Inside Chernobyl’s nuclear ghost town 50 years on

The nuclear ghost town built just two kilometres from the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant is marking its 50th anniversary.

Founded on the 4th of February 1970, Pripyat was entirely evacuated following the nuclear disaster of 1986.

The town is now empty and desolate and has become a haunting destination for tourists visiting the Chernobyl exclusion zone.

The former Soviet town was built from scratch, and many of its 50,000 residents worked at the nearby nuclear plant.

It is estimated that thousands of people lost their lives in the worst nuclear disaster the world has ever seen.

Following the explosion and meltdown, a concrete structure was hastily built over the reactor.

But by 1996 the original shelter had deteriorated visibly and it was impossible to repair.

Inside, radiation levels were estimated to be at 20 times more the lethal dose.

Take a closer look at the haunting site in the video above.