reaffirms its fall from grace and current insignificance as the gate to the site - guarded by a lonely man and his friendly dog, bored out of its mind, that will gladly come over to you to say hi.

A class register records the names of school children - many who will have died as a result of the massive nuclear disaster in 1986

Haunting: Many residents got closer to the explosion to have a look. But it ended up killing them faster

Remains: A discarded children's doll lies abandoned amid the ruins seen on Michael's tour of the disaster site

There are 11 reactors of the same type (RBMK) as Chernobyl (pictured) which are still operational around Russia, and although they've been improved

Most of the 30km area around the plant has been decontaminated and Michael's dosimeter normally just quietly chirped like an insect

Most of the nuclear material remains in Chernobyl Power Plant and it is still radioactive and will be for thousands and thousands of years

Michael says it's not true that the Zone feels like the people have just left - there are broken windows abd nothing is stopping rain and snow from getting inside

Now, one would think Chernobyl is a thing of the past, but the guide tells you that while 97% of the nuclear material was mercifully not ejected from the plant in 1986, it's still there and, of course, it's still radioactive (and will be for thousands and thousands of years).

The problem is, the lid of the so-called biological shield is rather precariously resting at an oblique angle, and if were to drop, and it might, we'd have to deal with a disaster much worse than the one of 1986.

What's more, 11 reactors of the same type (RBMK) are still operational around Russia, and although they've been improved, they are still of the same unreliable design, which was selected for its high efficiency and low cost, not reliability or safety. In fact, the remaining Chernobyl plant reactors 1-3 were operational after the disaster, the last one until year 2000.

As for Chernobyl Reactor 4, a new safe confinement is being built next to it, a giant structure that will cover the Sarcophagus - cynically called a pyramid of the twentieth century - that was remotely built by robots to contain the nuclear fallout.

Michael was two years old when it happened and was given a shot of Lugol's solution (elemental iodine and potassium iodide in water)

In the middle of the night, his parents, watching half awake, were not sure why their child was receiving such treatment, and neither were the people administering it

Overgrown: Parasitic plants and foliage grows everywhere, even inside buildings where smashed windows have allowed in the elements

A lot of what was left behind was stolen - it seems someone wanted a radioactive souvenir at home. One man took a hat to give to his son, who later developed a brain tumour

The model Soviet town of Pripyat, built specially for the employees of Chernobyl Power Plant was clean and church-less, Michael writes

The Sarcophagus was meant to hold on for 15 years, but it's been almost 30. It now has at least 200 square meters of spaces and cracks, and requires constant care. Some say it looks like a crashed spaceship, others see in it a Babylonian catafalque.

If you don't like your job, hate doing overtime or would like to make a difference, this might be a new, exciting role for you - you can work inside of the Sarcophagus for literally only a few minutes a month - insane radiation levels inside being a major catch.

When, like Russian dolls, the new safe confinement encloses the Sarcophagus, dismantling of that ticking bomb will at last begin.

'So when they dismantle it?' we ask. 'What's going to happen to all that radioactive material inside?' Our guide just shrugs, as unhappy workers move about the building site wearing heavy blue jackets. Because it turns out that although it will have to go somewhere, they still haven't figured out what to do with the fallout.

That's right, this story isn't over yet, and no one quite knows what the deadly depths of Reactor 4 and its nuclear lava have for us in store.

A new safe confinement is being built next to Reactor 4, a giant structure that will cover the Sarcophagus that was remotely built by robots