The Elephant's Foot
Photographer: Igor Kostin
Date: 1986
Location: Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, Ukraine
Igor Kostin, a Soviet photojournalist who extensively documented the Chernobyl disaster, photographed the Elephant's Foot — a massive, highly radioactive mass of corium (a lava-like mixture of nuclear fuel, melted reactor core, and other materials) that had flowed into the basement of Reactor No. 4 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant following the catastrophic explosion on April 26, 1986. The structure was not discovered until December 1986. At the time of the first photographs, the radiation level was approximately 10,000 röntgens per hour — enough to deliver a lethal dose to an unprotected human in under two minutes. Subsequent photographs, including one by Artur Korneyev using a remotely triggered camera, became widely known. Kostin, who documented Chernobyl extensively over many years and received significant radiation exposure, died in 2015.
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