CHELYABINSK [ Tcheliabinsk, Cheliabinsk, Tscheljabinsk, Czelabińsk]

Alternate names: Chelyabinsk and Челябинск [Rus], Tcheliabinsk, Cheliabinsk, Tscheljabinsk [Ger], Czelabińsk [Pol]. Chelyabinsk is a city in the NE corner of administrative center of Chelyabinsk Oblast,, just to the east of the Ural Mountains on the Miass River on the border of Europe and Asia. 55°10' N, 61°24' E ,930 miles E of Moscow.Population: 1,130,132;

• Słownik Geograficzny Królestwa Polskiego (1880-1902), I, p. 791: "Czelabińsk".
• Wikipedia [Apr 2014]
• nucelar pollution [Apr 2014] For 45 years prior to January 1992, the entire oblast was closed to foreigners. "In the late 1940's, about 80 kilometers north of the city of Chelyabinsk, an atomic weapons complex called "Mayak" was built. Its existence has only recently been acknowledged by Russian officials, though, in fact, the complex, bordered to the west by the Ural Mountains, and to the north by Siberia, was the goal of Gary Powers's surveillance flight in May of 1960. / The people of the area have suffered no less than three nuclear disasters: For over six years, the Mayak complex systematically dumped radioactive waste into the Techa River, the only source of water for the 24 villages which lined its banks.The four largest of those villages were never evacuated, and only recently have the authorities revealed to the population why they strung barbed wire along the banks of the river some 35 years ago.Russian doctors who study radiation sickness in the area estimate that those living along the Techa River received an average of four times more radiation than the Chernobyl victims. / In 1957, the area suffered its next calamity when the cooling system of a radioactive waste containment unit malfunctioned and exploded.The explosion spewed some 20 million curies of radioactivity into the atmosphere.About two million curies spread throughout the region, exposing 270,000 people to as much radiation as the Chernobyl victims.Less than half of one percent of these people were evacuated, and some of those only after years had passed. / The third disaster came ten years later.The Mayak complex had been using Lake Karachay as a dumping basin for its radioactive waste since 1951.In 1967, a drought reduced the water level of the lake, and gale-force winds spread the radioactive dust throughout twenty-five thousand square kilometers, further irradiating 436,000 people with five million curies, approximately the same as at Hiroshima."
• Chabad. [Apr 2014]
• "Chelyabinsk: Jewish Community hit by meteor. 15.02.2013, "We heard a huge blast, everybody started running, there was panic," said Rabbi Meir Kirsch, the FJC's representative in Chelyabinsk, Russia. "Many glass windows in the Synagogue exploded; we ran outside and were told it's a meteor from space."
  The blast that occurred early this morning happened while the Jewish community was gathered in the Synagogue for the morning services. One of the members, who ran outside immediately, discovered when he came back that his seat had been hit and damaged by a very large shard of sharp glass. "I could have been there, it's a true miracle" he said. The Synagogue's beautifully designed windows and some of the furniture were severely damaged and are in urgent need of repair in order to block the freezing wind and snow blowing in and disturbing the community's ongoing activities."   FJC.ru