Newry man's plea to be reunited with the child he sheltered from Chernobyl's fallout
AS the 40th anniversary of the Chernobyl meltdown fast approaches a Newry man has made a heartfelt appeal to be reunited with one of the children whom he sheltered from the disaster’s fallout.
AS the 40th anniversary of the Chernobyl meltdown fast approaches a Newry man has made a heartfelt appeal to be reunited with one of the children whom he sheltered from the disaster’s fallout.
Collie McGuigan, who has devoted his life to helping those most impacted by the disaster through his work with Chernobyl Aid Newry, made the appeal to be reunited with Belarusian native Alisia Suko.
Hailing from the city of Mazyr Alisia was amongst the first entourage of children to be facilitated by host families in the UK and Ireland in the aftermath of the 1986 nuclear meltdown which devastated the lives of countless millions for years afterwards.
Given the fact that Alisia’s home city was situated a mere 30km from the site of the disaster being afforded a chance to come to Ireland to avail of a radioactive free environment was an opportunity that Collie ensured the young Belarusian girl availed of for several consecutive summers in a row.
Whilst Mr McGuigan cherished every moment he and his family had with Alisia, who in turn savoured with every ounce the hospitality afforded to her by the McGuigan’s, the most lamentable part of every trip was having to bid their surrogate daughter adieu at the end of each summer.
However so strong was the bond that Collie and his family formed with Alisia that after several years of hosting her in 1997 Mr McGuigan resolved himself to travel to Belarus to try and find the child whom he loved like his own daughter.
Alas in a cruel twist of fate the trail of Alisia went cold after Collie was given an address to visit in the country in which she was not present.
Now with almost 30 years having elapsed since he last saw the girl whom he sheltered from the fallout of Chernobyl Mr McGuigan has stated that he would love to meet Alisia once more and that he still “thinks about her to this day”
30 years of yearning
“I would love to meet her again,” said Collie. “
“ I still think about her to this day but no one seems to know.
“It was in 1997, that was the last time I saw her. I knew she came from Mazyr. I went out to Belarus when I was working and I was not working too far away from Mazyr. I went up to try and find her but I couldn't.
“We were working down in a place not that far from Mazyr and it is only around 30km from the Chernobyl plant itself.
“I went up into Mazyr to look for her and I went up to a school and met one or two of the teachers there. They gave me the name and address of where she was but when we went to that address there was no sign of them. This is where the trail went cold. No one seemed to have known anything about where they went to. They just seem to have disappeared. I tried an interpreter to see if she could find something but nothing.”
Fond Memories
Although almost 30 years have elapsed since he last parted ways with Alisia, Collie can recall the many long summers which the Belarusian native spent with he and his family throughout the early to mid 90’s
As Mr McGuigan explains whilst growing up in an environment contaminated with the after effects of the worst nuclear disaster humanity has ever known would be a distressing ordeal for any child, even more distressing was having to return to this environment after being given the insight into the lifestyle every child has the right to by a family as charitable and altruistic as Collie’s
“We started bringing the children over first before we started going out.” explained Collie
“We were taking the children from around 1995 to 1996 over here. They were all from schools in Belarus.
“There was a Chernobyl group that started and they were looking for host families at the time. It was a crowd that was sent up in Newry it was called Friends of The Children of Chernobyl. There was a Belarussian school teacher in Warrenpoint. This is how it began. She contacted school 10 as each school had a number. There was school 10 in Mazyr in Belarus and this is where it all started with the taking the children over.
“They had an advert in the paper, looking for host families. This is how we got involved. I kept seeing it in the news and I wanted to do anything I could to help.
“There were different children given out to different families. I had a wee girl called Alisia Suko. She came from the city of Mazyr
“Where Alisia came from it was a rough city. Mazry was only about 30km from the Chernobyl Plant. It was a rough city, even the dogs went around in packs.
“When she was first in with me first she was maybe eight or nine and then I took her for maybe three or four years after this. We had her for about two months at a time over the summer.
“The general purpose was taking them over here and giving them a good standard of living
“They reckon that with the radiation that was in the air for every day or week that they were here with the good air it prolonged their life by an extra month or two months.
“It was a complete new world for them, they had literally nothing. It took her a while to settle in. When she settled in she was quite good and she was picking up the English and it ended up that she could speak English very well.
“Alisia hung around with my own daughter, she went with them and was like a normal child. She did everything that she did and if we were going anywhere, say out for spins we took her with us. She just slotted into the family. We got her dentist treatment and her eyesight checked, they would not get that over there.
“I took here over the first year then if you wanted the same child back you had to pay for her. For another couple of years I paid to take her back because she knew the family instead of bringing another child in and going through the same process.
“Then we got to the stage where she didn't want to go back and she would hide on us when it came time to go back. It wasn't fair on her and it became a serious issue with me.
”The child was screeching and I had to put her on a bus, it wasn't fair on her and it wasn't fair on us. She didn't want to go and we didn't want to let her go but we just had no option. It wasn't fair, the child screeching "don't send me back" and you having to do this, it would get to anyone.
“It was September of 1996 when I last saw her. I went out to Belarus and I went to Mazyr to try and find her but I could not. Around 96 would have been the last time I had contact with her. I got our interpreter to see if she could find her for me but we had no success.”