Chernobyl

American  

[chur-noh-buhl, chyir-naw-bil] / tʃɜrˈnoʊ bəl, tʃyɪrˈnɔ bɪl /

noun

1. a city in northern Ukraine, 80 miles (129 km) northwest of Kyiv: nuclear-plant accident 1986.

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Chernobyl British  

/ -ˈnɒbəl, tʃɜːˈnəʊbəl /

noun

1. a town in N Ukraine; site of a nuclear power station accident in 1986

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Chernobyl Cultural  

1. A place in Ukraine where a nuclear power plant — a generator powered by a nuclear reactor — underwent a meltdown in 1986. A cloud of radioactive gases spread throughout the region of Chernobyl and to foreign countries as well. Forty thousand people living nearby were evacuated. Dozens of deaths and hundreds of illnesses were reported to have been caused by the accident. (Compare Three Mile Island (see also Three Mile Island).)

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Compare meaning

How does chernobyl compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

• Chernobyl vs. Three Mile Island

Example Sentences

Reactor number four at the Chernobyl power plant – in what is now northern Ukraine - had exploded, spewing out radioactive material that would spread across swathes of Europe.

From BBC • Apr. 18, 2026

There’s a scene from the Salomon Brothers trading floor in “Liar’s Poker” when author Michael Lewis’s phone rang minutes after news broke of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 5, 2026

It had already been quite a year: the doomed Challenger space shuttle had exploded months earlier, and the disaster at Chernobyl was on everyone’s minds.

From Slate • Feb. 2, 2026

On 26 April 1986 a reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear plant in northern Ukraine exploded after a test went wrong.

From BBC • Jan. 23, 2026

The contamination had reached far beyond the area surrounding the Chernobyl reactor; radioactive isotopes had also spread across Europe.

From "Meltdown" by Deirdre Langeland