Anna Supranova stood in front of what was once a vast artificial sea. Her home – at no 7 Hetman Street – looks on to Kakhovka reservoir in southern Ukraine. Or at least it did. The water has recently vanished. Most of it disappeared in the space of three surreal days last month, after Russian troops blew up the Kakhovka hydroelectric dam farther downstream.
Ever since, Supranova and other residents in the frontline town of Nikopol have been without water. At the bottom of her garden is an unearthly and desolate muddy plain. It stretches as far as the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station, visible in the near haze. The civilian facility – occupied by Moscow since the beginning of its invasion – is 5km away.
The Russians have transformed the nuclear plant into a full-blown military base. According to Ukrainian intelligence, they have mined its six reactors and a cooling pond. Armoured vehicles shelter in its halls. In an ominous development, staff who have signed contracts with Rosatom – the Kremlin’s nuclear agency – have been told to leave. Three senior figures have gone to Crimea, with routine patrols scaled back.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has warned that Vladimir Putin is plotting a “terrorist attack”, and has urged the international community to act. “We have been saying for a long time that there is a serious threat. Because Russia is technically ready to provoke a local explosion at the plant, which could lead to the release of dangerous substances into the air. We communicate this very clearly,” he said on Saturday.
The town of Nikopol – current population 50,000 – and other nearby cities are taking the threat seriously. Last week for the first time they carried out radiation drills, a rehearsal for what locals should do in case of a repeat of the 1986 Chornobyl disaster, when contamination blew from Ukraine to Belarus, and across Europe to Scandinavia. It was the world’s worst ever civil nuclear incident.
“The Zaporizhzhia plant is on my doorstep. You can see it,” Supranova said. “If there is a nuclear leak we will fetch the dog, go inside and close the windows and doors. Unfortunately we don’t have a car. We won’t get far on foot.” She, her husband, Serhiy, and 15-year-old daughter, Angelina, would wait for rescue. “I’m not sure who exactly would come,” she admitted.
Speaking on Monday, the Nikopol military district chief Yevhen Yevtushenko said the situation was under control. Radiation levels were normal. There was no sign that the Russians were leaving the plant in big numbers, he said. The authorities were not planning a forced evacuation – for now. Since Russia’s all-out attack in February 2022 about half of the town’s population had moved to safer areas, he said.
Asked what the west might do to mitigate the situation, he answered wryly: “Make the Russians disappear. The safety issues with the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant only started when they showed up. If we can get rid of them the problems will go as well.” Thus far, the response from EU nations and the US to the developing crisis was unimpressive and “lethargic”.
“An explosion would be a catastrophe for the Black Sea region, for Europe and humanity,” he stressed. Russia’s reckless sabotage of the dam left 200,000 people in the district without drinking water, he added. Levels at the reservoir continued to fall. The town was delivering water in fire trucks, and distributing it free of charge. It briefly reappeared in domestic taps, only to stop flowing half an hour later.
In addition to a growing nuclear threat, Nikopol has for the past year come under regular Russian bombardment. Soldiers based in the plant and in the next-door village of Vodiane shell the town most days or hit it with Grad missiles. On 26 June two civilians were killed and one injured. The Russians are so close that there is no warning when a strike might occur or where a projectile will land.
Outside Nikopol’s shrapnel-pitted palace of culture, pensioner Oleksandr Sherban described the Russians as “idiots”. “Nobody knows what’s going to happen, or what they are capable of doing. They’ve mined everything,” he said. “Their bombing is completely unpredictable. It can happen any time of the day: morning or night. I think they do it whenever they’ve had a good meal.”
Sherban said Vladimir Putin was trying to use the nuclear plant for blackmail. The move was connected to Ukraine’s counter-offensive and its attempt to liberate the Zaporizhzhia region. He described the Russian-seized town of Enerhodar – adjacent to the plant and home to its atomic engineers – as “beautiful”. “I used to travel there by ferry. You could go across the reservoir in a boat,” he recalled.
Olexiy Kovynyev, a former senior nuclear worker who fled from Enerhodar last year, said the situation at the plant was tense. About 2,500 from its original 11,500 Ukrainian staff remained, he estimated. Many of those who stayed had – under pressure – signed contracts to work with Rosatom. They included its Ukrainian chief engineer, Yuriy Chernichuk, whom the Russians promoted to director.
“There are conflicts between those who collaborated, and those who didn’t,” he said. Kovynyev said that the plant’s reactors were impregnable, and encased in thick steel and concrete. More vulnerable was a dry storage area – home to spent radioactive fuel – and the cooling pond. “An explosion there would likely be contained. Of course if you are an absolute maniac and open the ventilation channels radiation would be thrown out,” he said.
Kovynyev described the destruction of the Soviet-built reservoir as terrible. “It looks like Mars, an arid desert,” he said. “Before it was a sea. I would swim in it. Every summer I would go to Enerhodar’s beach, take my sleeping bag and bed down for the night under the stars. It was wonderful.” He said he remained optimistic that a Chornobyl-style catastrophe might be avoided.
A billboard on the way into town reads: “Nikopol. Home to indomitable people.” The route in passes a snaking estuary – now entirely dried up, and devoid of life apart from a few gulls. The city was once a Cossack stronghold and the centre of a self-governing area known as the Zaporizhian Sich. Many of its modern factories are still working. Some people who left last year ran out of money, and came back, residents said.
Acting headteacher Svitlana Karamushka said locals had got used to living in a war zone. Many families had stayed and children learned online, she said. She had prepared a suitcase in case she needed to evacuate, and had taken part in a training session on what to do in the event of a nuclear explosion. “You have to wash victims,” she said. Who was to blame for this horrible situation? “Putin. He’s a prick,” her friend Nataliya said.
Back in Hetman Street, Supranova said the sudden disappearance of water was killing off her vegetable patch. The garden included apple trees, and a luscious trailing vine, which blanketed most of her cottage. “I’ve planted potatoes. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to harvest them,” she admitted. She added: “I’ve lived here my entire life, 36 years. I really don’t want to go. We hope for the best and prepare for the worst.”
Luke Harding’s Invasion: Russia’s Bloody War and Ukraine’s Fight for Survival, shortlisted for the Orwell Prize, is now available in paperback from Guardian Faber
