Thanks to Joseph sending me a link to a Mark Morford column, I just learned about the creepy Dyatlov Pass Incident. Ever heard of it? Here’s a summary: In February, 1959 nine experienced Russian mountaineers set off on a cross-country skiing expedition in the Ural mountains. When they failed to arrive to their destination, a search expedition was sent out and discovered their camp, abandoned. They had apparently built a camp for the night in an unplanned location due to inclement weather. Their tent had been cut open from the inside and their clothing and equipment was left behind.
The abandoned campsite. The tent had been cut open from the inside.
Eventually, they found two bodies, barefoot and in their underwear, in a forested area 1.5 kilometers downhill from the camp. There was evidence that the men had tried to build a fire and had attempted to climb a tree to locate the campsite. Three more bodies were found near the forest heading towards the camp. Although one of these bodies had a fractured skull, the official cause of death for all five was determined to be hypothermia.
It took two more months before the other four bodies were discovered, buried under deep snow in a ravine. All four bodies had signs of traumatic injury: one had a crushed skull, two had broken ribs, and the third was missing her tongue. There were reports of high radioactivity found on the bodies, and even reports of apparent blindness in some of the victims.
So, the legend began: what caused these nine experienced mountaineers to hastily leave their tent in the middle of the night and run out into the snow in -25 F cold in their underwear? Why did they cut open the tent rather than opening the ties? What caused the injuries? You can imagine where people’s imagination went… to a world of UFOs, Yeti, and other unexplained phenomenon.
Yet, Brian Dunning of Skeptoid put together a perfectly feasible explanation that doesn’t require anything supernatural. As usual. I tend to think his explanation is the closest to the truth (because let’s face it – our world is too boring for UFOs or abominable snowmen), but nobody really knows why those nine people died on that strange night in 1959. What’s your theory?
Read more about the incident here:
Fortean Times: The Dyatlov Pass Incident
St. Petersburg Times: Mysterious Deaths of 9 Skiers Still Unresolved
Pass Djatlova (in Russian)
The avalanche theory is more believable to me than the Yeti or the UFO. (Almost anything is always more plausible than UFO to me) but I have a hard time understanding how those nine people could have escaped from their tent at all if an avalanche struck them, never mind going off into the woods and trying to build a fire. From what I’ve read about avalanches, if you are in the path of one, you are pretty much done for. If you can get out from the snow before it gets compacted, you can be safe, but the odds are not very good.
And I’m still wondering about the missing tongue.
@Aimee
Okay, I should have finished his whole piece before I said anything. The power went out momentarily here and I got discombobulated.
His theory makes a lot of sense. But does hair usually turn gray/white from logn exposure? Never heard of it happening.
And I still want to know: was the severed tongue really missing, or what? If she bit it out, that would kind of look pretty obvious, would’t it? Would probably still be in her mouth or down her throat, right?
Hmmmm.
@Aimee
That last link says that the “white hair” was an urban legend. The skin really was an orange-ish color, but that could just be from natural causes. But the hair did not turn white. Not sure about the missing tongue – but, again, that last link suggests natural causes for it.
The avalanche theory goes like this: During the night, they hear a loud noise (maybe a nearby avalanche, maybe military tests, maybe a sonic boom, maybe an infrasound phenomenon that freaked them out, who knows?). Five of the skiiers believe an avalanche is bearing down on them and run for safety in just what they were sleeping in. That’s why they cut open the tent in such a hurry and didn’t get dressed. Four hang back, thinking that’s probably not a good idea.
The five that ran down the hill get down by the forest and think, “Aw, man, this was a fucking STUPID thing to do!! What the hell are we gonna do now?” Due to the darkness and the inclement weather, they can’t even see where they came from. One of them fell and cracked his head on a rock, and he’s injured. One of them climbs up in a tree to try to see the camp. No luck. They decide to make a fire to try to stay warm, but hypothermia is slowly settling in.
Two of them succumb to the cold and pass out. The other three raid whatever clothes they can from them to try to bundle up and decide to head back up the hill. However, they slowly, one by one, succumb to the cold as well, and lose consciousness.
Meanwhile, the other four are in the tent going, “Why did those idiots run like that?” They wait for awhile, go out and yell for them, etc. Then when they realize they’re not coming back, they head out to find them. During their search, they get caught up in a REAL avalanche that causes the injuries and they end up dead under the snow at the bottom of a steep ravine.
Doesn’t that make sense based on the evidence?
@Comtesse
Yes, i makes the most sense of any of the theories put forward. How terrified and confused they must have been!
For some reason this story puts me in mind of a Sopranos episode. Paulie and Christopher kidnap this formidable Russian mobster and take him out to the Pine Barrens, where they make him dig his own grave. They’re freezing in winter clothes but the Russian dude is in his pajamas and he tells them, in Russian, which they can’t understand, that he has done missions in Siberia and this cold is nothing to him. He suddenly knocks them down with the shovel, takes the gun and leaves in their car. They ahve to spend the night in the dark woods, in an abandoned plumbing van, with only some fast food ketchup packages to eat. They try to get hold of Tony but their cell phone service is goofy so you hear somebody babbling in Chinese over their conversation. They were told that the Russian had worked with the Interior Ministry and fought in Chechnya, but they mangle it when they try to tell Tony, so they tell him “He worked in Czechoslovakia as an inerior decorator!”
The whole episode is hilarious, but their fear being lost in the Pine Barrens overnight was very real.
@Aimee Best Sopranos episode ever!
Oh, and Paulie was bragging, right at the beginning, before it got dark, how he’d been in the army and knew all about survival in the woods. But of course by the time the sun went down, Paulie had lost a lot of his sparkle. Though of course he did try to scare Christopher even more than he already was with tales of the Jersey Devil and the Jackson Whites that supposedly roamed around these parts.
A possibility I thought of but which is based on supportive evidence of sorts. Google Carbon Monoxide Deaths Whilst Camping. They are uncommon but tragic
So here goes
1 there are a lot of people huddled in the sealed up tent, perhaps some of them warm enough to be partially clothed
2 this crowding may be causing raised CO2 levels, symptoms include panic, and impaired judgement
3 did they have a heater on and was it creating carbon monoxide, symptoms are intense dread,hallucinations, paralysis of extremities eg fingers
4 did someone then realise what was wrong and cut open the tent unable to undo toggles because their fingers would not work.
5 then a shared panic ensues and by escaping asphyxiation they are doomed to exposure and accident
6 remember rational decision making is impaired by CO and or CO2. By the time they start making sound judgements (eg attempting to return to the tent attemting to get a fire going) it is too late because of exposure
7 descending makes some sense (remember again the team may only be partially rational)as the air is less rarified
If I have thought of the above I am sure others have but I have not come across it specific to the Dyatlov incident. It is however a rational and reaonable theory , and people do tragically die from carbon monoxide poisoning in tents from using heaters, was it CO poisoning that precipitated a fatal cascade of events.
In the wild even comparitively minor things going wrong can rapidly escalate to a tragedy.
Richard Stone ps I am a nurse with some experience of poisons units including noxious gases. Pardon the mundanity of the explanation but carelessness kills people.
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The radiation is the smoking gun. This had to be a Soviet military incident. Then the government tried to cover up the foul play by throwing off the investigation that would follow by cutting off the woman’s tongue and leaving the note about snowmen. They didn’t want to blow back for killing these people and they wanted this to “go away” for national security reasons.
This incident was caused by UFOs.Im 100% sure. There were “bright orange spheres” seen in that area on that nite. The lead investigator said he was certain that the orange spheres was behind the skiers deaths. This incident is very close to the animal/cattle mutilations that have occured in the states since the late 1960s. In both cases there UFOs, raditation on bodies, missing tongues/body parts, and crushed bones. No other explaination fits the facts/evidence. It was not an avalanche. Look at the pictures of the area ; there is no evidence of an avalanche. The tent is still standing and the hikers footprints are still visible. Its was not russian military testing. The russians would not be testing a weapon on top of that mountain in the middle of the winter. And if they were then the area would be off limits to all civilian people. Nine hikers would never be allowed just to walk into weapons test than gave off raditation. NEVER. I suspect the russians knew more than what they said. I think there was more injuries than what the russian government released. I hear the russian helicopter pilots refused to transport the dead bodies from the mountain. WHY – something had to scare them. The facts dont fit an avalanche nor military testing nor anything else but UFOs.