It’s difficult to overestimate or articulate just how cold it has been in Ukraine. They’re used to cold winters here, but the biting eastern wind has been particularly sharp this year. With almost every conventional power station hit or damaged by Russian strikes, the burden has fallen on the country’s small network of nuclear power stations to fill the void. Nuclear plants are secure, secretive places. So, I was fortunate to visit the Khmelnytskyi nuclear power plant, in Western Ukraine. 

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I spoke to Dariia, who was a technician at Zaporizhzhia. She recalls being very frightened when the Russians occupied the site. When some colleagues were taken for interrogation, says her husband Ihor, they decided it was time to leave. Ihor, an engineer at the plant, was the third person I’d spoken to who expressed concerns about reported Russian neglect and lack of maintenance at Zaporizhzhia.