Fallout

On the evening of April 26, 1986, the weather in Luxembourg was warm and sunny. I was sat on the terrace of the Hotel Résidence in Larochette, staring up at the castle, which towers above the pretty little town on a spectacular rock outcrop.

The hotelier, a charming man of Dutch origin named Visser, was treating me to one of the many bottles of excellent Luxembourgish wine we consumed that evening. The reason for his largesse and our conspicuous consumption was an event then taking place 1,250 miles to the east.

We were toasting each other fatalistically as fallout from the world's worst nuclear disaster at the Chernobyl power station in the Ukraine, then part of the Soviet Union, rained down invisibly around us, having been carried on winds high up in the atmosphere.

Unknown to us, 600 miles to our west, an unusual combination of meteorological conditions were ensuring that a very high concentration of the same radioactive material was being deposited on North Wales.

I was reminded of all of this recently when I read an interview with Gruff Rhys of the Super Furry Animals who hails from Bethesda, a small mining town in the Ogwen Valley in North Wales. Gruff drew attention to the fact that, even after two decades, the fallout is still with us.

For more than 20 years, farmers in much of North Wales have had to work with restrictions imposed in the immediate aftermath of Chernobyl. Even today, sheep are regularly and thoroughly checked for radiation levels and they have to be clearly marked with red paint when they're moved.

Yet little interest has been shown in the welfare of the human population who exhibit higher than average rates of breast cancer, and male and female rectal cancer.

Some experts link this to Chernobyl and some to the redundant Trawsfynydd nuclear power plant, which closed in 1993. Concerns have been expressed about the level of radioactivity in the Trawsfynydd reservoir, which was used as a coolant before the station shut down.

The local health board believes the above-average rates of cancer are more likely to be linked to social deprivation and unhealthy lifestyles. They say they are concerned about smoking and alcohol abuse among the local population. Yet government statistics show that the rate of lung cancer in the area is actually lower than elsewhere in Wales.

You've read the rant, now buy the T shirt. The Bethesda piece (see Bethesda), a T-shirt that glows in the dark, is a bit of a ham-fisted attempt to draw some attention to this appalling issue. Although I find more reasons to be optimistic than pessimistic in Wales nowadays, you don't have to look too hard to find something to protest about.