A team of scientists from the U.K. and Ukraine just brewed the first bottle of artisanal spirits made of grain and water from Chernobyl's once-banned exclusion zone.
A steady stream of thrill-seekers have been drawn to the scene of one of the worst civilian disasters in the nuclear age, and soon they may be offered a chance to bring home a souvenir in the form of a bottle of Atomik Chernobyl vodka.
"Atomik vodka is no more radioactive than any liquor on the market," Jim Smith, professor of Environmental Science at the University of Portsmouth, told ABC News. Grain for the vodka was produced on a plot in Section 2, a wider part of the Exclusion Zone. The rye they grew tested positive for Strontium 90, a radioactive isotope, but all traces of contamination disappeared in the distillation process, when water and all diluting substances are completely removed, while fermented liquids are purified.
And just to be safer, Laptev and Smith said their vodka will be triple-distilled, like premium vodkas. "A lethal exposure of radiation ranges from 300 to 500 roentgens an hour," Laptev, who has worked on aftermath of Chernobyl explosion since 1986, said.
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