The outer shell that was struck is a protective cover built in 2016 over a heavy concrete containment structure. Soon after the 1986 disaster, the inner layer (in which there was no indication of a breach on Friday morning), was placed on the plant’s fourth reactor. The containment shells seek to prevent radiation leaks.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said a Russian drone struck the protective covering of the nuclear reactor that exploded at Chernobyl in 1986.

The structure that covers the old sarcophagus which confines the remains of the damaged fourth reactor of the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant, bears an impact of what the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy says was a Russian drone strike,

A Russian drone attack has hit the radiation shelter over the damaged reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said. The overnight strike hit the shelter of the plant's destroyed former fourth power unit,

A Russian attack drone carrying what Ukraine described as “a high-explosive warhead” has struck the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, piercing the protective structure over Reactor 4 — the site of the 1986 disaster.

Ukraine accused Russia's military of flying an exploding drone into the Chernobyl nuclear plant. The drone damaged the outer shell of the reactor, but it does not appear to have caused a radiation leak.