Radiation monitoring station destroyed near Zaporizhzhya NPP - IAEA

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has received information from Zaporizhzhya NPP that an external radiation monitoring station was destroyed by shelling and fire this week, further reducing the effectiveness of its ability to detect and measure a radioactive release during an emergency, IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said on 27 June.

The IAEA team of experts at the ZNPP site on Monday, 24 June, lost contact with the monitoring station located about 16 kilometres southwest of the plant. Due to the security situation, the team was unable to get to the site to confirm the damage.

Since the beginning of 2022, several radiation monitoring stations in the 30 kilometre zone around ZNPP have been out of service for varying periods of time due to war damage. Four stations - more than a quarter of the 14 available before the war - are currently inaccessible.

The latest incident comes just days after a 16-hour power outage in the nearby town of Energodar, where most ZNPP employees live, led to the temporary shutdown of some of the radiological environmental monitoring stations as they ran out of backup batteries.

The functioning of off-site radiation monitoring equipment is an integral part of nuclear safety worldwide.

These systems are important to continuously monitor radiation levels and, in the event of an emergency, to quickly assess the current and potential radiological impact and the necessary protective measures," IAEA Director General Grossi said.

He added that the loss of one radiation monitoring station has no direct impact on safety at ZNPP, but it is part of the continuous erosion of a range of safety measures during the war, which remains a deep source of concern.

Ukraine is among 51 countries participating in the IAEA's International Radiation Monitoring System (IRMIS), which collects radiation monitoring data from more than 6,000 monitoring stations around the world that are part of national networks.

Zaporizhzhya NPP continues to face other nuclear safety challenges during the war.

On most days last week, IAEA experts continued to hear explosions some distance from the site.

Earlier, Socialportal reported that Russian troops are using kamikaze drones over nuclear reactors at the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant, which is located on occupied territory.