I still keep a copy of the Radianska Ukraina of April 29, 1986, carrying a brief notice by the Council of Ministers of the USSR: “An incident at the Chornobyl nuclear power reactors. Relief efforts are under way. The victims are getting help. A government commission has been created.”

 Just a few short lines – and what a boundless scope of drama. 

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While the disasters of Three Mile Island and Chornobyl were caused by the mistakes of the maintenance personnel, as well as drawbacks in the design of the nuclear reactors, the Japanese catastrophe came in the wake of a powerful earthquake and a devastating tsunami. 

It is the first time that nature and the elements have radically changed the ideas of the Earth’s nuclear safety. 

To prove that our planet is indeed a globe, a sea expedition led by Ferdinand Magellan started on a circumnavigation which lasted from September 20, 1519 to September 6, 1522. Thus, it took him 1,081 days, or nearly three years. 

The first astronaut Yuri Gagarin circled the Earth on his spacecraft Vostok on April 12, 1961, in a matter of 108 minutes – the development of transportation has made the Earth much smaller. 

Nowadays, 441 nuclear reactors operate in 30 countries around the world to produce electricity. Out of these, 15 nuclear power blocks are located in Ukraine. 

Operator errors, design flaws, natural disasters, or acts of terror could all result in new nuclear catastrophes. With such a number of reactors, the planet has become tiny and extremely vulnerable.

Where shall the people from contaminated areas move, when there homes become uninhabitable after nuclear crises? Japan is made up of just a handful of islands, all of whose inhabitants might need to be evacuated after new quakes and nuclear power accidents. However, all the dry land of the planet is but islands in the World Ocean. Where shall people go, if the “peaceful” nuclear reactors start exploding?