Forest fires have been burning close to the positioning of the Chernobyl nuclear catastrophe since early April. NASA’s satellite eyes in area have been monitoring the smoke plumes from the wildfires within the Ukraine. The pictures paint a worrisome picture.

The 1,000-square-mile (2,600-square-kilometer) Chernobyl Exclusion Zone surrounds the nuclear energy plant to limit entry to areas contaminated with radiation from the 1986 catastrophe. NASA’s Aqua satellite captured views of this area on April Eight and April 9 that present energetic fires and lengthy swaths of smoke.

“Fires within the exclusion zone are usually not unusual, however the severity and depth of the fires has grown over time as extra forests and grasslands have recovered,” stated NASA’s Earth Observatory in a launch on Friday.

NASA additionally shared an annotated model of one of the satellite photos that reveals the current fires in respect to Chernobyl and the border with Belarus.   

Wildfires are dangerous sufficient, however the location of these fires make them notably regarding. A examine on exclusion-zone fires that occurred in 2015 discovered that smoke plumes can carry radioactive particles far past the zone’s boundaries.  

Excessive wildfires have grow to be a world phenomenon after damaging blazes burned by way of the US, Australia, the Amazon rainforest and even the Arctic over the previous yr. 

Firefighters are working to stem the Chernobyl fires.