The World - News from June 22, 1986

Soviet helicopters have been dumping water on the town of Pripyat and villages near the damaged Chernobyl nuclear reactor to keep windstorms from spreading radioactive dust into outlying farmland, the Communist Party newspaper Pravda reported. Soviet news reports also said that meteorological experts have been seeding clouds to induce rainfall before the clouds reach the contaminated area. Scientists fear that heavy rains could wash radioactive soil into the Pripyat River, which feeds the drinking-water supplies of Kiev.