The rising waters came as a relief at first, for both the tiny community living on the islands in the southern Kakhovka Reservoir and for everyone who had feared the low levels risked a meltdown at the nearby Russian-occupied nuclear power plant.Since mid-February, the water level in the reservoir has steadily increased, according to data from Theia, a French geospatial analytical organisation. An Associated Press analysis of satellite imagery showed the water has now risen so high that it is washing over the top of the damaged Russian-occupied dam downstream.
The waves first covered the natural shoreline, and then submerged the marsh grasses. Next, they came for Lyudmila Kulachok’s garden, then Ihor Medyunov’s guest room. The wild boars fled for higher ground, replaced by waterfowl. Medyunov’s four dogs have an ever-smaller patch of grass to roam, and Kulachok serves meals on a picnic table sloshing through the murk in waders.
Ukraine controls five of the six dams along the Dnipro River, which runs from its northern border with Belarus down to the Black Sea and is crucial for the entire country’s drinking water and power supply. The last dam, the one furthest downstream in the Kherson region, is controlled by Russian forces.
Flooded houses on an island at the …
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