Dyatlov's Pass

Whilst making my coffee at work the other morning, I started talking to a colleague about urban legends and the unexplained, and she revealed that she is a Fortean Times subscriber. (Which had me wondering why I cancelled my subscription? I still love that magazine.) She told me to look up the ‘Dyatlov’s Pass Incident’, which had been featured in a recent issue. Thank you, Heather! You have reignited my Fortean flame!

In January 1959, a group of Russian cross-country skiers set out on a trek to a mountain named Ortorten, in the northern Urals. Eight men and two women, they were all students or recent graduates of Ural Polytechnic University, and they were led by Igor Dyatlov.

They were all experienced in mountain expeditions, and were confident despite the hazardous terrain that was before them. They set off around January 25th, and up until February 1st their trip was going smoothly, despite one member having to turn back due to illness.
On February 1st, snowstorms made them lose their bearing, and the group found themselves heading in an unplanned direction. A decision was made to set up camp on the slope of ‘Kholat Syakhl’ (Which translates to ‘Mountain of the Dead’ in the local Mansi language), and wait for the weather to pass.
As with all mountain/wilderness expeditions, it had been agreed that Dyatlov would contact his sports club on their return from Ortorten, by 12th of February. After not hearing from anyone on the expedition, and after demands from the families, a search and rescue team were sent out on the 20th of February.
What they found still hasn’t been explained...

When they reached the camp on Kholat Syakhl, the first thing they saw was that the tents appeared to have been ripped open from the inside. All the students belongings and shoes remained inside the tent. A trail of footprints led towards some woods, but after 500m were covered with snow. Inside the woods, the first two bodies were found under a pine tree, dressed only in their underwear and stretched out by the remains of a dead fire. Branches of the pine tree were broken to a height of 5 metres, suggesting one of the skiers had climbed up it to look for something. Between this tree and the camp, 3 other bodies were found, all who had died in poses seeming like they were attempting to make it back to camp. It took the team 2 months to find the remaining four corpses, which were eventually discovered under 4ft of snow at the bottom of a ravine.

Initial medical examinations on the first five bodies concluded that as there were no injuries, they had all died of hypothermia. However, examinations on the four bodies found in the ravine changed a simple explanation into something nobody could clarify. One of the skiers had suffered sever head trauma, his skull seemingly crushed from within. Two others had massive chest fractures, which could only be caused by immense pressure. The final body, one of the women, was missing her tongue, which appeared to have been cleanly and neatly removed.

Suggestions of attacks by indigenous people or animals were disregarded, as despite massive internal injuries, there was no soft tissue damage. Yet despite many unanswered questions, the case was closed, the files classified, and all walkers/skiers were banned from the area for the next three years.

People still tried to solve the mystery – theories ranging from the team stumbling across a group of escaped convicts, to being attacked by the abominable snowman, or by subterranean Russian mountain gnomes...

In 1990, the files were declassified and reopened, but only served to deepen the mystery. Medical tests had shown high levels of radiation on the bodies and clothes of four of the skiers. One of the rescue team had taken a Geiger counter with him and it started to click rapidly on his approach to the slope where the skiers had died. There were testimonies from another group of hikers, who had been camping 30 miles south, that they had seen bright orange flying spheres in the sky. The level of secrecy over the whole incident points towards the possibility they stumbled across a secret military testing ground, and were killed by some yet to be made public radioactive weapon. Perhaps they were killed by military personnel so they could not be witnesses to what they had seen. Or maybe they were just killed by an avalanche – although that would not explain the radiation, or how they managed to travel so far from their tents.

All in all, a satisfyingly Fortean mystery, that makes me think of ‘The Thing’ and ‘The Mountains of Madness’ in equal measures. The area where they died has been renamed as 'Dyatlov's Pass'.
Yuri Yudin, the team member who had to go back due to illness, has stated "If I had a chance to ask God just one question, it would be, 'What really happened to my friends that night?'

The Memorial that now lies at Dyatlov's Pass.