In April 26, 1986, Reactor #4 of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine exploded, contaminating an area of more than 200 000 km2 in Europe with above 0.04 MBq of 137Cs/m2 as well as other radioactive particles (IAEA,06). Most contaminated in Ukraine is an area of 260,000 hectares known as the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (CEZ) that was contaminated with 90Sr, 137Cs, 154Eu, 238Pu, 239,240Pu, and 241Am. This CEZ was evacuated and cordoned off for limited activities and access. This area is known as the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (CEZ). Radioactive contamination was unevenly spread in the CEZ.
And, activities were limited based on radiation intensity within and around the CEZ. The CEZ is in a glacial outwash landform, and so is generally droughty, sandy soils. Two “fire seasons” (times of high likelihood of fires) occur each year: in early spring and late summer.
The pine forests are especially fire-prone, in part because they have been allowed to grow overly crowded because of small amounts of tending following the 1986 reactor explosion.
The Ukrainian Forest Service had identified relative fire hazard zones within the CEZ. And, wildfires of up to 17,000 ha had occurred within the CEZ.
The effects of radiation in the forests had been studied by the Ukraine Institute of Agricultural Radiology [Kasparov et al. (2000, 2003) and by Yoschenko et al. (2006a, 2006b)].
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