Chernobyl’s hero diver flees capital

ALEXEI ANANENKO, 62, was one of three men who volunteered to wade through radioactive water in May 1986 to prevent a second cataclysmic explosion at the stricken Chernobyl reactor.

The men were dubbed suicide divers because of the perilous mission, but Mr Ananenko said he was just doing his job.

Now in poor health after being hit by a car five years ago, he and his wife Valentina, 53, fled Kyiv yesterday for western Ukraine.

‘I have never been so offended by Russia, but now I realise that I cannot forgive this genocide of the Ukrainian people, this destruction of us as a people,’ Valentina said.

Speaking on the dangerous road out of Kyiv, she said: ‘Alexei and I have left to go to western Ukraine. I need to stay alive to care for him, and he must stay alive. I want to save my life so I can prolong his life. Without my care he will end up helpless in a nursing home or, in the worst case, homeless.’

The explosion on April 26, 1986, destroyed Reactor No. 4 at the nuclear plant, now in Ukraine but then part of the Soviet Union.