It would be tough to have missed the news that this week is the 20th anniversary of the disaster at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. Nearly every major media outlet in the world has run some kind of story looking back at the accident and the devastation it caused in Ukraine, Belarus, Russia, and beyond. Members of the Ukrainian-American community wrote in to tell us they will be holding a candlelight vigil tonight at 7 p.m. at the usual Ukrainian-American rally point, the Taras Shevchenko Monument at 22nd and P NW. People interested in joining the vigil to remember victims of the accident are encouraged to attend, and are asked to bring candles.

You may have also heard that tourists can now visit Chernobyl and Pripyat, the abandoned city adjacent to the nuclear power plant in Ukraine. The photo collage above was assembled from snapshots taken by a friend of DCist, Christina Redko, who recently toured the ruins of Chernobyl. Clockwise from top left, the photos are a basketball melted by the heat of the raging fires that accompanied the accident left deflated and abandoned outside an apartment building in Pripyat, a sign at the power plant, the red button that was responsible for it all, and the ruins of the Pripyat ferris wheel.