‘I compare it to Chernobyl’: Ukrainians face consequences of dam disaster

For decades, Ukraine’s southern Kherson region was a destination for nature lovers, home to at least 70 species of animals, including many endangered ones.

But on Tuesday, when the Kakhovka dam broke, its vast nature reserves, national parks and popular zoos were “completely swept away”, said Julia Markel, head of environmental NGO Let’s Do It Ukraine.

The fate of wildlife trapped in the spreading currents following the dam’s collapse is just one aspect of the disaster still unfolding, which is set to change the geography and ecology of the region as well as causing further hardship for already affected populations. ready for. Warning.

“I compare it to the Chernobyl disaster,” said Maxim Soroka, an environmental protection expert at the Dovkola Network NGO – a reference to the Soviet-era nuclear accident that unfolded on Ukrainian territory. “Yes, the consequences are different, but the long-term impact on the population and the region is the same.”

Rescue efforts are still underway after the dam broke in the early hours of Tuesday, with Ukrainians trying to assess the long-term damage to the region’s economy and environment. Officials and experts warn that unique ecosystems could be lost, farmland turned to desert and remaining water supplies contaminated.

Several hundred tons of lubricants and fuel oil were washed into the Dnipro River by the collapse of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant, as well as landmines dug by the torrent.

Officials said the floods also polluted groundwater sources, leading to a shortage of drinking water for the local population. The reservoir provided drinking water to the cities of Kherson and Kryvyi Rih as well as to the Crimean peninsula via a 400 km canal.

Pollution from rotting fish carcasses, toilets and cemeteries poses a serious risk of disease, the health ministry said, and instructed local residents not to consume water drawn from wells and ground pumps given, as is still common in rural Ukraine.

Soroka said he expected an “epidemic of intestinal infections”, adding: “The situation is even worse in the occupied areas of the left bank of the Kherson region. People do not have access to medicine and there is no way to avoid this disaster.” There’s no way. And there’s nothing we can do to help them.”

Beyond its immediate humanitarian consequences, the dam’s breach would deal a severe blow to the vital agricultural industry. Ukraine’s Ministry of Agriculture said the loss of the Kakhovka reservoir was a “man-made disaster” for farming in the region, a large grain- and oilseed-producing region where summers are hot and dry.

A highly competitive arable sector was a bright spot in Ukraine’s economy prior to the Russian occupation and blockade of the Black Sea ports. Global wheat prices rose 3 per cent after the dam collapse as investors digested the implications.

The lake contained by the dam covered 2,155 square kilometers before the break of the barrier, and contained 18 cubic kilometers of water. It provided irrigation for 584,000 hectares of arable land in the Dnipropetrovsk, Kherson and Zaporizhia regions, which produced 4 million tons of grain and oilseed crops in 2021.

With the withdrawal of the reservoir, Kherson, an arid region in the far south, has lost 94 percent of its irrigation, Zaporizhia 74 percent, and Dnipropetrovsk 30 percent.

“It was a giant irrigation system in which Ukrainian farmers had invested billions of dollars after the collapse of the Soviet Union,” said an executive of a large agricultural company. “It’s all gone.”

Denis Marchuk, deputy chairman of the Ukrainian Council of Agriculture, a trade union, told Ukrainian television that the destruction of the dam could cost the country up to 14 percent of its grain exports. He noted that a third of the country’s beets, onions, cabbage and carrots – ingredients for the national dish of borscht – are produced in the region.

“Until (the dam) is restored, we will not be able to develop anything in the Kherson region,” Marchuk said. Even without war, it can take years to build a new dam.

Environmental activist Markhel said a “mini-desert” could begin to form in Kherson, leading to more droughts.

The dam’s disappearance also eliminates the navigability of the Dnipro between the city of Zaporizhzhya and the Black Sea, a cheaper form of transport for crops and industrial goods. The Kakhovka Reservoir was also an important source of water for heavy industry, including large steel and metallurgy plants in Nikopol and Kryvyi Rih.

The Ministry of Agriculture said that 95,000 tonnes of fish could be lost. A video shared online by Andrey Yermak, chief of staff to President Volodymyr Zelensky, showed thousands of fish on the banks of a dry riverbed on the banks of the village of Mariyanske, Dnipropetrovsk region, 90 km upstream from the destroyed dam.

Ihor Sirota, director general of hydropower operator Ukrahydroenergo, said on Wednesday that it may be possible to protect part of the Kakhovka reservoir with water at a depth of 3 meters (down to 16 metres), depending on whether the base of the dam remains intact. Or not. Akhand.

“We will see it in two or three days,” he said. “But we understand that it is most likely that the dam will be completely destroyed.”

For decades, Ukraine’s southern Kherson region was a destination for nature lovers, home to at least 70 species of animals, including many endangered ones.

But on Tuesday, when the Kakhovka dam broke, its vast nature reserves, national parks and popular zoos were “completely swept away”, said Julia Markel, head of environmental NGO Let’s Do It Ukraine.

The fate of wildlife trapped in the spreading currents following the dam’s collapse is just one aspect of the disaster still unfolding, which is set to change the geography and ecology of the region as well as causing further hardship for already affected populations. ready for. Warning.

“I compare it to the Chernobyl disaster,” said Maxim Soroka, an environmental protection expert at the Dovkola Network NGO – a reference to the Soviet-era nuclear accident that unfolded on Ukrainian territory. “Yes, the consequences are different, but the long-term impact on the population and the region is the same.”

Rescue efforts are still underway after the dam broke in the early hours of Tuesday, with Ukrainians trying to assess the long-term damage to the region’s economy and environment. Officials and experts warn that unique ecosystems could be lost, farmland turned to desert and remaining water supplies contaminated.

Several hundred tons of lubricants and fuel oil were washed into the Dnipro River by the collapse of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant, as well as landmines dug by the torrent.

Officials said the floods also polluted groundwater sources, leading to a shortage of drinking water for the local population. The reservoir provided drinking water to the cities of Kherson and Kryvyi Rih as well as to the Crimean peninsula via a 400 km canal.

Pollution from rotting fish carcasses, toilets and cemeteries poses a serious risk of disease, the health ministry said, and instructed local residents not to consume water drawn from wells and ground pumps given, as is still common in rural Ukraine.

Soroka said he expected an “epidemic of intestinal infections”, adding: “The situation is even worse in the occupied areas of the left bank of the Kherson region. People do not have access to medicine and there is no way to avoid this disaster.” There’s no way. And there’s nothing we can do to help them.”

Beyond its immediate humanitarian consequences, the dam’s breach would deal a severe blow to the vital agricultural industry. Ukraine’s Ministry of Agriculture said the loss of the Kakhovka reservoir was a “man-made disaster” for farming in the region, a large grain- and oilseed-producing region where summers are hot and dry.

A highly competitive arable sector was a bright spot in Ukraine’s economy prior to the Russian occupation and blockade of the Black Sea ports. Global wheat prices rose 3 per cent after the dam collapse as investors digested the implications.

The lake contained by the dam covered 2,155 square kilometers before the break of the barrier, and contained 18 cubic kilometers of water. It provided irrigation for 584,000 hectares of arable land in the Dnipropetrovsk, Kherson and Zaporizhia regions, which produced 4 million tons of grain and oilseed crops in 2021.

With the withdrawal of the reservoir, Kherson, an arid region in the far south, has lost 94 percent of its irrigation, Zaporizhia 74 percent, and Dnipropetrovsk 30 percent.

“It was a giant irrigation system in which Ukrainian farmers had invested billions of dollars after the collapse of the Soviet Union,” said an executive of a large agricultural company. “It’s all gone.”

Denis Marchuk, deputy chairman of the Ukrainian Council of Agriculture, a trade union, told Ukrainian television that the destruction of the dam could cost the country up to 14 percent of its grain exports. He noted that a third of the country’s beets, onions, cabbage and carrots – ingredients for the national dish of borscht – are produced in the region.

“Until (the dam) is restored, we will not be able to develop anything in the Kherson region,” Marchuk said. Even without war, it can take years to build a new dam.

Environmental activist Markhel said a “mini-desert” could begin to form in Kherson, leading to more droughts.

The dam’s disappearance also eliminates the navigability of the Dnipro between the city of Zaporizhzhya and the Black Sea, a cheaper form of transport for crops and industrial goods. The Kakhovka Reservoir was also an important source of water for heavy industry, including large steel and metallurgy plants in Nikopol and Kryvyi Rih.

The Ministry of Agriculture said that 95,000 tonnes of fish could be lost. A video shared online by Andrey Yermak, chief of staff to President Volodymyr Zelensky, showed thousands of fish on the banks of a dry riverbed on the banks of the village of Mariyanske, Dnipropetrovsk region, 90 km upstream from the destroyed dam.

Ihor Sirota, director general of hydropower operator Ukrahydroenergo, said on Wednesday that it may be possible to protect part of the Kakhovka reservoir with water at a depth of 3 meters (down to 16 metres), depending on whether the base of the dam remains intact. Or not. Akhand.

“We will see it in two or three days,” he said. “But we understand that it is most likely that the dam will be completely destroyed.”