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22| dyatlov pass

in january 1959, nine soviet college students were killed under mysterious circumstances while hiking through the ural mountains in what is now known as the dyatlov pass incident.

on january 31st, 1959, 23 year old ski hiker igor alekseievich dyatlov (russian names are so hard to spell) and his team of eight experienced hikers set off from ural polytechnical institute on a journey to reach the peak of otorten mountain, a mountain in the northern urals. none of the hikers would ever be seen alive again.

from what was recovered from cameras and diaries found at the site of the deaths, investigators were able to piece together that on february 1st, the hiking team began to make their way through the then-unnamed pass leading to otorten.

as they pushed through the hostile, cold climate towards the base of the mountain, they were hit with snowstorms that ripped through the narrow pass. decreasing visibility caused the team to lose their sense of direction, and rather than move towards otorten, they accidentally deviated their course west and found themselves on the slope near the top of a nearby mountain. the mountain is called kholat syakhl, meaning "dead mountain" in the language of the indigenous mansi people of the region.

in order to not lose the altitude they had gained, or because the team wanted to practise camping on a mountain slope before their ascent of ortorten, dyatlov called for camp to be made there. it was on this solitary mountainside that all nine hikers would meet their end.

before he had embarked on this journey, dyatlov had told his sports club that he and his team would send them a telegram as soon as they returned from the hike. however, when january 26th rolled around and there was no communication from the hikers a search party was mounted. after the volunteer force found the campsite, army and police investigators were sent in to determine what had happened to the students.

when they arrived on the mountain, investigators intended to find a simple scene. though these students were experienced hikers the route they were taking was difficult, and accidents on tricky mountain trails were not unheard of. however, what the investigators found would only raise more questions as to the nature of the events that killed these nine students, and would open up a mystery that continues to this day.

when they arrived at the camp, the first thing the investigators noticed was that the tent was cut open from the inside, and all of the team's belongings and most of their shoes were left there. they then discovered eight or nine sets of footprints from the team, many of them clearly made by people with either nothing, socks, or a single shoe on their feet. these tracks led to the edge of the nearby woods, almost a mile away from the camp.

at the forest's edge, under a large cedar, the investigators discovered the remains of a small fire that the hikers appeared to have built. around the fire were the first two bodies that they found - yuri krivonischenko, 23, and yuri doroshenko, 21. despite the temperatures of -13 to -22F/-25 to -30C, both men were found shoeless and only wearing underwear. they then found the next three bodies - dyatlov, zinaida kolmogorova, 24, and rustem slobodin, 23, who died on their way back to the camp from the cedar tree.

while these deaths were odd, they were far from inexplicable. all the students had clearly died of hypothermia, with no indication of severe external damage. it was not until the other four bodies were found two months later that the mystery deepened. they were found in a ravine 75 metres deeper into the woods than the cedar tree with significantly different causes of death.

three of the hikers had fatal injuries - nicolai thibeaux-brignolles, 23, who had significant skull damage and lyudmila dubinina, 20, and semyon zolotaryov, 38, had major chest fractures that could only have been caused by an immense force like a car crash. the most gruesome body was dubinina's, who was missing her tongue, eyes, part of her lips, facial tissue and part of her skull bone. alexander kolevatov, 24, in the same location but without the severe wounds.

there was evidence that the hikers used clothes of the others who had died first. dubinina's foot was wrapped in a piece of krivonishenko's woollen trousers and then zolotaryov was found in dubinina's faux fur coat and hat. these mysterious circumstances of the dyatlov pass incident begged for an explanation, and many were put forward. early on a lot of soviets suspected that the deaths were the result of an attack by the local mansi tribe. however the mansi people were largely peaceful, and there was no evidence of the type of attacks they used on the bodies.

the investigators of the incident also suspected early on that the hikers may have been killed by an avalanche, which would've accounted for the intense blunt force trauma on some of the bodies. however, it was highly unlikely that the experienced hikers would've made camp somewhere an avalanche could occur. also, when investigators found the bodies there was no evidence that an avalanche had occurred any time recently in the region, and no avalanches have been recorded at the site before or since.

other investigators began to test the theory that the deaths were the result of an argument among the group that had gotten out of hand, possibly related to a romantic encounter which may explain the lack of clothes. however people who knew the hikers said they were largely harmonious and they wouldn't have been able to cause the massive injuries on some of the bodies.

as the cause of death remained a mystery other, more out there, theories began to crop up. people began to say that the hikers were killed by a menk, a russian yeti, which would account for the immense force necessary to cause the injuries. reports of slight radiation on the bodies led to theories that the students had been killed by some secret, radioactive weapon. though the radiation was largely discounted as the cause of death because a radioactive weapon would've elevated radiation to much higher levels, it is possible that the hikers were unfortunate enough to encounter the testing of a ussr weapon.

this explanation would match with the testimony of another hiking group, who were camped out 50km from dyatlov's team. this group spoke of strange orange orbs floating in the sky moving towards kholat syakhl. the testimony was also backed up by reports from the weather service and the army. lev ivanov, the chief investigator of the incident, said "i suspected at the time and am almost sure now that these bright flying spheres had a direct connection to the group's death," when he was interviewed by a small kazakh newspaper in 1990.

however, censorship and secrecy in the ussr forced him to abandon this path of enquiry. in the end, the deaths of the students was officially attributed to "a compelling natural force" and the case was closed. as of now, what happened on that fateful night in kholat syakhl is still unknown, and these strange deaths continue to baffle and confuse investigators to this day. the pass that the incident took place in was named dyatlov pass in commemoration of this mysterious event.

what do you think happened? i think it was either aliens or a soviet weapons test. the aliens theory could explain the orange lights and why the government made ivanov close the case, because they didn't want the public to know aliens existed. however the weapons theory would explain the radiation and also why the government wanted ivanov to close the case.

how i think it went down - the nine were in the tent when they heard a loud noise and saw the orange lights. in a panic they cut open the tent from the inside, some of them forgetting to put shoes on in the rush. they all went to see what happened, but five stayed behind at the cedar tree while the rest carried on. the four made it to the ravine where a weapon from the ufo/soviet test landed right in the ravine. it directly hit three giving them the strange injuries while the other died after the impact. back at the cedar tree they had a fight - two wanted to wait for the others to come back while the other three wanted to go back to the tent. three went back but because they were so underdressed they died of hypothermia. despite the fire they made the other two succumbed to the cold soon after.

information from allthatsinteresting.com/dyatlov-pass-incident-photos