Two incredible photo essays about Chernobyl

[a_t_rain]

Somebody at a message board I frequent linked to this remarkable collection of notes and photographs by a Ukranian woman who rode her motorbike through the area around Chernobyl: Ghost Town and Land of the Wolves.

Creepy and sobering. Go read it. Now.

Comments

[mrstater.livejournal.com]

Oh, I've seen those before. Absolutely haunting and terrifying and so very...empty.

[bradamant.livejournal.com]

I don't remember the details, but I thought there were some doubts about the authenticity of this. I don't think anyone was saying the whole thing was a fake, but that some of the details were off, or something. Can't remember the details, but Wikipedia has a little bit about it. Photos are still interesting though.

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

Interesting. After doing a bit more digging, I'm not sure whom to believe.

The pictures seem to be authentic, though, even if she was on an organized tour when she took them.

[straussmonster.livejournal.com]

It's totally apocryphal--she made it up. There was an article in the Chronicle about it a few months ago.

[author-by-night.livejournal.com]

...

Wow. I have no words. Pretending to care about a sensitive subject, only to really not care enough to stop herself from faking her travels.

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

How totally is "totally"? I mean, the NYT article linked to in the Wikipedia entry quotes a tour guide who claims to have seen her taking the photos, so if he's telling the truth she did visit the site at one point -- just not the way she says she did.

[straussmonster.livejournal.com]

It's been a while since I read the article (and I'm not paying to read it now :), but IIRC, it was completely dismissive of her claims to have taken the photos that she did with the motorcycle and everything. The only way to visit the site at all is very restricted.

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that seems to be pretty much the substance of most of the allegations that it's a fake. On the other hand, she does offer an explanation for this on her site: her side of the story is that her father is a nuclear physicist who works in the area and that he pulled a few strings for her, which strikes me as plausible (and as something that people who work there might have a vested interest in denying). On the third hand, she also has a vested interest in lying, since she's using her site to solicit donations to finance future trips.

On the whole, the tour guide in the NY Times article who says she visited Pripyat with an official tour group and took some of the photos on that occasion seems to be a reliable witness. (On re-examining the site, I can't find any place where she actually claims to have had her bike with her in Pripyat, which suggests that she is indeed fudging about this part.) I'm a bit skeptical about the more highly colored statements from the other tour guide, Rimma Kiselytsia, which have been reported in a few Web postings -- the source isn't verifiable, as she seems to have died at a convenient moment, and it's not reported by any reliable news sources.

In the absence of any further evidence, I'm inclined to believe she took the photos of the surrounding countryside on her motorcycle but has not actually taken it inside the town. I'd probably classify this as misdirection rather than out-and-out fakery, since she's up front about the fact that she's combining photos from multiple sources to create this "virtual tour," and she doesn't claim, except by implication, to have visited the town on her motorcycle. There doesn't seem to be any evidence that the photos themselves are faked.

[straussmonster.livejournal.com]

I'd trust the Chronicle account over the NY Times one--seemed more detailed--but YMMV.

Randomly...

[bradamant.livejournal.com]

I just randomly read a little ways down your journal, and your account of having to request a German book from Mudd rang very true. Except that I used to need so many books from Mudd that I'd actually just go work there.

And the Mr. Bento love continues to spread! That makes me happy.

Re: Randomly...

[straussmonster.livejournal.com]

I'm too lazy to generally actually go over to Mudd, but I certainly will if I end up pursuing the entertaining side-project idea my prospectusing has generated. It's not even far away.

I'm pondering the Mr. Bento purchase still, I am. Worth using valuable luggage space to take to Europe for the summer with?

Re: Randomly...

[bradamant.livejournal.com]

I love Mr. Bento, but I probably wouldn't shlep him to Europe. The thing about Mr. Bento is that his usefulness is directly proportional to the amount of time you are willing to spend preparing delicious food to put in him; if he isn't full of delicious food, it's not worth it. If I were going to Europe for just the summer, I'd just eat Döners the whole time and try out Mr. Bento when I got back.

Re: Randomly...

[straussmonster.livejournal.com]

I *am* going to be living in Berlin for almost three months, but yeah--that may be a better idea. But he's not useful during the year because I have no kitchen. :(

Re: Randomly...

[bradamant.livejournal.com]

So I guess some things at Yale haven't changed... :P

Re: Randomly...

[straussmonster.livejournal.com]

Hey, if you have no lease you have nothing to tie you to New Haven in the summer, which is a Fate Worse Than Death. Never again. Only tolerable thanks to a penthouse with HBO and crazy roommates.

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

I'll have to see if I can track down the Chronicle story at the library. Do you have any idea when it was published?

[straussmonster.livejournal.com]

9/23/2005, 'A Historian in the Dead Zone'.

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

Damn, and just as I'm getting curious about this, that would be the volume that is late getting back from the microfilmery. Aargh.

[muscadinegirl.livejournal.com]

The photos are real enough. It seems that there are indeed bus tours of the Dead Zone and that she had been on one. Here's a video (http://www.helpmearoundtheworld.com/elenafilatova/nameless.mpeg) of one of the towns in the Chernobyl area taken from the back of a motorbike. She says that it wasn't she who took the pictures.

On May 1st she updated her website to include another instalment of a documentary (http://www.elenafilatova.com/) about the death of Valery Legusov, the consultant they called in to deal with the Cherny situation and eventually to report a highly censored version of the disaster to the world.

I have no idea whether what she says is genuine or not, but the pictures and video are haunting. Even if the Chernobyl information weren't there, I would read this site just to follow her excavations of the Serpent's Wall (http://www.kiddofspeed.com/serpents-wall/intro.htm).

And hi, I found your link from junediamanti's journal.

[mrs-wolf.livejournal.com]

This is incredibly interesting. Regardless of whether she is telling the truth or not I would be interested in how serious Chernobyl actually was. And she tells the truth: there is a money-interest and power-interest in keeping the extent of the damage under wraps.