The tragic events at the Dyatlov Pass in 1959, which led to the death of a group of nine tourists, remain one of the most mysterious incidents in Russian history. Over the years, researchers have put forward many theories, and the case was partially declassified only in 1989. On the next anniversary of the campaign, we have collected the latest versions of the tragedy.
The group's winter campaign was dedicated to the XXI Congress of the CPSU - in about three weeks, the participants had to ski about 300 kilometers in the north of the Sverdlovsk region and climb two peaks of the Northern Urals: Otorten and Oyka-Chakur. The hike officially belonged to the highest category of difficulty.
Missing tourists
The group consisted of ten tourists-skiers from the tourist club of the Ural Polytechnic Institute. The supervisor was a fifth-year student Igor Dyatlov. On January 23, tourists left Sverdlovsk by train and three days later reached the starting location - the village of Severny, but here one of the participants fell ill and came back.
After that, the tourists did not get in touch. When the skiers did not appear at the final point of the route - the village of Vizhay - at the planned time, the sports club of the institute became worried, on February 19, a rescue operation began with the participation of aviation and several groups of search engines. Also, the military joined the search for Dyatlov's group.
Experts immediately named the area from Mount Otorten to Oyka-Chakura as the most promising for searches - it was considered the most difficult and potentially dangerous. On February 26, the search engines found the abandoned tent of the group at the Kholatchakhl pass - and soon they began to find the bodies of tourists nearby.
The tent was examined - the slope facing the slope was cut in several places, and inside there were clothes, shoes, personal belongings of tourists. One of the tent poles was broken. Apparently, the group left the tent, cutting the exit with knives from the inside. After that, the skiers rushed down the slope - to the forest at the foot of the mountain.
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Footprints around the tent indicated that people, for some unknown reason, left the tent without outer clothing and even without shoes. The bodies of tourists began to be found one and a half kilometers from the tent - while some received terrible intravital injuries, while others had a mysterious orange-red skin color.
The examination also revealed that the clothes of the deceased contain applied radioactive substances with beta radiation. The finds raised many questions - the search engines did not understand what made people hurriedly leave the tent without clothes and shoes, as well as how they could get terrible injuries on almost flat terrain.
Official investigation
The search engines immediately suggested that the tourists were driven out of the tent by an avalanche that descended from the slope. However, in the photos taken by the first search expedition, no traces of snow melting are visible around the tent. In addition, the very slope of the mountain in this place is rather gentle, so the avalanche convergence was recognized by experts as unlikely.
Initially, the investigation considered the version of the attack and murder of tourists by representatives of the indigenous people of the northern Urals, Mansi. The Mansi from the clans of Anyamovs, Bakhtiyarovs and Kurikovs fell under suspicion, since Mount Kholatchakhl was considered sacred by them. Mansi beliefs were forbidden to climb the top of the mountain. Moreover, there was an ancient prayer house nearby.
However, interrogations of the Mansi showed that in early February their birth was far from the scene. In addition, a forensic study found that the cause of death of tourists was freezing. Therefore, soon all suspicions were removed from the Mansi. However, the Mansi said that in early February they saw a strange "fireball" at night.
It is noteworthy that the tourists carried with them a significant amount of photographic equipment, which is not typical for a hike of the highest category of complexity. At the same time, out of ten photographic films, only four survived - on one of them, the researchers found a trail of technogenic impact in the form of a luminous ball.
Participants in the hike south of Mount Otorten later said that in early February they observed an extremely bright glow in the sky. "The glow was constantly strong, that one of the groups, being already in the tent and getting ready to sleep, were alarmed by this glow, left the tent and observed this phenomenon," the investigation notes.
In the Mansi legends, it is stated that during the time of the worldwide flood, nine hunters perished on the mountain, who perished "in an eerie radiance." The name Holatchahl is translated as "Mountain of the Dead". However, all these ominous details can only be coincidences that have nothing to do with the death of Dyatlov's group.
What kind of fireball could tourists see? One of the theories is UFOs. But there are also more rational versions. Over the uninhabited areas of the northern Urals, spent stages of R-7 ballistic missiles with remnants of liquid fuel, which were launched from the Tyuratam test site, fell. However, whether such a burning rocket stage could have scared the group remains unclear.
New versions of the tragedy
The investigation was powerless to establish the details of the emergency. The decision stated that given the absence of signs of struggle and the presence of all the group's values, as well as the conclusion of the forensic medical examination, "it should be considered that the cause of the death of tourists was a spontaneous force, which the tourists were not able to overcome."
Today, there are nine main versions of the tragedy, which were developed by researchers. Officially, the avalanche led to the tragedy. Other theories include the destruction of a group by the military, exposure to infrasound, death at the hands of the Mansi, a quarrel between tourists, an attack by escaped prisoners, a weapon test, a UFO impact, or a "controlled delivery" of radioactive materials.
One of the most recent theories, which began to be discussed in 2017, is the version of a sudden movement of the snow-ice layer, which could have been caused by several reasons at once. So, expert Yuri Antipov believes that the tragedy occurred due to improper installation of the tent on the slope, which led to the vile one of the stands.
“The Alpenstock, stuck in the snow just before the tourists spent the night, changed its position relative to the tent. And the squeezing of the tent, like a press, by a moving layer of snow with an ice crust, forced the tourists to urgently get out of the tent, cutting it open,”Antipov said.
Researcher Vladimir Garmatyuk also believes that the reason for the sudden exit from the tent was the movement of the ice layer. The expert is sure that the crust arose due to the use of the stove in the tent by tourists, which greatly heated the surrounding snow. In this case, the descent of the layer could cause a person to leave the tent or the explosive effect of a "fireball".
One of the last photographs of tourists shows how they set up a tent - skiers dig deep snow to the ground, standing up to their chests in a kind of "trench", and a strong wind blows snow back into the pit. Thus, the tent was practically dug into the snow slope, and the stove melted its edges, turning it into deadly ice.
Most likely, on the night of February 2, the layer shifted and the tent received a strong ice blow. Frightened people mistook him for an avalanche and hurried to leave the place of emergency, cut open the tent in panic and rushed to the forest, hoping to make a strong fire there. However, due to severe frost and without part of the equipment, people quickly lost their strength and died in a few hours.