The Mystery of the Hollinwell Incident #shorts

Gruesome deaths. Strange lights in the sky. Government cover-ups. If this sounds like an episode of the X-Files, you’re not far wrong, however this strange case occurred in real life, in Russia in 1959.

What has made it even more tantalising throughout the years is that while there are theories galore as to what happened to the nine young hikers caught up in this strange event, there is not one theory to rule them all. Nothing so far has adequately explained all the elements of the case. This is not one for the weak of stomach. We’re talking about the Dyatlov Pass Incident.

The Mystery

In early February 1959, a group of nine hikers led by Igor Dyatlov were camping on the side of a mountain in the northern Ural region of Russia. This was not necessarily the best place for them to pitch their tent but darkness was approaching and they had a big day of climbing planned for the next day. During the night, an event occurred that sent the campers scrambling from their tent in a mad panic, ripping it open from the inside to get out.

Their bodies were eventually found over a series of many weeks, some with no obvious signs of injury, others with huge trauma to their chests and heads. Two people had missing eyeballs. One had a missing tongue.

They were not dressed for winter in the Russian mountains, rather they were all wearing items of each other’s clothing and some were in little more than underwear when they were found. Two of the hikers had high levels of radiation on their clothes. Others had burns on their bodies.

What in the living heck could have happened to cause these experienced people to flee into the night and then come to horrible, grisly ends? Around the time of the events, other hikers and local people had described seeing lights in the sky. The last photograph taken from one of the Dyatlov group’s cameras is a blurry image of what looks like at least two lights hovering about in the night.

There were rumours that one or more of the group were working for the KGB. The hikers were within range of a military base which only added to the conspiracy theories.

In May 1959, less than 4 months after the tragic events, the case on the Dyatlov Pass incident was closed. Blame was handed off to Igor Dyatlov for camping in a dangerous area and the official explanation given to cover the entire weird manners of death was this: “it is concluded that the cause of their demise was overwhelming force, which the hikers were not able to overcome.” Er, exsqueeze me?

Could you be a little more vague there? What kind of overwhelming force are you talking about? A natural one like an avalanche or a violent one like an animal or human attack?

An extraterrestrial force? The flipping force from Star Wars? Also, calling it the Dyatlov Pass Incident seems to tone the whole thing down a bit.

An “incident” sounds fairly benign or like a title from a Victorian detective story. How about the Dyatlov Pass Mass Killing Event? Let’s get into the details here.

A lot of them ain’t pretty but it’s mainly because of the range of weird injuries the hikers sustained that this case has kept the public’s attention for the last 6 decades.

The History

On the 23rd January 1959, a group of ten people, 8 men and 2 women, set off for what they were expecting to be a challenging but rewarding hiking and skiing trip in the Ural mountains. They had all completed many hikes and treks before and were all considered to be more than capable of finishing this expedition. In the time before cell phones and quick communication, they told friends and family they expected to arrive back at Vizhay, a very small town, by February 12th and that was that.

Nothing was expected to go wrong and if it did, the party was large enough and contained at least one person with experience as a medic to be able to sort things out on their own. The people in what’s become known as the Dyatlov Group were as follows:

Leader of the group, 23 year old Igor Dyatlov. I will just point out here that the Dyatlov Pass was so named after the - spoiler alert - tragic events that befell the party. It wasn’t as though Igor Dyatlov said “Hey, guys, let’s go for a hike over in the Urals. I’ll let you check out my pass.” The area now known as the Dyatlov Pass is located near but not exactly in the area where the bodies were found. Dyatlov was studying Radio Engineering at UPI, the Ural Polytechnic Institute as it was known at the time.

Yuri Doroshenko, a 21 year old radio engineering student.

Lyudmila Dubinina, the youngest of the group at 20 years old. She was studying Engineering and Economics.

Aleksander Kolevatov, a 24 year old Physics student.

Zinaida Kolmogorova, a 22 year old Radio Engineering student who had hiked extensively with Dyatlov.

Yuri Krivonischenko, a 23 year old Construction graduate who had been part of the crew to clean up after the 1957 Kyshtym nuclear disaster.

Rustem Slobodin, a 23 year old graduate of UPI with a fondness for long distance running.

Nikolai Thibeaux-Brignolle, a 23 year old Civil Engineer.

Semyon Zolotaryov, the old man of the group at 37. He was a late and mysterious addition to the party. He died on his 38th birthday.

Yuri Yudin, the only surviving member of the group. Yudin left the others on January 28th as he was unable to carry on due to problems with sciatica. That left 9 people in the Dyatlov party.

The remaining 9 carried on with the trip, hiking, skiing, taking photos and writing in various diaries. The group dynamics seemed fine with no-one mentioning particular tensions over leadership or romantic rivalry of any kind. The weather was noted in the group diary as being around -16 degrees Centigrade during the day (3.2 fahrenheit), dropping to around -26 centigrade (-14.8 degrees fahrenheit) at night.

Yeah, it was cold. The last entry in the group diary is January 31st, 1959. In it, Dyatlov notes that the weather has closed in and they are making slow progress at a rate of about 1 mile an hour.

They’re extremely tired but manage to make camp in the forest, ready to push on to the mountain the next day. The last part of his entry reads: “We’re exhausted, but start setting up for the night. Firewood is scarce, mostly damp firs.

We build the campfire on the logs, too tired to dig a fire pit. Dinner’s in the tent. Nice and warm.

Can’t imagine such comfort on the ridge, with howling wind outside, hundreds of kilometers away from human settlements.” This area is where the now-named Dyatlov Pass is situated.

On the 1st of February, the group left some of their belongings behind to make it easier to climb the mountain and also to have a stash of provisions for the return leg. It’s then theorised that they went a bit off course on their trek and decided to pitch their tent on the north slope of the mountainside rather than having to back track however far and then have to do the route again the next day. The mountain they camped on was Kholat Syakhl which has been translated as “dead mountain” or “mountain of the dead” from the native Mansi language.

While this is a creepy foreshadowing, the definition is really more like “meager” or “lack of game” i.e. not a place that’s going to kill you, just a place that’s not great for hunting. The Dyatlov group’s target climb was Mount Otorten. This has similarly become known as meaning “don’t go there”, a warning for people to just stay the heck away.

This might be another mistranslation, however, and that name might actually refer to a different mountain further away in the Urals. The apparent Mansi name for the mountain referred to as Otorten actually translates as “Mountain with Swirling Winds” which doesn’t really fit into the whole death omen narrative so has been ignored for the more ominous monikers.

That night, something happened which left all the hikers dead and has never fully been explained. We’ll go into the theories in a minute but first let’s talk about how the bodies were found.

As previously mentioned, the group wasn’t expected back until February 12th. When Yuri Yudin had to leave them due to illness, Dyatlov told him that actually, they would be back by the 15th instead. After a few more miscommunications, bad weather and desperate attempts from family and friends to find out where they were, a search party was eventually sent out on February 21st which was obviously far too late to rescue anyone.

Dyatlov also hadn’t filed a copy of the route they were taking anywhere so that made it even harder for searchers to locate the party. It wasn’t until 5 days later on February 26th that a group from the rescue search party found the Dyatlov group’s tent. The front of the tent was propped open but the rest was covered in snow.

It was not particularly deep and was deemed at the time to have just been a natural accumulation of windblown snow. Searchers recovered 9 backpacks, coats, pants, shoes, boots, skis, hats, blankets, food, papers, a stove, an axe; basically everything a group of people would have needed to survive in the mountains in winter. The tent had holes and was ripped in a way that looked like maybe someone cut their way in.

It was only after later analysis that it was determined the cuts were made from inside the tent, pointing to the hikers having cut their way out in a great hurry. There were photographs taken of several sets of footprints heading away from the tent. One of the rescue party noted:

There were footprints of bare feet, but in socks. Some were from valenki (soft felt boots), and occasionally we could make out the tread of a ski boot. All of these prints were raised higher than the actual wind-scoured surface of the slope. We followed these prints from the tent in the direction of a spreading cedar, which was clearly prominent on the hill.

First we lost, and then we found, the tracks again. They appeared again in the birch-tree undergrowth, and then they went down along the ravine which led to the Lozva River.

From what rescuers noted at the time, the tracks these footprints made seemed quite orderly and not evidence of the group sprinting out haphazardly into the night. The only conclusions the rescue party could draw was that someone or something had forced the Dyatlov group to leave their tent in the dark, taking practically nothing with them. They had headed for the forest and not the supplies they’d left the previous day and they never returned to the tent.

The first bodies were found on February 27th, almost a month after the event took place. Under the prominent cedar tree noted by the search party, about a mile from the tent, were Yuri Doroschenko and Yuri Krivonischenko. It looked like they had built a fire but it hadn’t been enough.

They had practically no clothes on and burns to their feet. An investigation of the cedar tree found traces of human flesh several metres up, perhaps indicating that they had scrambled up the tree to get away from something. Doroschenko also had a burn on his head and foam on his cheek, possibly caused by pressure to his chest.

Krivonischenko had apparently bitten off a piece of his own knuckle. Yes, this gets a whole lot grimmer so if you’re already wrinkling your nose up, prepare yourself for a whole lot of grossness. Neither man was wearing shoes or jacket.

They were lying next to each when found and it looked like one or both had been moved post-mortem. Their cause of death was given as hypothermia.

Later that same day, the bodies of Zinaida Kolmogorova and Igor Dyatlov were discovered. Dyatlov was found a few hundred metres from the cedar tree, wearing ski pants, a shirt and sweater but no hat and again, no shoes. He had some minor facial injuries but he had bruising on the knuckles of both hands, similar to what you might get if you’re in a fist fight and punched someone really hard. He also had injuries to both ankles.

His skin was described in the report as “bluish-red”. He was found lying with his head towards the tent, perhaps indicating that he was trying to climb back up the slope when he died. His watch had stopped at 5.31.

Kolomogorova was found under about 50 cm (20 inches) of snow by a search dog. She was about 630 metres (2066 feet) from the cedar tree and the nearest body to the tent. She was also found with her head towards the tent as if trying to get back to it. Of the first four bodies found, she was the best dressed wearing several layers but still no shoes.

She had some facial and hand injuries similar to Dyatlov and her skin was noted as being “purple red”. Further investigations also found a huge bruise on her side, like she’d been hit hard with a bat or baton. The cause of death for these two was also given as hypothermia.

Despite search teams searching the area meticulously after these finds, it wasn’t until March 5th, another week later, that the next member of the group was found. Rustem Slobodin was found between Dyatlov and Kolomogorova, also lying with his head in the direction of the tent. Because of the way the ice had melted under him, the search party concluded that he’d been alive and warm when he lay down and, for whatever reason, didn’t get up again.

He had four pairs of socks on and a couple of layers of sweaters and trousers, making him the best dressed of the group so far. He was also considered the strongest of the party, meaning that he would be expected to keep going longer unless something happened to impair him. This might be explained by the huge fracture to his skull.

Slobodin also had wounds to his arms and bruising on his leg. His watch had stopped at 8.45am. His cause of death was given as hypothermia.

If you’re wondering why it took the search party so long to find anybody, it’s because they were basically completely blind. Any visible footprints stopped at a certain point. Snow had fallen constantly and the search didn’t even start until weeks after the group died so they were completely hidden from view.

Searchers used metal detectors but none of the Dyatlov group had significant amounts of metal on them to make using them worthwhile. In the end they just had to fan out and use rods to poke down into the snow until they hit the ground or something else. They did this every 50 cm (20 inches) over a huge area with no real idea where to look.

Most of the volunteers were students, friends of the Dyatlov group, desperately hoping to find their friends safe and sound. One of the search party detailed how tough it was in his report: “Every day we worked in deep snow, at least knee deep but often waist deep. So we worked very slowly and for many hours per day, testing with the three-meter probes.

Sometimes when our probes touched something and we thought that we had found a body, we would dig feverishly with full power, shovels and hands, but the snow would fall back. Finally, we would find something. ‘Oh shit, it’s a tree trunk.’

We would start again.” Cut them a bit of slack!

Because of the difficulty of the search, another 2 months went by before the final group of bodies was found. On the 5th of May, a trail of cut branches was noticed and eventually a small den or shelter was uncovered. The remaining 4 hikers had cut branches and piled clothes on them to form makeshift seats off the snow.

There were a few other items near the den but the knife used to cut the branches was never found. About 20 meters (66 feet) on, by a stream, they found the body of Lyudmila Dubinina under about 4 metres (13 feet) of snow. She was on her knees, upright against a rock wall with her head facing upstream.

She had damage to her face with significant amounts of soft tissue missing. Her eyeballs were completely gone as was her tongue. She had broken ribs on both sides of her chest.

Her cause of death was given as hemorrhage following the chest fractures and internal bleeding. She was wearing a brown sweater which later tested positive for radiation.

Semyon Zolotaryov was next to be discovered, right next to Aleksander Kolevatov and appeared to be in a position of protection around the younger man. Zolotaryov was wearing quite a lot of clothes and also had a camera around his neck. There was a deep wound on the back of his head and his eyeballs were also missing. He had crushed ribs on the right side of his chest.

Kolevatov also had major trauma around the eye area and an open wound behind one ear. His neck is reported as “deformed” but I’m not sure if that means broken or crushed. Either way, it’s not a good thing to happen to a neck. His skin colour was noted as “gray green with a tinge of purple.” Because he’d been lying in the water for so long, his hands and feet were decaying. Parts of his clothing tested positive for radiation. His official cause of death was given as hypothermia.

The final person in the group to be found was Nikolay Thibeaux-Brignolle. Like Zolotaryov, he was quite well dressed and was wearing a pair of soft boots that the hikers would put on when in the tent. He had suffered a massive temporal skull fracture and also had an injury on one arm. For some reason he was wearing 2 watches, one of which had stopped at 8.14 and the other at 8.39.

These last 4 hikers were all found very close together and despite the broken bones they had, there was no outward sign of damage in those areas, like bruising or tissue damage to the chest etc. It was later reported that the force needed to cause these types of injuries would be the equivalent of being hit by a car. It’s also of note that the last four autopsies seemed to have been reported in far less detail than the previous 5. Dubinina’s tongue is just noted as “missing” and left at that, for example.

As you’d expect, after the long slog to recover the bodies and the subsequent autopsies and radiation testing on them, there would be a thorough official report to try and get to the bottom of the whole strange affair, right? Nope. On the 28th of May 1959, just over 3 weeks after the final bodies were found, the conclusion to the case by Junior Justice Counsellor Lev Ivanov was typed up on just 4 pieces of paper and submitted as closed. Let’s just recap the official explanation here:

Considering the absence of external injuries to the bodies or signs of a fight, the presence of all the valuables of the group, and also taking into account the conclusion of the medical examinations for the causes of the deaths of the hikers, it is concluded that the cause of their demise was overwhelming force, which the hikers were not able to overcome.

So we’ve got 9 dead people. Various different types of injuries. Radiation. Mixed up clothing. What the heck happened?

The Theories

Oh. My. God. So many theories! You could probably have a whole series on the theories alone. To call some of them a can of worms is an understatement. It’s like opening a can of worms and then having those worms fall into more cans ad infinitum. We’re going to go down some weird rabbit holes here so strap in and remember that it can’t possibly be all of them. Or can it?

It might be easier to get the odder ones out of the way first and for once, aliens are not one of the odder theories! But cryptids are. Yes, perennial mischief maker the Yeti makes a guest cameo in the Dyatlov Pass Incident.

Yeti

Something ripped that tent apart. Was it a yeti or some other large beast roaming around the Russian wilderness? I think we can cross this particular cryptid off the list, even though the Dyatlov group actually mentioned it themselves in a group newspaper they created during the trip. Although the original copy of the “Evening Otorten” has been lost, there was apparently a brief paragraph saying something like “From now on we know the Snowmen exist.

According to recent reports, Yetis live in the Northern Urals, near Mount Otorten.” There was also a photograph recovered from one of the group’s cameras showing a large figure coming out from behind a tree. The missing tongue of Lyudmila Dubinina also gave this theory credence as why else would that be missing apart from that a yeti ripped it out and ate it?

Let’s debunk this one right now. The paper the group made was just a fun, satirical news leaflet, not a scientific journal. The photo of the “yeti” just looks like one of the group wearing full-on winter clothes standing a little awkwardly next to a tree. I am obviously no Yeti expert but I have never heard that they particularly like tongues and if they do, why stop at one? Sorry snowman, I don’t think you were responsible for this one.

The Mansi

If ever there was an easy target, the local Mansi people were it. Sure, blame the indigenous locals and their unfamiliar religious practices for the horribly grisly end of 9 young Russians. There is no evidence that the Mansi tribe were in any way involved in the Dyatlov group’s deaths.

The area the group were hiking in was not considered sacred or forbidden in any way and it was not unusual for hiking groups to have perfectly cordial interactions with the Mansi. No crimes had been committed in the area and the Mansi did not have a confrontational or violent reputation. None of the diaries note any worries or misgivings about the local people and the evidence left behind pretty much does away with any credible motive.

Why would the group be attacked and then everything be left untouched? Nothing seemed to have been taken from the tent and there were plenty of things that would have been useful to people living in cold conditions. There were also gems, watches, matches and other things left on the bodies that seems to rule out an attack for personal gain.

The footprints leading out of the tent were easily followed, at least to begin with. There wasn’t a sign of a large number of other people present and if the Mansi were the culprits, surely they would have used their know-how to hide the bodies better instead of leaving them where they fell. They also aided in the search for the hikers and used their own dogs to help discover the bodies.

I know that it’s a trope that killers will involve themselves in the search for their victims but this really doesn’t seem to be the case here.

What about other human involvement then? A psychotic murderer maybe? An escaped prisoner or two? There was a prison camp a few miles from the groups’ final camping site so there was a possibility of criminal involvement.

Except…remember, this was on a mountainside in the middle of a Russian winter. If anyone had escaped, and there were no recordings of this having happened at the time, they wouldn’t be in a fit state to take on 9 strong hikers by the time they’d reached the camp. Injuries to some of the hikers’ hands might coincide with having punched something, maybe a person, but at this point it’s not possible to tell. Also of note, however grim, is that none of the bodies had signs of sexual assault, another strike against attack by people.

And again, the fact that many useful and valuable things were left behind seems to close the door on any sort of attack by random criminals.

Animal Attack

Picture the scene: you’re setting up to cook a nice meal for your buddies on the mountainside when all of a sudden a wild animal, maybe a large wolverine, comes leaping out of the forest at you. It charges into the tent, starts ripping it to shreds and in its panic, unleashes its smelly spray, stinking up the place. Everyone calmly gathers a few bits and bobs and heads off to give the animal some space and let the stench clear. Ok, sounds vaguely reasonable.

It might even explain why the hikers left the tent in the first place. But then what? They all just split up, fell over enough to give themselves skull fractures and died? There is no way an animal attack can even begin to explain their deaths.

Next!

Some Sort of Mania

There are a couple of different theories suggesting that the group was basically off its face and everyone wandered around in a disoriented state until they all killed each other or fell down the ravine and died. The first culprit for this state is what’s known as “Arctic Hysteria”. As the name suggests, the cold conditions induce some sort of hysterical reaction which can be passed around the group leading to confusion and ultimately death. This hysteria only appears to affect native tribes, though, i.e. people living constantly in that environment.

The Dyatlov group were very experienced hikers, had plenty of warm clothes and supplies and were just passing through. It seems unlikely that they would fall prey to this sort of thing.

Another strand to this theory is methanol poisoning. Maybe somehow the group ingested methanol that was meant for the stove and a few hours later it made them all blind and disoriented. In their panic they all ran away and met with various grim fates. While poisoning might explain why they left the tent, that’s about it.

The fact that one group had managed to make a makeshift shelter after leaving the tent and another had made a fire shows that they must have been thinking somewhat coherently. There is also no evidence that the group used anything other than wood for their stove.

So what about magic mushrooms or “shrooms” as they are irritatingly called? Could some or all of the group have knowingly or unknowingly taken some sort of hallucinogen and ended up throwing all their clothes off? Or was it person or persons unknown who were on a drug-fuelled killing spree and the Dyatlov group were in the wrong place at the wrong time?

It’s not totally beyond the realms of possibility. In a book by Svetlana Oss called “Don’t Go There”, she speculates that another indigenous tribe called the Khanty were under the influence of the fly agaric mushrooms and had stalked and attacked the Dyatlov group, kicking Rustem Slobodin in the head and causing the chest injuries to the others by kicking or jumping on them. Ouch.

The previously mentioned “yeti” photo could instead be one of the group capturing evidence of someone following them and might explain why they didn’t camp in the forest as they were worried about this other tribe. While some things can be explained by this mushroom theory, it doesn’t explain how other members of the group might have died, or why nothing was taken. Don’t forget about the radiation too, whether the group was attacked by drug-fuelled loons or took the drugs themselves, it wouldn’t have caused anybody to be radioactive.

Katabatic Winds

Remember how the correct translation for Mount Otorten is supposedly “Mountain with Swirling Winds”? Well, maybe this is relevant after all. There is a natural phenomenon known as “katabatic wind” or “descending wind”.

It’s also known as “gravity wind” and can occur in mountains or over glaciers. Basically, a strong wind can suddenly roll downhill at huge speeds, wreaking havoc in its path. In places like Antarctica, katabatic winds are a fairly common occurrence.

They spring up out of nowhere and can quickly reach speeds of 15 to 20 metres or 50 to 66 feet per second. This could be a reason that the group hurriedly left their tent and might even explain why some of it was covered in snow if they quickly heaped some on to stop it from blowing away. If they were then caught in hurricane-force winds, this might also explain the trauma to their bodies if they were thrown or fell against rocks or were hit by flying objects.

Perhaps the strong winds also triggered a slab avalanche which finished off the rest of the hikers. Such rare events are almost impossible to reconstruct but on the face of it, it’s a credible theory if you ignore some of the other injuries such as the burns and why the backpacks and other contents of the tent were still all close by and not flung around everywhere.

We’re now entering major conspiracy theory territory. Enter at your own risk.

KGB / Special Forces and other undercover shenanigans

This whole thing takes place in Soviet Russia during the Cold War. That alone should have you reading the official reports with a liberal sprinkling of salt but some elements of this case just smack of a cover up. It has been posited that at least two members of the group were working for the KGB and using the trip to carry out some secret mission, maybe to find some pesky CIA agents hiding in the wilderness.

Remember the hastily added last member, Semyon Zolotaryov? He had a shadowy past involving the military and sported cryptic tattoos that nobody could work out the meaning of. This might not mean anything though, I’ve read enough tattoo mistake clickbait articles to know that a lot of tatts are not particularly significant to the wearer.

His identity has been subject to debate over the years and he was even exhumed in 2018 to check if he was who people thought he was. Turns out, he wasn’t. While the skull in his grave matched known photographs of Zolotaryov, a DNA test from a private lab showed no matches to his sister’s daughter, leading people to wonder if the real Zolotaryov had been rescued by his KGB handlers and some other body planted in his grave.

A further DNA test carried out by the Russian Center of Forensic Expertise, however, did find that DNA from the body in Zolotaryov’s grave matched that of his niece. So maybe I should recant my previous statement. The story doesn’t quite end there, though.

The way the DNA was collected means that it could potentially have come from another family member. Zolotaryov’s brother disappeared during the Second World War leading some people to speculate that it was actually his body that was buried, leaving special agent Semyon Zolotaryov free and clear.

Aleksander Kolevatov has also been tapped as a potential KGB agent. His source of income didn’t really match the average wage a young science grad could normally expect and he had been given a work placement in a secretive ministry department straight out of university. The theory goes that the undercover agents were meant to deliver radioactive samples to the CIA but things went horribly wrong leading to the deaths of the entire Dyatlov group.

It was also theorised that the Dyatlov group accidentally came across a group of special forces soldiers and were killed by them. Remember the “deformed neck” of Aleksander Kolevatov? He also had an injury behind his ear. A blow to that area plus a neck snap is a special forces calling-card.

As previously mentioned though, that whole group’s autopsy reports were oddly light on detail so we can’t say for sure those were his actual injuries. It’s also been noted that it looked like Yuri Doroshenko, the first hiker found, had foam on his cheek which may have been caused by a pulmonary edema by someone i.e. special forces, putting pressure on his chest.

While you can fall down a dark spiral where this seems perfectly credible, we have to remember the facts. All the members of the group left the tent. Something then happened which prevented them from returning and either caused or led to their subsequent injuries and deaths over a period of at least several hours and possibly longer. A group of military agents attacking them does not really fit this scenario although it’s not the last time shadowy government involvement will pop up.

Lights in the Sky

Ok, was it our extraterrestrial friends paying a visit? Strange lights had appeared in the sky in the area with other hiking groups in other parts of the mountains confirming their appearance around the time of the Dyatlov group’s deaths. The Mansi tribe had drawings of orbs in the sky and thanks to the launch of Sputnik in 1957, interest in all things space-y and UFO-y were at quite a high point.

There was also an intriguing photo, the last on the roll taken by one of the group showing at least two blurry lights. This theory states that weird lights were appearing in the sky. The group left the tent in a huge rush to capture photographic evidence and then whatever happened…happened.

Were they attacked by an alien craft? There were trees in the forest that were burned at the tops, maybe by some sort of precision heat seeking ray? Some of the hikers sustained burns, a strange injury on a snowy mountainside.

And the lead investigator, Lev Ivanov was actually told to remove all mention of unidentified flying objects from his report. In his later years, he said “When E. P.

Maslennikov and I examined the scene in May, we found that some young pine trees at the edge of the forest had burn marks, but those marks did not have a concentric form or some other pattern. There was no epicenter. This once again confirmed that heated beams of a strong, but completely unknown, at least to us, energy, were directing their firepower toward specific objects (in this case, people), acting selectively.”

So if even the lead investigator was convinced these lights had something to do with it, what other explanations could there be for them? It might be worth pointing out here that while the photo of the blurry lights fits in with this theory well, other people have said that the photo was not the last to be taken by the group but rather the first to be taken in the lab when the photos were being developed. The shutter was half open meaning that to remove the film, the technician had to take a photo to advance the film and open the camera.

The blurry lights were therefore just some lights in the lab. That’s a disappointingly boring explanation though so let’s stick with the UFO lights one.

Anyway, back to what else might have caused the lights. There is a phenomena called ball lightning which is, funnily enough, a ball of lightning. It’s pretty rare, can last for several seconds and can even move around quite near to the ground.

One theory is that atmospheric conditions caused ball lightning to appear near the Dyatlov group’s tent. They all pegged it outside and waited for it to pass. But it didn’t and several people fell victim to close proximity electrocution by lightning strike.

The victims by the cedar tree did have burns and injuries that could be explained by a lightning strike. The lightning strikes could also have created an explosion in the ravine, accounting for the blunt force trauma the group in the den suffered. So is this it?

A plausible if statistically rare explanation? Well, it’s not really possible to say definitively as there are too many other threads to too many other theories. The radiation found on two of the victims is still perplexing as is the time frame with the hikers dying over a period of hours, if not a day or more.

And there is one other theory that links to the lights in the sky and that’s:

Rocket Launches

Does anybody smell a nuclear test launch gone wrong and a subsequent government cover up? If your nostrils are twitching, this is the theory for you. There were no official rocket tests on the 1st or 2nd of February.

Allegedly. Evidence exists of a radiogram sent to the search party making mention of a meteorological rocket that was seen in Ivdel, about 100 miles (160 km) away on the first of February and was also observed separately by a different group. It was suggested in the radiogram that the Dyatlov group had made the fatal error of leaving their tent to see what was going on in the sky because of this rocket.

We can now expand on that theory by suggesting that either the military killed them for having accidentally seen some secret testing going on or their campsite was bombed, maybe by accident or maybe not. The group in the den in particular had injuries that could be explained by being caught up in an explosion and maybe the radiation found on their clothes came from a nuke. After the military realised their oopsie, the scene was carefully staged before the search team came in, hiding any evidence of military involvement.

You had me at rocket explosion, but staging of the aftermath, not so much. Why leave everything in such a state as to arouse more confusion and suspicion in the future? It would have to be the least effective cover up of all time as we’re still talking about it over 60 years later.

There are many other theories relating to the case from other atmospheric phenomenon to death by snowmobile, but let’s end on a big if slightly anticlimactic one:

Avalanche

When you hear that a group of hikers who had camped on the side of a mountain had cut their way out of a tent in a panic and ended up in a ravine further down the mountain, the first thing that probably springs to mind is “avalanche”. They heard the noise or were in the process of being buried in the tent so scrambled to get out and were carried away, sustaining horrible injuries and later dying as a result of them. This theory does seem to be the flavour du jour as the Dyatlov case was reopened in 2018.

In 2020, the official report was that, yes, an avalanche was to blame. Perhaps triggered by the activity of the group themselves, a slab avalanche took out the tent and forced the group to take shelter in the ravine. From there they failed to survive their injuries and the freezing conditions and eventually all died.

This is a neat theory. It also still has a LOT of holes. Why were the frozen footprints the search party found so orderly if the group were fleeing for their lives?

Why was there a flashlight found on top of the snow by the tent and not buried under it? Was it left there accidentally by the government agency stagers after they moved the tent to make it look like the hikers had picked a really bad place to pitch it? How unlucky was it that this happened in an otherwise non-avalanche prone area?

Although we keep referring to the mountainside, the slope the hikers were on was not actually that steep so how deadly could a local avalanche be? How do you account for the burns on some of the victims? How, out of a group of 9 very experienced hikers, could not even one person escape the avalanche or make it back to the campsite?

Why didn’t Ivanov mention the possibility of an avalanche in his closing report instead of leaving it so vague?

Loose ends

If you’ve been wondering about the mixed up clothing and the fact that some people were found with not much on, there are, yes, various theories about it. Sure, friends let friends borrow a pair of woolly socks or a spare sweater now and then but every single member of the group was sporting at least one item from someone else. One explanation is that they were suffering from hypothermia and a contradictory side effect of freezing to death is that you start to feel very hot and it’s not unusual to find people who have removed their clothes in very inclement conditions.

It’s also probably because some of the group died significantly earlier than others. The two men found under the cedar are largely agreed upon to have died first, with surviving members of the group moving them into a more respectful position before pillaging their clothes in order to keep themselves alive. As other members died, their clothes were then taken by the remaining hikers and so on.

The group of 4 that were found last had had time to dig out a makeshift den and use branches to create something to sit on off the snow so whatever occurred did not kill everyone instantaneously.

Come on, you didn’t think I was going to forget about those missing eyes and the tongue did you? While being very creepy and weird, it’s maybe not that difficult to explain. The bodies that had missing eyes, Lyudmila Dubinina and possible KGB agent for all the good it did him, Semyon Zolotaryov, were found right by a stream.

They also weren’t found until months after the incident happened which is a long time to be in contact with running water. The bodies were noted as decaying when they were found so it’s pretty likely that any soft tissue would be rotting away and eyeballs would either be fair game for the local fauna or maybe they just rotted and fell out by themselves. Sorry!

The tongue might have gone the same way. Dubinina was positioned with water running over her head so it might have just rotted off. She also could have bitten through it if she’d been flung against something due to an explosion or a fall through the snow.

Or yes, aliens could have removed it for their own nefarious purposes. The autopsy report gave zero detail about the tongue apart from that it was missing. Sensational reports have said that there was blood in her stomach meaning she was alive when the tongue went missing or was removed but this has been challenged as being a mucosal mass and not blood.

So think what you like about that but in my opinion if you’ve suffered facial injuries and been dead for months with your head under running water you’d be lucky to have much of a face left at all.

And what of the weird skin colours, variously being gray-green, brown-purple and purple-red in the autopsy reports? Mikhail Sharavin who was one of the first people to find the bodies of the hikers by the cedar tree described seeing that their feet and hands were “reddish-brown”. Igor Dyatlov’s mother had said she had had trouble recognizing him at his funeral and that his hair had been grey. These colours may be due to frostbite or maybe they were flash burns from being caught in an explosion.

Or maybe the real Dyatlov had been killed in a secret military operation and this was the body of an older person used in his place? Or maybe it was due to something else, I mean who knows at this point?

The other remaining stand-out thing is, of course, the radiation on the clothing. Why were the clothes even tested for radiation in the first place? Is this routine for bodies found on a mountain?

Whatever, radiation was detected on a sweater Dubinina was wearing, she of the missing tongue and eyeballs, and on the sweater and ski pants Aleksander Kolevatov was wearing, he of the deformed neck. These two were both found in close proximity near the makeshift den they’d created. It’s interesting to note that even after being exposed to running water for a few months, the radiation level in the clothes was still significant.

Was it something in the water, then? Unlikely, as neither of the other two hikers found in the same spot had any trace on their clothes. Also, the sweater Dubinina was wearing was not hers.

While it was not formally identified during the investigation, it’s been speculated that it belonged to Yuri Krivonischenko. If you recall, and I’d be impressed if you did as it was several thousand words ago, Krivonischenko had worked in a nuclear facility and was involved in the clean-up after the Kyshtym nuclear accident. Now, I don’t know how easy it is to get a lot of radiation on your jumper and for it to still be significantly radioactive two years later but at least that’s kind of a reason for his clothes to have traces on them.

As for why Kolevatov’s clothes also tested positive? Apparently both he and Krivonischenko had previously trekked in a site known to have been contaminated by the Kyshtym explosion on more than one occasion so maybe that’s how they picked it up although again, it seems like they would have needed to pick up a whole lot for there to be such high amounts still left over. Were they smuggling radioactive samples to the CIA in some sort of undercover operation after all?

Your guess is as good as mine.

So there you have it, a mystery that everybody has an opinion on but nobody can explain every aspect. While it can’t be everything, maybe it was a combination of things like a wayward rocket exploded by the camp which then also set off an avalanche. Hey, now that I mention it, that does seem a very plausible theory. Newsflash - we’ve cracked the case!

Or, like when I mentioned this to my daughter, she immediately suggested a murderer broke into the tent and set a radioactive animal on the group. Um, yeah. Maybe I should keep a closer eye on what she’s watching on YouTube.

Now, there is a granite memorial to the 9 dead hikers at the pass that’s been named after them and the Dyatlov Pass Incident with its wide range of tantalising clues and theories will remain one of those weird, unknown events that keeps history interesting.

Katy Watson

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the Dyatlov Pass Incident?

The Dyatlov Pass Incident refers to the mysterious deaths of nine experienced hikers in the Ural Mountains of Russia in February 1959. The hikers, led by Igor Dyatlov, were found dead under strange circumstances, with some exhibiting severe injuries and others with no apparent signs of trauma.

What were the conditions like when the hikers set up camp?

The hikers set up camp on the side of a mountain in the northern Ural region of Russia. The weather was extremely cold, with temperatures around -16 degrees Celsius during the day and dropping to around -26 degrees Celsius at night.

What happened to the hikers during the night?

During the night, an unknown event caused the hikers to flee their tent in a panic, cutting their way out from the inside. Their bodies were later found scattered around the area, some with severe injuries and others with no obvious signs of trauma.

What were some of the unusual findings at the scene?

Some of the hikers had severe injuries, including missing eyeballs and a missing tongue. Two hikers had high levels of radiation on their clothes, and others had burns on their bodies. Additionally, strange lights in the sky were reported around the time of the incident.

What was the official explanation for the hikers’ deaths?

The official explanation given by the authorities was that the hikers died due to an ‘overwhelming force’ that they were unable to overcome. This vague explanation did not provide a clear cause of death and left many questions unanswered.

What are some of the theories about what happened to the hikers?

Various theories have been proposed, including an avalanche, animal attack, KGB involvement, rocket launches, and even extraterrestrial activity. None of these theories have been definitively proven, and the case remains unsolved.

What was the significance of the radiation found on some of the hikers’ clothes?

The radiation found on the clothes of two hikers, Lyudmila Dubinina and Aleksander Kolevatov, has led to speculation about possible nuclear testing or other secret military activities in the area. However, the source of the radiation remains unexplained.

How were the hikers’ bodies found?

The bodies were found over a series of weeks, with the first four bodies discovered on February 27th and the remaining five found on May 5th. The bodies were scattered around the area, with some found near a cedar tree and others in a makeshift den.

What was the role of the Mansi people in the incident?

The Mansi people, who are indigenous to the region, have been speculated to have been involved in the incident. However, there is no evidence to support this theory, and the Mansi people aided in the search for the hikers and used their dogs to help discover the bodies.

What is the current status of the Dyatlov Pass Incident?

The case remains unsolved, and the Dyatlov Pass Incident continues to be a subject of fascination and speculation. A granite memorial has been erected at the pass named after the hikers, and the incident remains one of the most mysterious and unexplained events in history.

Sources

• Original Decoding the Unknown video: The Mystery of the Hollinwell Incident #shorts
• Hero image source by Alisdare Hickson from Woolwich, United Kingdom / openverse, by-sa.