The beginning of the end for Visaginas started at 01:23 on Saturday 26th April 1986. The death-knell for this town, which was created from virtually nothing by the eastern European USSR economy started with the destruction of reactor 4 at the Chernobyl RBMK Reactor. Originally Visaginas was simply a small collection of houses with a population of a few hundred, that grew to support the construction and operational teams that run Chernobyl’s sister plant at Ignalina. Swollen at its peak to almost 34,000 individuals, the four lane roads, the infrastructure and the support services needed to support working families and the 5000 individuals involved in the operation of the RBMK are now decaying. The present from the power plant to the town in 1975 was a giant granite boulder which symbolised the towns birth on 10th August. Wandering around the abandoned grounds, riding the half closed and empty roads and watching children play in abandoned playgrounds amongst the soviet style concrete block housing was a surreal moment.
