The Dyatlov Pass Incident – The Tent

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Part 1.

The Tent

In 1959, a group of hikers died in mysterious circumstances on the slopes of a then unnamed mountain.

Now, one of the most famous mysteries of the 20th century, are we any closer to understanding what happened on that cold February night all those years ago?

In the first of our three-part series, we introduce you to the people involved and recount their movements during the time leading up to their untimely deaths.

The sun was already beginning to set over the western rise as Boris and Mikhail crested the hill.

A combination of exhaustion and the biting cold of the late Russian winter had slowed their progress to a crawl, but it had not dampened their determination.

As they plodded through the deep snow, they still had only one thing on their minds, ⁇ finding their missing friends.

The search party was far larger than just the two men of course.

There were over 50 in all, mainly pupils of the Ural Polytechnical Institute in Jekaterinburg, a town some 550 miles to the south.

It was from the institute that nine individuals, most of them other students, had set out on a 200-mile hike towards Mount Atorton some four weeks earlier.

The leader of the group, 23-year-old Igor Dyatlov, had been an associate of Boris's, and he knew very well of the telegram Igor had planned to send to the University Sports Club upon returning to the village of Vizyai.

Still,

even when that telegram failed to arrive, it hadn't raised much concern.

After all,

navigating the Ural Mountains in January was no easy feat.

Delays were not only commonplace but expected.

But as the days turned into weeks, the loved ones of the nine missing hikers began to demand action.

In response, the head of the institute organised several groups of volunteers to follow Dyatlov's trail and attempt to locate them.

After several days without so much as a trace, Boris learned that both the army and the militia had joined the effort.

Whether Dyatlov and his companions were holed up in a canyon somewhere or resting in a nearby village, it would only be a matter of time before somebody found them.

Unfortunately, the dying light meant that Boris and Mikhail would soon have to call it a day.

In February, This part of Siberia averages minus 10 Celsius during the day, but can reach minus 25 once night falls.

What's more, neither of the men relished the idea of finding their way back to camp in the dark.

The Urals are beautiful and serene in a desolate sort of way.

However, the harsh weather and terrain make the region one of Mother Nature's most unforgiving domains.

Boris could only hope that she had been kind to their friends.

As they made their way back towards their base camp, the two men could see the rising slopes of Holot Siakal ahead of them.

To hikers, it was simply known as Hype 1079,

but the local Mansi translation is somewhat more ominous.

To them, it was Dead Mountain, a reference to the fact that nothing ever grew on its slopes.

That evening, Holot Siakal was more than living up to its name.

It had been snowing on and off for weeks, so the vision that greeted the two men was that of an immense, perfectly smooth hillock, blanketed in pure white.

As Boris stared at the slopes, something suddenly caught his attention.

In the midst of all that brilliant white, he could just barely make out a singular dark spot about halfway up the side of the mountain.

Blinking the snow out of his eyes, he realised that what he was seeing was not a trick of the light, nor was it a piece of nature.

What he was seeing was distinctly man-made.

Racing against the setting sun, he and Mikhail set off up the thousandmetre hill.

Even moving fast, The deep snow meant it took them almost 30 minutes to reach the spot.

Still,

as they got closer, Boris could clearly make out the vague outline of a large tent.

It was unquestionably from Dyatlov's group, as Boris had personally helped sew the 8-meter tent together several years earlier, using two smaller shelters.

As they frantically began digging it out of the snow, Boris and Mikhail quickly realised that the tent was empty.

At least insofar as that Dyatlov and his companions weren't inside.

Because apart from a large hole in the side canvas, everything else was in order.

The sides of the tent had been insulated with jackets and empty backpacks, ski boots were lined up neatly near the entrance, and padded coats and blankets lined the floor.

At the far end they found personal items carefully stowed away alongside a wood axe.

The two rescuers breathed a sigh of relief.

On the one hand, they hadn't found their comrades.

On the other, they hadn't found them dead.

Nevertheless, Boris and Mikhail simply could not shake the feeling that something about the scene before them seemed a little strange.

Just a few short hours later, as they began to pull their friends' mutilated bodies from the snow, they would learn that Strange does not even begin to describe it.

The mystery of Dyatlov Pass, as the area would come to be known, is one of the most famous unsolved cases in history.

In the days after Mikhail and Boris's unsettling discovery, what began as a rescue operation would turn into a seven-decade hunt for the truth.

In that time, hundreds of theories would be proposed, debunked and reconsidered.

Since the incident, the government of Russia has changed dramatically, yet clearly not enough to provide answers as to just what happened to the nine hikers who suffered such a cruel and mysterious fate.

In fact, as far as Russian officials are concerned, the case is closed.

However, numerous books, podcasts and websites continue to challenge the official story, pointing out that the government's narrative simply does not fit the facts.

The only way to understand why is to revisit those facts in order, one last time.

Who knows?

Perhaps this retelling will be the one that finally reveals what could have possibly killed the Russian hikers before seemingly disappearing without a trace.

Here is their story from the very beginning.

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In January of 1959, a group of students from the Ural Polytechnical Institute, along with one older former military companion, set out to hike across the Siberian wilderness.

There were 10 of them in total, and they were all experienced hikers.

In fact, they had all been rated at least Grade 2 by the Institute itself.

The aim of the journey was to reach Gora O'Torten, a mountain in the northern Urals.

Of course, the backpackers were well aware that making a 200-mile hike in the dead of the Siberian winter would not be easy.

That was just the point.

In accomplishing the trek, the students were hoping to achieve their Grade 3 certification, the most prestigious hiking qualification in the country at that time.

However, Grade 3 demanded that the hike meet a range of difficult criteria.

They needed to cover at least 186 miles of ground, a third of which had to be in challenging terrain.

Moreover, the minimum duration of the trip had to be 16 days, with no fewer than 8 of those days spent in uninhabited regions.

At least 6 nights had to be spent in a tent.

Whilst it was an immensely difficult task, achieving Grade 3 would mean that each member of the group would be able to teach their craft as masters of sports, a distinction they were all desperate to attain.

The venture was led by Igor Dyatlov, an accomplished radio engineer who many regarded as a natural-born leader.

Though only in his early 20s, Dyatlov was well respected by both his peers and his professors.

In fact, his hikes had earned quite a reputation amongst the outdoor enthusiasts at the Polytechnic Institute to the point it it was considered a high honour to be invited to come along.

And so, there was a distinct mixture of excitement and determination in the air as the ten companions stood on the platform at Sverdlovsk train station, stooped under the weight of their packs.

There were eight men and just two women, each of whom had followed a very distinct path in order to end up at Sverdlovsk that day.

21-year-old Yuri Doroshenko was a natural outdoorsman.

Tall and well-built, he was often described as both impulsive and brave in the same breath.

A fourth-year student of radio engineering, he was already famous amongst the Polytechnic Institute's hiking club, having once chased away a bear with nothing but a geologist's hammer on a previous hike.

Until somewhat recently, Yuri had been romantically involved with one of the other members of the group, Xena, but they had since broken up.

Despite reports that the split was amicable, his potential jealousy over Zena's rumoured relationship with Igor Dyatlov is often cited as one of the possible catalysts for the incident that befell the party.

23-year-old Georgi Krivonoshenko was known as the group's joker and storyteller.

and most of his companions considered him a dear friend.

He studied construction and hydraulics whilst at the university, having graduated in 1957.

That same year, he had had a strange experience that many researchers point to as an explanation for some of the more bizarre circumstances of the case.

He had been assigned to work cleanup on a secret nuclear facility which had suffered an incident that eventually became known as the Kishtim disaster.

Thousands of people had been evacuated following the event, during which many, many, including Krivonoshenko, were potentially exposed to at least moderate levels of radiation.

A musician, Gyogi was often referred to as the life of the party.

In fact, one story from the Otorton Trek tells of him nearly getting arrested for singing whilst trying to have a bit of fun with Liuda, the outing's other female hiker.

At 23,

Igor Diatlov was not the eldest, but his brilliance and experience meant not a single member of the hike doubted his ability to lead.

Thanks to his engineering prowess he had constructed a radio and a small stove that he would often bring along on hikes.

Known for being in great physical shape, he often hiked with Yuri Doroshenko's ex-girlfriend Zina.

This led many to assume the two had a romantic relationship.

Though this has understandably been difficult to confirm, Dyatlov was later found with a photo of her in his belongings.

As for Zina herself, her full name was Zeneda Kolmogorova and she was just 22.

Warm, outgoing and attractive, many of her male companions and fellow students admitted to having a crush on her at one point or another.

However, she was not just a pretty face tagging along with the boys.

Zina was a fifth year radio engineering major who had been on at least eight major hikes.

On one occasion, she had been bitten by a snake, yet still refused to lighten her load.

From her diaries, it was later learned that both of her parents were disabled, forcing her to become fiercely independent and mature at a young age.

As a result,

She was not the type of person to let the group suffer for her comfort.

Doroshenko, Krivonoshenko, Dyatlov and Kolmogorova were the first four bodies to be pulled out of the snow roughly a month after setting out on their trek.

Yet as they stood there on the platform of Sverdlov's train station, they could not have been more overjoyed at the trip that lay ahead of them.

Young, adventurous and experienced, they had no way of knowing that they would die terrible, painful deaths in just a matter of days.

23-year-old Rushtem Slobodin was the group's second musician.

The son of affluent university professors, he had already earned a degree in mechanical engineering.

Athletic, quiet, and honest, Rushtem had once hiked more than 186 miles across the sparsely populated western Tien Shan at the behest of his father.

During this expedition, he would come into contact with a wide variety of Kyrgyz, Uyghurs, Uzbeks and Dungans, ethnic minorities who often had an area kind word for the light-skinned Russians.

It's unclear how the interactions with these peoples affected him, but his trip to Otorton would require him to collaborate with another remote tribe, the Mansi.

The elder of the group was 38-year-old Semyon Zolotoriov, the only hiker to already possess his Class 3 certification.

Aside from being an experienced outdoorsman, Zolotoriov was also a veteran, having been deployed to the Russian front during World War II.

To say he was a hard man was something of an understatement.

Estimates suggest that around 8.7 to 11 million Soviet soldiers died during the conflict, both in combat and from other causes such as disease, starvation and the harsh conditions of captivity.

Though he was relatively unknown to the rest of the expedition, Semyon's easy manner had allowed his companions to warm up to him quickly.

After his body was discovered, much would be made of Zolotoriov's tattoos and gold tooth, which some say could have been a sign he was more nefarious than originally thought.

However, It's important to note that most of the tattoos consisted of simply dates and names, and that tattooing, though rare in civilian culture, had been common amongst soldiers.

The young woman with whom Georgi Krivonoshenko had nearly been arrested for singing at the start of the trip was named Lyudmila Dubanina.

At just 20, she was the youngest member of the party.

Growing up on the Soviet island of Arkhangelsk, Lyudmila was no stranger to the outdoors.

She was also a natural athlete, having taken part in short-distance running competitions for most of her life.

A fourth-year engineering and economics major, Liyuda had considerable hiking experience.

She had even been shot in the leg during one of the treks when a hunter mistook her and her companions for prey.

According to her friends, Had Igor Dyatlov not led the trek, Liudmila could have easily done the job.

Devotees of the Dyatlov Pass incident will be aware that no conversation about Liudmila Dubanina would be complete without mentioning the premonitions she reportedly had about her death.

Indeed, her diaries mention that her psychological condition had been deteriorating in the days leading up to the tragic events.

In one entry following the group's stay in the village of V.

Shai, Dubanina used expressions like evil as hell and mood is bad to describe herself, saying that she had started isolating herself from her companions.

By the 28th of January, she ceased writing in her diary altogether.

Many simply chalk this up to the rough conditions the hikers encountered during their stay in a supposed hotel in the town, yet others are adamant that Liudmiller somehow knew that she was in danger.

Nevertheless, all the time Liyudmila and Zolotoriov have spent under the microscope pales in comparison to the analysis done on 24-year-old Alexander Kalevatov.

A native of Sverdlovsk, he had come from a rather well-off family until the day his father had been found dead under suspicious circumstances.

Despite his newfound poverty, Alexander scraped by and went to college where he managed to get a position at a secret institute known as the Ministry of Media Machine Building in Moscow.

Between his scholarship and salary, he was making more than twice the average Russian and living in one of the capital's most expensive neighbourhoods.

Given that he was never more than an average student, many see his success as being more than a little suspicious.

Then there was 23-year-old Nikolai T.

Bu Bryn Yul.

Well read and with a great sense of humor, few if any of his fellow hikers were aware of his past which included a father in prison and a brother who had been killed in the Battle of Kursk.

All they really knew about him was that he was a gifted student and that he loved to hike, having gone on at least five major treks in his time at university.

The final member of the group was 21 year old Yuri Yudin.

Of the ten people standing on the platform that day, Yudin is the person about whom we know the most.

This is owing to one rather glaring fact.

He survived.

At the time, Yuri was just another student at the Urals Polytechnic Institute.

After the hike, however, he would be racked with survivors' guilt for decades.

Not only because he had fallen ill and had to remain behind before the deadly event that befell his comrades, but because he would forever claim that what caused their death was no mere accident.

All his life Yuri would swear that his companions died due to something far more sinister.

But whilst he would never recognise it, Yuri Yudin was actually the hero of this story.

It is thanks to him that we have a detailed account of the hikers' movements up until the 28th of January.

Everything after that point has had to be painstakingly pieced together from journal entries and photographs taken by the group.

What follows is the most accurate and comprehensive account of what happened.

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On the evening of January the 23rd, the party caught the 9.05pm train from Sverdlovsk, which would take them over 200 miles north to Sarov.

The journey was roughly 11 hours long and would see them arriving at their destination at 7.39am the next morning.

Whilst in Serov, they caught up on some much needed sleep and then spent the afternoon entertaining the children of a local school.

In the evening they boarded another train which would take them 100 miles further north to Ivdel, arriving there at around midnight.

This left them with a six hour wait before they caught a 6am bus out to Vizyai on the 25th.

Given the fact that they were about to spend so much time in the wilderness, many of Dyatlov's team were excited to stay that night in the hotel.

However,

as detailed in Liudmila's diary, the hotel was far from luxurious.

Some researchers have even suggested that the group was put in the hotel against their will, as indicated by her use of the words, we were taken, rather than simply, we went to the hotel.

The hiker's shared log is also disparaging, describing the place as a so-called hotel and noting that they had to sleep two to a bed, with some even opting to sleep on the floor.

Whatever the circumstances, the party woke up the next morning none the worse for wear and in seemingly good spirits.

From Vijay,

the group travelled further north to an area known simply as Sector 41, where they would spend the evening.

At 4pm on the 27th, they hiked up the frozen Lozva River in the dead of night, arriving at an abandoned geological site in the early hours of the following day.

It was at this point that Yuri Yudin, hindered by radiculitis and other ongoing illnesses, was forced to turn back.

After saying their farewells, the rest of the team continued travelling north towards their objective.

Yudin would look over his shoulder one last time to see his friends skiing away in the opposite direction, his heart heavy with disappointment, oblivious to the quiet irony that his illnesses had just saved his life.

This was the last time he ever saw his friends alive.

However, he would not leave empty-handed.

At some point during their travels, Liudmila Dubanina Dubanina had given Yuri a small teddy bear.

Though some have suggested that the keepsake might have hinted at a deeper relationship between the two students, Yuri always denied this.

Nonetheless, he kept the teddy bear until his death, in 2013.

Up until this point, the journey had been relatively easy.

But on the 29th of January, the group's hike commenced proper.

After having travelled mostly by road and rail, it was now time for the hard work to begin as they made the rest of their way towards Atorton on foot.

They continued skiing north along the river into the late evening before setting up camp for the night.

On the 30th they began to head west, following the Ospia River, one of the Lozva's tributaries, all the way up to the base of Holot Siakul, or to them, Height 1079.

As they set up camp that night, they decided to also build a cache in which to store any excess supplies.

This would serve to lighten their loads in preparation for the ascent of a tortun.

Unfortunately, the 1st of February would see their progress slow to a crawl as harsh weather began to set in.

The low visibility would soon force the group to stray off course, and in the last hours of daylight they would find themselves halfway up the slopes of height 1079.

It's theorised that due to a combination of not wanting to lose the ground they had already covered and the fact that the daylight was fading fast Igor made the decision to set up camp here for the night.

It's also possible that he wanted to practice camping on a slope as an extra challenge for himself and the rest of the party.

In any case, it is known that the hikers were settled into their tent by around 5:30 pm.

They worked on a mock paper together, the Evening O'Torten.

It was a humorous report on the group's activities over the last few days and served as a team-building exercise.

Photographs taken whilst they were making camp clearly show that everyone seemed to be in high spirits.

But the good times would not last for long.

At some point that evening, something spooked the nine individuals so completely that they would apparently cut their way out of the tent and run out into the freezing cold night barefooted and in little more than their underwear.

All nine group members perished, most of them from hypothermia.

but some from horrifying and somewhat bizarre injuries which nobody has yet been able to satisfactorily explain.

The entire event is still steeped in mystery even after all this time,

and although a few theories have come close to presenting a plausible explanation of what exactly took place, none of them are without problems.

The Dyatlov Pass incident is quite literally a blank page from the moment the hikers curled up for sleep on the 1st of February.

The story doesn't resume until the 26th, when a student by the name of Mikhail Sharovin, accompanied by a close friend of Dyatlov's, Boris Slobtsov, discovered the abandoned tent on the gentle 30-degree incline slopes of Holotsiakol at an altitude of 800 meters.

It had collapsed and appeared to be badly damaged, with a large slit in the side canvas.

Most importantly, there was no sign whatsoever of the hikers.

For one more night, Mikhail and Boris were able to nurse nurse the idea that their friends were still out there somewhere, alive and possibly braving the cold in a snow cave or abandoned house.

They could not have known that the bodies of their friends were lying beneath the snow, lifeless and silent, not too far from their own camp.

It was only a matter of time before the full horror of the Dyatlov Pass incident would begin to unfold.

Join us tomorrow for part two

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