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The Most Polluted Area On Earth

By Theodora Filis



Near the southern Ural Mountains, in the Russian province of Chelyabinsk, there is a Soviet nuclear facility called the Mayak Chemical Combine (MCC). From 1948 until 1990 when the last of five reactors was shut down, the Combine contaminated the region to such an extent that it is now known as the most polluted area on Earth.

This title is due to the MCC's continuous disregard for environmental and public safety.

Between 1949 and 1956, 2.6 billion feet of liquid waste was dumped into the Techa. The radiation in the Techa is estimated to equal the amount released by the Hiroshima atomic bomb or nearly 20 times that released at Chornobyl in 1986.

It is believed that the river now contains 2.5 times the number of long-life isotopes as were released by the Chornobyl reactor. 124,000 people were exposed to high-level radiation through the river.


Waste has not been dumped in the river since 1951 when radiation was detected in the Arctic waters of northern Russia. The government also restricted drinking and fishing in the river. However, because local residents were not told why the new restrictions were put in place, they continued using the river. In addition, evacuations were ordered, but on a very small scale, and in some instances, never took place.

The implications of the disastrous environmental state of the Chelyabinsk region are many, and not restricted to national boundaries. Russia's desire for secrecy meant that the rest of the world would not learn of the incidents at Mayak until the late 1980s. Interestingly enough, there is evidence that the Central Intelligence Agency knew of the 1957 explosion but did not divulge its knowledge so as to prevent instilling fear in the Western nuclear program.

What does this mean for the rest of the world?

The incidents at Mayak have not been identified as having affected other nations. However, radiation was detected in the Arctic waters in the 1950s and is assumed to have come from the Techa River through the Ob River. Too, the water that has drained into the water tables around Lake Karachy could again make its way to the Ob and perhaps Arctic waters.

Finally, there has been some speculative research that shows radioactive runoff from the Ob could form into ice flows that move throughout the Arctic region, even extending to Alaska.

In a report prepared by the UN Scientific Committee on the Effects of Radiation, much of the plant and animal life was affected by the radiation, but no one species is known to have become extinct. Of the 20 types of herbaceous plants in the southern Ural, no single species was more affected than others. Cereals and woody plants, especially pine trees, suffered severely.

The Mayak Chemical Combine is now credited by the Worldwatch Institute as the creator of the “most polluted spot” in history, a mess whose true magnitude is yet to be known.

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