Chernobyl disaster other undamaged reactors at the power station, with No. 3 continuing to produce electricity up into 2000. The accident motivated safety upgrades on all remaining Soviet-designed reactors in the RBMK (Chernobyl No. 4) family, of which eleven continued to power electric grids . The disaster began during a systems test on 26 April 1986 at reactor 4 of the Chernobyl plant near Pripyat and in proximity to the administrative border with Belarus and the Dnieper River. There was a sudden and unexpected power surge. When operators attempted an emergency shutdown, a much larger spike in power output occurred. This second
Effects of the Chernobyl disaster major release of radioactive material had occurred came not from Soviet sources, but from Sweden, where on 28 April workers at the Forsmark Nuclear Power Plant (approximately 1100 km from the Chernobyl site) were found to have radioactive particles on their clothing. It was Sweden's search for the source of radioactivity (after they had determined there was no leak at the Swedish plant) that led to the first hint of a serious nuclear problem in the Western Soviet Union. Contamination from the Chernobyl disaster was not evenly spread across the surrounding countryside but scattered irregularly depending on weather conditions. Reports