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E002 Dyatlov Pass Part 1
4.2k Plays6 years ago
When a group of highly-educated, highly-dedicated friends decided to hike Kholat Syakhl they never would have guessed the turn their well-thought-out plan would take. What the Russian Government would label as death due to "hypothermia" has been in question for some time. What in those mountains could have caused their strange and violent injuries, which could lie beyond human understanding? Part 1 of this episode focuses on the people and why this group of friends never made it home.
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Transcript
Introduction to Baba Yaga's Legend
00:00:01
Speaker
Let me begin today by telling you about a woman. Her name is Baba Yaga or Baba Yaga. Much like human nature and our own capacity for both good and evil, Baba Yaga too is both. Sometimes she is kind, charitable, helpful, if you're good, and if you earn her help.
00:00:28
Speaker
But if you are bad or you fail her tasks as the legend goes, well, she is far from the sweet old lady. Picture yourself in the land of her legend, in the snows of the Russian Ural Mountains. You've been walking for days when you find, far in the distance, what looks like a hut at the edge of the woods,
00:00:56
Speaker
But it's not like any hut you've ever seen. This hut looks unnaturally tall, like it's on stilts. At least it's surrounded by... Are those lights?
00:01:11
Speaker
You're exhausted from your journey. You draw closer. After all, it is cold. As you step nearer, you notice first the glow from what you thought were lamp posts, but they're not lamp posts at all. They're illuminated human skulls. And that strangely tall hut, it's not on stilts, but has chicken legs growing from the bottom of its structure.
00:01:42
Speaker
Upon recognizing this hut as that of Baba Yaga from Slavic legend, you recoil in horror at the recollection not of her bony legs, though those are associated with her potentially hellish origin, but of her teeth. You see the sweet grandmother figure of the helpful Baba Yaga?
00:02:05
Speaker
can be replaced with an old crone with a long nose and vacant eyes. And her smile, in your mind's eye, you can see her lips creep up at the corners of her mouth, bending upward ever so slightly to reveal the iron spikes for teeth that are used to devour children and to grind human bones to dust.
00:02:35
Speaker
No, you tell yourself. Stories like those aren't real, but you soon realize evil is. And if I believe in good spirits, guardian angels, mustn't there also be the opposite? What if Baba Yaga and her capacity for evil isn't just a legend after all?
Introduction to 'Coffee and Cases' Podcast
00:03:06
Speaker
Welcome to Coffee and Cases where we like our coffee hot and our cases cold. My name is Allison Williams and I'm Maggie Dabron. We will be telling stories each week in the hopes that someone out there with any information concerning the cases will take those tips of law enforcement so justice and closure can be brought to these families.
00:03:23
Speaker
With each case, we encourage you to continue in the conversation on our Facebook page because these families will tell you conversation helps keep their missing family members in the public's eye and help keep their memory alive. So sit back, sip your coffee, and listen to what's brewing this week.
00:04:13
Speaker
I know last week Maggie we were practically in our own backyard.
00:04:18
Speaker
I know. I'm so excited for this week. I know. Well, this week we are, and for the next two weeks actually, this week and next week, we are halfway across the globe in Russia.
Dyatlov Pass Incident: Setting the Scene
00:04:28
Speaker
Never been there. No, me neither. Last week we dealt in realistic speculation of what might have happened. This week and next week, in addition to the realistic, well, there's also the fanciful, the speculation of other dimensions, other worlds, of yetis.
00:04:47
Speaker
So this is going to be a complete shift. I had heard of this case before.
00:04:56
Speaker
But trust me, if you are interested, you could literally spend weeks reading through, actually longer, all there is to find about this case. And I use no hyperbole here. I would say, and Maggie can attest to this because she's seen me walking around the hallways with stacks of papers. I have read no less than, I'm gonna say 900 pages of information about this case. Oh my God.
00:05:25
Speaker
I go a little overboard, it's okay. However, it is one of those cases where the more you read, the more questions you have, which is why we are going to take two weeks to tell it. As we go through this case, you will find yourself asking why, asking how, and for some, the questions I asked in the introduction about Baba Yaga,
00:05:52
Speaker
Could it be when realistic explanations don't suffice that there could be something maybe even outside of our human capacity to explain? Those are some of the things that we're gonna be talking about. But I'm getting ahead of myself. So Maggie, I'm gonna start with the who and the where. Okay.
00:06:15
Speaker
The story this week and next week involves many characters who I want to introduce you to, Maggie. Most of them were current or past students of the Yuri Polytechnical Institute. I didn't even mess up on the Russian word there. Yuri Polytechnical Institute in Sverdlovsk.
00:06:34
Speaker
So just so you guys know, we are not Russian. Not even close. No. I do have a Russian student who helped us with some of the names. That is true. But we're probably going to struggle a little with the names. And it's okay. Yeah. You will enjoy the story nonetheless. Yes.
00:06:51
Speaker
Now, I don't know what you listeners or you Maggie imagine when you picture Russia. If it's kind of the way I feel like other Americans picture New York, there's this tendency to think that all of New York State looks like New York City. Truth, it doesn't. There's a lot of farmland in New York. Similarly, if you were picturing the setting of our story to be some bustling metropolis like Moscow, you would be wrong again.
00:07:19
Speaker
This story is set in and around an area where open countryside was not rare. A place where skiing was a common pastime. And Maggie, I'm not talking about like swooshing down the slope skiing. I'm talking about trekking with skis and backpacks of supplies and camping in negative 20 degree weather.
00:07:42
Speaker
I don't ski nor do I camp. I went skiing once. My dad took me and I remember I kept my legs in the pie shape the whole entire time and there were like four year olds who were zooming past me. But I can't do that and I don't camp. No. So I can't imagine
00:08:02
Speaker
skiing and camping without the like lodge with the hot chocolate, the fireplace, all of that stuff. So that is what the men and women of our story though were no strangers to was that kind of skiing that I'm talking about. They were no strangers to the challenges that you would face trekking across
00:08:26
Speaker
open snowy landscapes. In fact, they were pros. The reason these students who I'm getting ready to tell you about were gathered together in room 531 of the Ural Polytechnical Institute. Gosh, I can't see.
00:08:41
Speaker
Eventually. They were frantically packing up all of the last-minute supplies was because they were about to undertake the daunting task of a roughly 16-day trek across Otorton Mountain and Kolot Siackel.
00:09:00
Speaker
nearly 200 miles of very difficult and sometimes even
The Dyatlov Group: Background and Journey
00:09:05
Speaker
treacherous terrain. And that makes sense because it was just this kind of trek that would earn them their grade three. And I read that in a lot of the research so I looked it up. And at the time a grade three certification was the Soviet Union's highest level hiker certification. So it's like proof of how good of a hiker you are.
00:09:27
Speaker
Okay, so I was wondering if it was for fun or if it was like for school, but I guess it was for fun? Yes. Okay. This was their idea of fun. Okay. It's getting their hiking certification. And as you can imagine, you would not go from being a novice hiker and skier like myself to trying this challenging task.
00:09:49
Speaker
These young people were already very, very experienced. I listened to several other podcast episodes about this particular event that I'm gonna talk to you about today. And according to one gentleman, Ben, and the research he completed for his Dark Histories podcast episode on the incident, great podcast, check it out, I was able to find the following descriptions of the hikers.
00:10:18
Speaker
First, we have Igor Dyatlov. He was 23. As you can imagine, since the place where this case for this week and next week took place is called the Dyatlov Pass, he was the leader of the group.
00:10:33
Speaker
Oh, right. Yes. He was an engineer and an inventor as well. In fact, the group took with him, I read in all these different accounts, a stove that he had built for this tent because he's an engineer. So he builds things.
00:10:49
Speaker
He had built this stove, and the stove worked so well that all of the people who were on this trip with him, according to diary entries, would fight about who had to sleep next to it because it was so hot. That's impressive, and he's only 23. Right.
00:11:08
Speaker
When we talk about the tent where they're staying, at least you now have some sort of an idea. It was a warm tent. Like it's not, even though they're in negative 20 degree weather, and that alone is impressive to me that you can create a stove that will just keep you so warm. In fact, that you don't want to sleep next to it.
00:11:25
Speaker
I'm just impressed that they height 16 miles. Is that what you said? Negative 20 degree weather? Yes. You guys go. Good job. No, 16 days. 16 days. 16 miles. 16 days. Okay, even better. Super impressive. Yeah. Next was Yuri Dorshenko, 21.
00:11:46
Speaker
also an engineering student like Dyatloff. Rumor has it that on a previous expedition, Maggie, armed with only a geologist's hammer, which is like this teeny tiny hammer. Well, you would use it to like, I guess, pick at stone to get... Not like delicate. Right. He had charged down a bear. Oh, so it's not like Thor's hammer. No. Okay. It's a big bow and arrow where you could, you know, you could be far away from the bear. No, you would have to be pretty close. What are you gonna do, gouges, Aya?
00:12:16
Speaker
You know, my daughter told me that the only way to scare a bear away was to try to act bigger than it and not to run or act dead. And I just kept thinking those were the only two things I would do. I would run or I would drop. I definitely would not be like Yuri Doroshenko and charge at a bear. With a pig. Yeah. Would not do that.
00:12:38
Speaker
Even though the rock pick is made to break up stone, I'm telling you, I would have to hold it in my hand, which means I would have to get close to the bear. That's not happening.
00:12:50
Speaker
Also in the group was Ludmila Dubinina. She was called Luda for short. So we will call her Luda. We can handle that. At age 20, she was the baby of the group. But again, according to stories about her own previous trips, Maggie, she was also no one to discount. Now she didn't charge down a bear, but on a past trip, the economics student was accidentally shot
00:13:18
Speaker
when a fellow hiker was cleaning his gun and instead of complaining about it, no fuss, she apologized to her fellow hikers for slowing down their progress. So I'm imagining me at 20. That was not that long ago. I am pretty positive. I was like writing a paper, complaining about my life.
00:13:43
Speaker
The internet was probably down at my small college. You were crying. I was probably, yeah. I was beating. I might have been tanning. Needing your emotions. Yeah. I wasn't hiking. Not getting shot by the low hikers. And just keeping on trucking. Right.
00:14:00
Speaker
Joining them also was Yuri Krivonashenko. There we go, got it. Krivonashenko, age 23. He was a member of the group that I think you always need on a trip like this when stress and tediousness of the task can get to you because from all accounts, he was the Joker.
00:14:21
Speaker
Okay, so he lightened the mood. Yes. He was a construction and hydraulics student, but what the group loved about him was not his ability related to school. It was that he was always singing and playing his mandolin.
00:14:37
Speaker
Well, I guess if you're going to be gone that long, you need entertainment. So, pack your mandolin. Just play. Yeah. Just sing. In fact, even though the group had sworn off cigarettes for the trip to stay focused, he did pack his mandolin so he could play for them and they could have some sort of
00:14:58
Speaker
enjoyment and stress relief. Beyond puffing a cigarette. Right. According to an interview posted on the extensively researched dietloftpass.com website with Yuri's brother, he stated, and I love this, that his brother's favorite song was, and I quote, I love you life and I hope that it's mutual. Aww.
00:15:23
Speaker
That is sweet. I know. I wish my students had that philosophy, but no, they're kind of negative. Yes. Rustam Slobodan, age 23, the fifth of the group.
00:15:39
Speaker
seemed a bit more straight-laced, but only just a little bit more. I say this because Rustam, a mechanical engineer born into a wealthy family in his diary, not only had the words to a popular student song at the time,
00:15:54
Speaker
But also, so there's like the lighthearted parts because he's writing down, you know, song lyrics. But he also had a running dictionary of man-see words. And we're gonna talk about the man-see people a little bit today and next week. They are the people indigenous to the area of the Urals where the team was hiking.
00:16:15
Speaker
So my husband is also an engineer. He is a civil engineer so he works on roads and I'm like trying to picture him packing for a 16-day like trek across Russian wilderness.
00:16:29
Speaker
I think he would survive a few days, but he likes the comforts of home. I don't know that he could do 16 days. Oh. I don't think I would last an hour. No. I really don't. I would complain so hard. I know. Or I'd be holding it in but secretly crying and my tears freezing to my face as I'm walking.
00:16:50
Speaker
Alexander Kalevitov. I'm really working on it. I'll get their first names. Age 24, one of the oldest of the group at age 24. So this is a young group. Yeah. He was no different than the others in that he was intelligent and well-educated. I mean these are all students of this Polytechnical Institute. He, Alexander, was studying nuclear physics. Oh my. Yes. Okay.
00:17:12
Speaker
And from what I read in several sources was somehow involved in supervising nuclear power and potentially nuclear weapons. So pretty like high class, highly classified stuff. Yeah, all very important jobs, important people. Yes.
00:17:31
Speaker
Zeneda Kolmogorova, Zena, for short. Got it. Was 22, just like the others. She was intelligent. She was friendly. She was also a student at the Institute, but she was a student who everyone knew and everyone liked. She was studying radio engineering and was also an experienced hiker who had her own tales to tell. Once on a previous trip, she was bitten by a viper and continued on like everything was normal. Are those poison eggs?
00:18:00
Speaker
Yeah so Luda shot continues on. Zena bitten by a snake just keeps on going keeps on trucking. Maggie reads about it and is like not today. But you know I wonder if part of it now I know obviously I no matter what time period I was born in I would not be strong enough to
00:18:24
Speaker
handle that. But I wonder if part of it was the time because it makes me think of the story of my grandma and she was picking flowers. She had a sick neighbor so she was picking flowers in her front yard. She had this huge like rolling slope of a front yard that was filled with flowers. So she was picking flowers for a neighbor fell while she was picking flowers broke her arm
00:18:48
Speaker
and just continued picking flowers, took them to her sick neighbor, and then called my dad and was like, I think I need to go to the hospital. And so I do not have that kind of grit. No. That's not me. So when did this happen? 1959. 1959. OK. And I mean, what my grandma had was grit, and Zina had it too. And Luda, well, every member. All of them. All of them had it.
00:19:19
Speaker
Yuri Yudin, age 21, was an economic student at the Institute. While he is the sole surviving member of the group for reasons that Maggie Yu will soon see, he was also someone who tied the group together in thought. While Yuri suffered from rheumatism, sciatica, his journals,
00:19:41
Speaker
that I've read his diary entries. They're filled with gratitude for the kindness of others. They're filled with philosophical comments about the need for deep conversations and even for songs that can bond us together that have messages for the soul instead of what he called song trinkets. So like, you know, just the little ditties that get caught in your head, but they don't really have meaning to them. These people are so well-rounded. I know.
00:20:08
Speaker
at only 23, 21. Again, I don't think I was anywhere close to that. It's pretty impressive. Rounding out the team was Nikolai Thabo-Brignoles, age 23. Nikolai was a civil engineer. There you go. Go easy. He played the role of another important figure in a friend travel group.
00:20:32
Speaker
the parent role. That would be you. I know. I would be like, do you need a band-aid? Oh no, you're sick. Here, let me take care of you. Here, let me start the fire and your tent. Oh, let me make some cookies. Yeah, that's me. Although he, Nikolai, had told his family and others that this would be his final trip, he was ready to take on that caring fatherly role one final time. And unfortunately,
00:20:59
Speaker
It was, yes, the final, the final time. So it was with a frantic, yes, but also with excited spirit that the group left Sverdlosk on January 23rd, 1959, my birthday, I mean not the 59 part, this is 20 years earlier, but yes, January 23rd.
Journey into the Mountains
00:21:21
Speaker
For what we listeners now know would be, and for most of them anyway, their final expedition,
00:21:29
Speaker
We know from the extensive, and at times meticulous, diary entries that the group made several stops along their way to Orton Mountain and Colette Seachel. I think this was part of them getting that grade 3 certification that they had to keep track and give proof.
00:21:49
Speaker
So they're keeping diaries, they're snapping photographs all along the way. So that way there's photographic evidence. That they were there and they just didn't disappear for so many days. And make it up, right. We did it. One of those stops was when Yuri Kravanashenko, remember he's the jokester,
00:22:07
Speaker
was actually detained by authorities because he was singing too loudly on one of the trains that they were taking to get there. I thought you just meant like in the wilderness. Oh no. Why are there policemen in the wilderness? No. At that particular stop
00:22:25
Speaker
Yuri Yudin noted in his diary that the group was also welcomed at a school near the train station. It was at the school before the group re-boarded a train to Evedale on January 25th that the group were literally mobbed by curious kids at this school. They wanted to see the
00:22:44
Speaker
They wanted to hear about all of the hikers past journeys. They wanted to ask them questions and they were happy to oblige. Like they were giving talks to these kids and the kids were just enthralled. I feel like that's a normal reaction though. I think our kids would be super excited if someone came and like you were like a class three hiker and you could tell about the time you were bitten by a viper and shot in the leg and stabbed a bear. All of that good stuff.
00:23:14
Speaker
So when the time came for the team to depart, and this is according to both Yuri Yudin's diary and Luda's diary, the whole group of children literally followed them to the train station to see them off and they even cried. Yes, begging Zena to stay with them because they loved her. Remember, she's the one who everybody at the Polytechnical Institute just loved.
00:23:39
Speaker
At some point along the way, in different accounts and I've never been able to get a clear, clear picture of this, another hiker had joined the group and he's a little bit of a mystery.
00:23:54
Speaker
While the oldest of the original Dyatlov 9 was only 24, a 37-year-old man asked to join the group in hopes to earn time to receive a certification as well. This man's name is Semyon Zolotaryov, but he went for some reason by the name of Sasha. So he didn't go by.
00:24:18
Speaker
his birth name. He was a decorated military veteran and a bachelor. And while it's said that he often visited his mother, that's about as much as we know about him. He was a man of few words, but his body was covered with tattoos that while unspoken of to the group seemed to be filled with meaning.
00:24:41
Speaker
I mean, I can only assume if you're gonna get, I mean, there are some people who get random tattoos today, but I feel like- Most have a meaning or a purpose. Something related to your past or your identity. Those tattoos that Sasha had included a five-pointed star, 1921, the year of his birth. That one seems a little odd to me. Like, why would you get the year of your birth tattooed?
00:25:06
Speaker
then you can never lie about your age. Yeah, that's true. Can't pretend like you're of age. The name Guiana, initials of three individuals. One of the initials was his own initial in it. And it was written as an equation that equaled a symbol for friendship, but we don't know who the other two people are. Okay. A heart with the letter C and another tattoo that according to one of the sources I read looks
00:25:34
Speaker
basically like gibberish. So obviously there's some sort of secret meaning to it that we will never know, much like a lot of the mysteries of this incident itself. So these 20-year-olds are hiking with the almost 40-year-old tatted military bed? Yes. Okay. Yes.
00:25:54
Speaker
From the time the group got off the train, the trip for the now group of 10, because remember we had the nine from the Polytechnical Institute and now Sasha has joined them, became, their trek became much more off the beaten path as the group then took a bus for the next leg of their journey before then taking the back of a truck
00:26:21
Speaker
community called the 41st District. Now I'm going to post pictures of these on our website, but I'm going to show Maggie. There's a picture of the group in the back of the truck. How would you describe the way they look?
00:26:33
Speaker
Besides cold, I would say like your best friends. Like I can see my college friends and I obviously not hiking through the Russian wilderness, but in a very similar pose, like just doing something we were having fun together, just like a hobby we would do.
00:26:51
Speaker
They're laughing. And I even have pictures, again, they're documenting everything, from when they got to that logging community in the 41st District where they then had to hire a sled. So this is getting even more remote, right? They had to hire a sled to an abandoned mining community called the North 2 Settlement.
00:27:20
Speaker
And according to Yuri Doroshenko's diary, he noted, and I quote, Second North is an abandoned geological site consisting of 20 to 25 houses. So they used to, I guess, look for geological minerals and different things there, but it had long since been abandoned. They only found one that was suitable for living and that's where they stayed the night. Here is
00:27:48
Speaker
a picture of that log cabin. And again, they're just kind of getting ready and pictures of them outside of the cabin. Like they're hugging, they're laughing. They're like, they look happy. I mean, this is early on in the trip. Like they're excited. Yeah. They're not tired. Hiking for them is exciting. Yeah. So they were super happy. They found one that was worth living in in complete darkness. They said they found,
00:28:18
Speaker
a village in the house, and this is in the diary again of Yuri Doroshenko. He said, in complete darkness, we found a village in the house. We started a fire with wood boards. Smoke came from the stove. Several people hurt their hands on old nails. Everything is well.
00:28:38
Speaker
Well, I mean, it would be if you got bit by a viper and the worst thing that happened to you on this trip was cutting your hand on a crusty nail. So true. It's all about perspective. And he said, we were talking and joking until three in the morning. So it's like college roommates. Yeah. Right. Just hanging out.
00:28:55
Speaker
On January 28th, so now we're a couple of days in, remember they left the Polytechnical Institute on the 23rd. On the 28th, one of the members of the group, Yuri Yudin, remember he's the one who suffered from rheumatism, sciatica. He was in such extreme pain, Maggie. And I mean, think about how much they'd been looking forward to this trip and planning it and packing it and taking all these notes.
00:29:20
Speaker
And this was a decision that broke his heart at the time because he believed that he would not be achieving a great feat alongside his friends and, well, later broke his heart because of the loss of all of those same friends. Yuri Yudin knew that he would have to turn around and go home, that he would not be able to aid his friends in this journey. And that is why at the beginning I mentioned him as the sole survivor.
00:29:48
Speaker
Oh wow, so good of state. Yes, because of this pain, he said, I can't go on. And that is what saved his life. Wow.
00:30:01
Speaker
When Yuri Yudin left them, his friends promised to send him a telegram when they were headed back to Sverdlovsk. So when they got back into, you know, actual civilization, yes, they would send a telegram to let him know that they were coming back. And they anticipated to be back in Sverdlovsk, according to a lot of the information that I read, by February 12th. Okay, so again,
00:30:28
Speaker
Obviously they're not, I said 16 day trek. They didn't actually begin the trek until they got to the mountain, right? So all of those days of travel to get there on the train and then the bus and then the back of the truck and then the hired sled, right? That's not part of the trek that would count toward their certification. So this is an extensive journey. Yes. So they anticipated that they would be back by February 12th on January 29th.
00:30:58
Speaker
the group set out on their skis to achieve their grade three. Especially exciting likely I would think for Yuri Doroshenko because it was his 21st birthday. So this is like great birthday present. We're going to achieve this. Yes. Day one.
00:31:15
Speaker
We know from their journals that the group had been following the trail of a Mansi reindeer tracker and I don't know if you remember this from the beginning but I mentioned the Mansi. That's that indigenous tribe of the area of the Ural Mountains where the Dyatlov team was hiking and they would mark their path
00:31:33
Speaker
by carving into trees along the way and Maggie I'm going to show you some pictures of those carvings. Again they're taking meticulous record of their trek and I will show these on the website as well but this local tribe would mark their track on the trees. Now how would you describe the markings? They sort of almost look like
00:32:02
Speaker
they're not random like they have to have some type of meaning because there's lines going like diagonal horizontally vertically so I feel like they would have to have some type of meaning and they're a lot longer than what I thought they would be like probably two to three feet long and kind of narrow right
00:32:20
Speaker
So and we know this because again they are keeping meticulous record of this trek and we have photographic evidence from their cameras that they were following this mancy reindeer tracker.
00:32:36
Speaker
So, in one particular frame that I'm gonna post on the website, there's an image of Kravanashenko staring at one of the mancy tree carvings. And we know from their diaries, they keep mentioning the mancy people. They were writing down mancy words and the translation into Russian. And so obviously this is something, a group of people that were in the forefront of their
00:33:02
Speaker
Are they interacting with these people or they just know of these people and that they're from that area? Exactly. They know of these people. These are, again, an indigenous group to this area of the mountains. There wasn't a whole lot of interaction, but according to a lot of what I read, the Mansi people, they're not a violent people. They're kind of like, just keep to ourselves. Like solitary. Yeah.
00:33:28
Speaker
Another seemingly uneventful day passed on January 30th. Most important to note is a diary entry by one of the group, noting that January 30th was Sasha's birthday. So it was almost like, and several of them are gonna have birthdays on this trip, so it was almost like it was this celebratory, let's get our certification, but let's make it extra special by going- On our birthday. Exactly.
00:33:56
Speaker
Now, what's interesting is that the diary entry on January 30th mentioned that it was Sasha's birthday. And he is the 37 year old. He is the 37 year old. However, we know now from records that his actual birthday was November 16th.
00:34:18
Speaker
As the author of dietlawofpass.com has noted, and I will read this quote, if a person chooses a different date for his birthday, that's usually because of a strong affection or life-changing event that happened on that date. But we don't know what that is for Sasha. So he's again, this mystery. On January 31st, the weather began to worsen.
00:34:46
Speaker
And Dyatlov himself wrote in his diary entry that they could only, and I quote, advance gropingly through low visibility and piercing winds. And again, I'm gonna go show Maggie a picture I will post on the website. How would you describe those conditions?
00:35:09
Speaker
So I think it would be described as like a wide out. Isn't that how they describe it? Like for driving conditions, the wind's blowing and it's like picking up the snow and you can't see very far.
00:35:22
Speaker
I think I can see shadows of people up ahead, but you can only make out like the first five people in the line. Right. Definitely low visibility. I mean, if the person at the back of the line can't even see the front of the line, and there are now nine of them because Yuri Yudin, remember, had to go back home, then that's
00:35:41
Speaker
That's pretty low visibility. Are they connected by anything? Not from anything that I've read, that they were just following. Maggie went with peace out. Peace out. On February 1st, so the next day, the group left a bunch of their supplies to lighten their load. Now this, from everything I read, was a common practice for experienced skiers.
00:36:04
Speaker
So, I mean, you can imagine if they're carrying enough food and stuff, yes, a stove, their tent, all of that stuff for 16 days, I mean, that would get pretty heavy. So once they got to this point on February 1st, they would build this kind of elevated,
00:36:22
Speaker
platform so animals couldn't get to it, they would leave a bunch of their equipment and things for the return trip in it so it would lighten their load for the hardest part and then they would then pick it back up on the way back through. Somehow though, even though they're doing everything that an experienced group of hikers should do, that experience would not be enough to save the group from whatever befell them later that night.
00:36:52
Speaker
Now Maggie, I mentioned that on January 31st, Dyatloff wrote in his diary about the piercing winds and the low visibility. On February 1st, their progress was impeded again and the group was forced to stop their travel for the day and to make camp way earlier than what they had planned to.
00:37:11
Speaker
But what's interesting is that instead of making camp along the tree line where you would be protected somewhat from winds, exactly, the group decided to set up camp right on the open mountain side of Kolatsiakal. Now, a lot of articles I read speculated that Dyatlov himself had, you know, maybe he wanted the group to practice setting up the tent under these harsher conditions.
00:37:39
Speaker
And so that way they would practice it and this would be something that they could write in their diary entry. That we're able to do this. Exactly. We've done this. Or maybe, this is another theory that I read, he didn't want them to lose the altitude on the mountain that they had gained because going back to the tree line would have meant retreating.
00:37:58
Speaker
So they would have to recline. Exactly, the next day. So maybe he just wanted, he knew, you know, this is difficult terrain. Let's just stay where we are and not lose ground.
Search and Discovery
00:38:11
Speaker
Again on DyatlofPass.com, there was an official statement from the Junior Counselor of Justice and Criminal Prosecutor of Sverdlovsk Region, Lev Ivanov. He said on 1st February,
00:38:25
Speaker
He began the ascent to the summit at 3 pm, even though he knew about the difficulty of the terrain. Furthermore, and this is still according to Lev Ivanov, and this was Dyatlov's next mistake,
00:38:41
Speaker
He chose a line 500 meters to the left of the planned pass. So the planned path that they meant to take that lies between peak 1079 and peak 880. So the group found themselves basically on the slope of the wrong peak.
00:39:00
Speaker
Which could be a problem if you're in a blizzard-like condition. Right. Like, how would you know where you're headed or whether you're even getting off track if you can't even see nine people in front of you? Well, I can't read a map, so... We'd be lost. I would be like, Google, can you find me this? From the very beginning.
00:39:16
Speaker
Right, so what they did was they used what was left of daylight to ascend as far as they could to the summit in the strong winds, which are typical for this region, and in low temperatures of minus 25 degrees centigrade. And again, I have pictures of the group, and now it's not smiling faces. How would you describe this picture that we're gonna post on the website?
00:39:44
Speaker
It looks very... And this might be the wrong word to describe this, but like very... Like I feel like I'm looking at a picture of like something we would show when we're talking about the Holocaust. It's like very sad, very dark.
00:40:02
Speaker
They look really cold. The tone has shifted. Yeah. There's no smiles. They're covered in snow. Their skis are sticking up in the ground. It's much more like intense. Yeah. Yep. So, and again, according to Lev Ivanov, Dyatlov himself
00:40:22
Speaker
He found himself in these bad conditions for the night, so he decided to pitch his tent on the slope, and again, I'm reading this verbatim, on the slope of 1079, so as to start in the morning without adding the distance from the forest to the remaining trek of about 10 kilometers to the summit. So he was like, we're almost there. We've almost made it to the peak. To get this grade three, let's not retreat.
00:40:49
Speaker
Could this have been done, again, I don't know a lot about Russian climate? Is the weather always like this? From my understanding, pretty much so. Okay. I mean, we're talking like Siberia. So this is very northern Russia. Yes, this is very, very cold. Now, first of all,
00:41:11
Speaker
I don't know about you, Maggie, but the idea of striking camp, well, we wouldn't even be out there, but let's be honest. We'll pretend. But the idea of striking camp, out in the open, on a mountain, remember this mountain that they're on is kolatsiakal.
00:41:28
Speaker
whose name literally translates into Dead Mountain, or even more eerily, Mountain of Death. It's probably not a good omen. No. I probably would be like, maybe. Just call me in the morning and you can wait and I'll trek up from the forest. Right, something that's not called Mountain of Death.
00:41:49
Speaker
Not today. Well remember the group had told Yuri Yudin, the friend who had to head back and who couldn't continue with him, that they anticipated to begin their return February 12th they would send that telegram. That day came and went. No word from the group.
00:42:09
Speaker
Now this alone wasn't enough to raise concern though because... It's bad weather. Exactly. And I can imagine, especially, you know, this isn't the age of cell phones or anything like that. And so this group is in an extremely rural area. Anything could happen that would extend the trip. You could get bitten by a viper. I mean, obviously not in these conditions. You could be attacked by a bear.
00:42:34
Speaker
you know, if they're encountering these poor weather conditions, it could take a lot longer than what they anticipated. So at first, nobody's, you know, raising alarm or super concerned about it.
00:42:45
Speaker
And again, this is an experienced group. So a lot of people have faith in them. But when another week passed with no information from or about the group, friends and family started to get concerned. So on February 21st, search parties began looking. By February 26th,
00:43:08
Speaker
a team of searchers and government investigators. So this went like super high up to the government very quickly. Yes. Found the Dyatlov tent. Okay. So that's good. Yes. So they're like, okay, well we have found, so here's a picture of what they found in terms of the tent. What do you notice about the tent? Well, at first I thought it had been burnt, but then I'm looking at it.
00:43:38
Speaker
More, like, closer. That wasn't good grammar, by the way. And it looks like it's collapsed. Like, there's been so much snow on it that it spilled down. And there's some type of cross in the background. Or like, skis or something. Right. Some sort of equipment. Something sticking out of the ground. Well, intent at this word is very liberal. This is an intent. Loosely used. What they found was interesting
00:44:09
Speaker
because inside the tent were nearly all of the group's belongings, including working flashlights, ice picks, skis, jackets, winter boots, all of these items that could have been used for safety, warmth, and protection if you were going to leave. What they also found
00:44:38
Speaker
was that there were three cuts in the side of the tent. How are you gonna fend off the bear without the pig? Right, why leave it? And these cuts that were in the tent, Maggie, they were not made from something or someone on the outside trying to get in, but from someone on the inside desperate to get out.
00:45:05
Speaker
Oh no, this took a whole new turn. I love the anxiety is rising. The 37 year old chopped them. Is that your theory? Yes. We're going to talk about theories next week. Outside the tent was no less peculiar because when investigators were able to locate the footprints of the team from their observations, there were only nine sets of footprints leaving the tent.
00:45:35
Speaker
So if somebody came along maybe and tried to attack them, there would be more than nine sets of footprints, because there's only nine of them. Meaning that from their estimation, there was no physical person or animal, because there are also no animal tracks, which had driven them into the cold and out of safety. So again, I can imagine, you know, if some stranger showed up in the tent and then wouldn't let me out the front entrance,
00:46:00
Speaker
it would make sense why you would cut the side of the tent to get out or if there's an animal that's trying to get to you and it's blocking the front entrance. So you would have to cut into this because why would you cut into the side of the tent knowing that is your safety and there would have to be something blocking the front entrance. And if we saw their footprints we should see the footprints of whatever caused the mayhem. Exactly. So but we don't.
00:46:29
Speaker
We have nine sets of footprints and we have cuts from the inside of the tent as if someone is desperate to get out of the tent in order to get to safety. But here's what's even freakier.
00:46:44
Speaker
The nine sets of footprints that they found, despite the seemingly frantic sign of the slashed tent, because to me that seems frantic. I mean, if you're splashing the tent to get out, you are desperate. The footprints that they found, and I guess they could tell this from the forensic experts that I read by the depth of the footprint and then the drag of it and the size of it, that they were made by individuals who were not running out of fear.
00:47:14
Speaker
but instead we're walking calmly of their own accord. So we've slashed the tent in an attempt to get away from something in the tent and we are gonna walk away calmly of our own accord. Which means that no one was being drug or anything like that.
00:47:41
Speaker
leisurely walking away and just wait because if that doesn't if that isn't odd enough for you they could tell by the size of the prints in the snow that the Dyatlov team went out into the deadly cold barefoot. Okay, immediately I thought of Lieutenant Dan.
00:48:05
Speaker
Why is that? In Forrest Gump, he tells them to protect their feet, to keep their feet dry. Right. Because your feet are your most important part. And that's absolutely, especially when you're in 28 degrees. Right. And you're walking in feet of snow.
00:48:22
Speaker
So they slashed the tent frantic to get out. I would run just if I was barefoot in the snow. If nothing was chasing me. I can think of like when I go to the beach and there's hot sand and I'm like, ooh, ooh, ooh. Like running to the right. I would be doing the same thing just to snow. No, they were walking leisurely away of their own accord, but without shoes.
00:48:47
Speaker
So then you start questioning, what could possibly have happened that would make them do such a thing? What was it that could make an escape into the snow barefoot seem a safer option than staying in that extremely warm tent with that stove? Why the frantic cuts, but the calm descent out of the tent and
00:49:15
Speaker
If the escape from the tent were not rushed, right, if they were just walking away, what could possibly have motivated the group to leave behind essentials that any experienced hiker or, for that matter, even any logical person would know that they would need if they were to survive in this climate? So even though there are these frantic slashes,
00:49:44
Speaker
If they have the, like, what's the word I wanna use? Like, with it-ness enough to calmly walk away, why would they have not put shoes on? Or grabbed a flashlight. Grabbed a flashlight. Grabbed a weapon. Grabbed something that they would need to survive.
00:50:05
Speaker
On February 27th, the investigators followed the footprint trail and traces of a small fire that had been built by members of the team that they found under a large tree. So they're searching for the bodies, they see the footprints, they follow them, and they're able to see the remains of some small fire. So whatever happened was bad enough that they did not want to go back to retrieve their jacket. Right.
00:50:28
Speaker
So there's this small fire that had been built under a large cedar tree. And interestingly, from what I read, and I, again, I'm not an outdoorsy person, I don't know, but there were branches that were seen broken on that large tree up to 15 feet off of the ground. So then we start questioning,
00:50:51
Speaker
What were the members of this group doing climbing this tree? Were they trying to see their tent maybe because the snow is so blinding and they're trying to find their way back, right? Maybe they built a fire because they're like, listen, for some reason they left the tent and now they're trying to get back to it and they can't see it? Because again, you couldn't even see nine people in front of you and now we're talking about, you know, longer than a football field away.
00:51:19
Speaker
So could it be that they were trying to climb a tree to? To kind of see distance wise? Right, to see if they could locate it. Was there some danger on the ground? And they're climbing the tree to try to escape it? So what were they doing? Well, upon closer search, the investigators found near the small fire, the bodies of Yuri Doroshenko and Yuri Kravana Schenko.
00:51:49
Speaker
Now, while investigators might have known ahead of time what to expect in terms of this oddity of no shoes on the victims, they knew that because they could tell by the footprints. They could not possibly have suspected what else they found.
00:52:06
Speaker
The two young men, while wearing shirts only and no coats, one of them wearing a short-sleeved shirt and the other a long-sleeved shirt also had on no pants. Now we know that whatever happened to them happened about six to eight hours after they had eaten.
00:52:25
Speaker
So I'm guessing in the middle of the night, so they were already dressed for bed, and if the stove is warm, that Dyatlov built is so warm that it almost like burned you out of the tent, it wouldn't make sense that they were sleeping in, you know, like shorts and a t-shirt or something like that. What doesn't make sense to me, again, is if they are walking away
00:52:49
Speaker
calmly of their own accord, not in a rush, knowing that you're going out into negative 20 degree weather, that hypothermia is sure death in just a matter of a short time, why you wouldn't have grabbed in other clothing and different things like that. So, Doronashenko, he had on only shorts.
00:53:15
Speaker
And Kravana Schenko had on only underwear, in addition to the shirt. And Dora Schenko was found with ripped shorts and his socks were burnt. Now, I don't know if he was standing too close to this fire. They just spilled. Were they on his feet?
00:53:32
Speaker
Yes, they were on his feet. I was going to say maybe they used them to start a fire. So maybe he was trying to stay in too close to it. Maybe they got wet, you know, when he was trying to dry them out or something like that. But interestingly, Doroshenko's hair was also burnt on the right side of his head. His hands
00:53:51
Speaker
and the autopsy had ripped skin. Now they did find in that tree that had all the broken branches, they found chunks of skin in the bark. So again, like you're desperate to try to climb it. Right. So that could explain the rips in the skin on the palm of his hands. They also found gray foam.
00:54:12
Speaker
on his cheek that had come from his mouth and they speculated that it was caused by some sort of chest trauma. Now I did read one source that said maybe when he was climbing the tree he had fallen out of the tree so like some sort of chest trauma we don't know though. According to several sources and this is a little bit again more peculiar
00:54:36
Speaker
I was reading about liver mortis spots on his body and I didn't know what that was, but those are the spots. They occur about two hours after death from pulled blood, so it would turn like darker, right? But they were found on the back of his neck, these liver mortis spots. But that's not consistent.
00:54:58
Speaker
with the position that his body was found in. So his blood would have pulled differently. Yes. And the cause of death, as it's listed in official documents, hypothermia. Probably because they didn't know what else to say. Right. Kravanashenko, remember he's the other body that was found at the same time as Dorashenko, was found with bruises on his forehead and on his left temple.
00:55:26
Speaker
He had bruises on his left arm, on his left thigh, and on the right side of his chest. A chunk of a knuckle on his right hand was found during the autopsy in his own mouth. Now, some speculations. Again, everything we're gonna talk about, it ranges from the normal explainable to normal.
00:55:53
Speaker
bit more grotesque. So there's some speculation that maybe he was biting his hands to try to get blood flow in it because again they don't have gloves on so he's very cold. He's biting his hands so he can you know keep the blood flow right in it or a bit darker. Was he biting his knuckle to stifle a scream or a cry?
00:56:20
Speaker
Cause of death for Kravanashenko. Also, hypothermia. No, I don't. Between the remains of the fire and the group's tent, searchers quickly also found the bodies of Zena, Dyatlov, and Rustom.
00:56:45
Speaker
It was almost as if they were desperately trying to get back to that tent, warmed by the very stove that they used to complain about that now held out their only hope for survival. So they were found between that small fire and the tent, like they were trying to get back. Like I would be doing? Yes. Zena was found better dressed than the previous two.
00:57:10
Speaker
She had hats on, multiple hats, and sweaters that had torn cuffs, which have, that's led a lot of people to speculate maybe she tore it off of someone else to add another layer of clothing. And again, I don't know what I would do in terms of survival, but that would be hard. And you mentioned the Holocaust earlier, and I know that that happened quite often, that you almost have to break off that idea that if someone has passed away,
00:57:39
Speaker
you know, that you have to respect what's on their body. Because again, if you need that thing for survival, whether it's shoes or a jacket, you would then take it because it's no longer doing that other person
Unexplained Injuries and Deaths
00:57:53
Speaker
any good. So a lot of speculation is that the reason why this sweater had torn cuffs had died. Maybe the first two were found like that because otherwise took their clothes because they had already passed away.
00:58:03
Speaker
So she had these sweaters on, she also had ski pants on and three pair of socks, but she had some odd injuries just like the others. She had frostbitten fingers, right? Again, you can imagine, right? Even with gloves and socks and all of that. And she had a large bruise all the way around her right side.
00:58:32
Speaker
her cause of death was ruled hypothermia due to a, quote, violent accident. Meaning something happened and she couldn't move, so she froze to death. Right. That something had happened to cause, I guess, this major bruising on her right side. And then because of that injury, hypothermia. Everything about this case is extremely vague. And odd. Yes.
00:59:02
Speaker
Dyatlov, when they found him, and remember this is called Dyatlov Pass, he was the leader of the group, he had on ski pants as well and a coat and mismatched socks. He had a lot of small abrasions on his face, so like little scrapes and on his right arm and bruises on his right hand that are common from being in a fist fight.
00:59:23
Speaker
which is weird because the people they found at the small fire also had like the bruises on their face, maybe they fought each other. They had bruises everywhere, possibly. But again, like we saw the pictures. I find it hard to believe that this group that are like smiling, happy, taking pictures with each other, would all of a sudden turn on each other, right? And they're getting in trouble, not for fighting in public, but for singing songs together too loudly. So it seems,
00:59:53
Speaker
odd, these injuries right here. Will Dyatlov's cause of death? Hypothermia. Again. Again. Roostum was found better dressed still. He had on a sweater over other layers of shirts, had on two pair of pants, four pair of socks, and a single boot on his right foot.
01:00:19
Speaker
I guess part of my confusion when reading about this case is if the tent is so warm, logically to me it would make sense why some were sleeping in like a t-shirt and shorts or whatever, but then why are others so much better dressed? Why a single boot?
01:00:41
Speaker
These are questions that just keep. Because it's like you had time to put on multiple sweaters. Or if some people did. But only time to put on one boot. Right. And then some people had time to do nothing. Right. He had blood discharged from his nose, bruises on both of his hands, common to bruising from being in a fist fight.
01:01:05
Speaker
He also had a fractured frontal lobe of his skull and hemorrhaging in his temples akin to being hit with a blunt object.
01:01:20
Speaker
Oddly, he was found on his back but had no bruising or injuries on the back of his head. So he hadn't fallen backwards in this final moment of life because there's no bruising on the back of his head. What many believe is that he had fallen potentially multiple times into the snow face first.
01:01:43
Speaker
because the skull fracture placement is near the front of his head. So they said well you know maybe he fell and there was a rock under the snow and he hit his head on the rock causing the injury. But what doesn't make sense about that theory
01:02:02
Speaker
is that all of the injuries on his hands were on the tops of his hands. And if you were falling, what do you not naturally put out? To catch yourself. To catch yourself. So why would there be bruising on the backs of his hands as if he's been in a fist fight?
01:02:20
Speaker
There's an injury on his skull, like being hit with a blunt object, but if he were falling, if the injury on his skull was caused by a rock under the snow or something explainable, why would he have not tried to stop himself in the fall? Those are the things that don't make sense to me. So it's clear that he had done nothing to break his fall. Well, despite the fractured skull,
01:02:50
Speaker
Cause of death? Hypothermia. Hypothermia. Okay, so what we've talked about so far, that accounts for five of the members of this nine-member team. The other four members of the team wouldn't be found until the snow had melted nearly two months later.
01:03:10
Speaker
when a Mansi hunter, remember the indigenous tribe, and his dog were able to locate the bodies. On May 4th, and some accounts I read said May 5th, so somewhere around May 4th, May 5th, they found a makeshift den that had been built nearly 250 feet deeper into the woods from the tall tree.
01:03:31
Speaker
So they're all still relatively close though. Right, where Dorshenko and Kravana Shango had been found. They found the bodies there of the remaining four members of the team. Nikolai, Sasha,
01:03:44
Speaker
Kalebitov and Luda. Nikolai and Sasha, when they were found, were warmly dressed, even appropriate for the weather. So what that has led a lot of people to believe is that they were actually outside the tent, potentially, when the threat, whatever that threat was, happened. Because most notably,
01:04:08
Speaker
They both had on both of their shoes. So they're thinking. They weren't in a rush. Right, maybe they were already outside of the tent when whatever threat happened, happened. Nikolai had a fracture to the temporal bone of his head that led to cracks extending to his frontal bone. Now Maggie, I'm gonna show you a drawn image of his skull with this injury.
01:04:39
Speaker
So what does that look like to you? It looks like someone hit him in the head with a club. It's like a perfectly round or oval shaped break on the side of his skull with a line going to the front to his eye. He looks like he got hit with a club. Yes, and what I'm getting ready to read to you, this is from
01:05:05
Speaker
I'm about to get creeped out. A source that I read that included a transcribed interview with a medical doctor concerning nickelized injuries that you just described. Here is what happened in that transcribed interview. The interviewer asked the doctor what could have caused nickelized injuries. The doctor responded that he could have been, and I quote, thrown down from the height of a grown man.
01:05:33
Speaker
The doctor said, again, I quote, he might have slipped and fell, but the fracture of his skull suggests that his injuries are similar to a victim that was dropped with great speed and strength from a quickly moving car. So his injuries are the equivalent of an automobile accident in the middle of the woods. Yes, because his skull is shattered. Shattered.
01:06:04
Speaker
So in other words, these are not injuries that are consistent with anything that a human could inflict upon another human. Cause of death, super vague, fatal injury. Sasha, as I mentioned, I know Maggie is questioning. She's questioning Sasha at every turn, also warmly dressed. When he was found, he had a camera around his neck.
01:06:32
Speaker
This camera holds a mystery in itself. As I mentioned several times, everything about this trip was documented to the T.
01:06:43
Speaker
It was meticulous. It was listed every provision that they had brought everything down to like grams of salt they were talking about before they left for this trip. Well, this camera that was found on Sasha was not the one that he used for the everyday documentation of the trip. And we know this because
01:07:06
Speaker
The police and the investigators consulted with the only surviving member of the group, Yuri Yudin, to say, hey, whose is this? Whose is this? Because otherwise they would have not known, oh, this belonged to an outsider, an intruder who potentially was in the tent, right?
01:07:23
Speaker
And Yuri Yudin accounted for everything that was in the tent, everything that was on each person. He identified, he was like, oh, that's the jacket that I left for, you know, Doroshenko. Yep, that is Luda's diary. That is this. But he had no idea about this second camera. So now you're questioning Sasha even more. Why would he have two cameras?
01:07:51
Speaker
If you only needed one to document that you were there, what would be the need of two? To take pictures of all the crazy stuff you're doing to the rest of the people that you are on this hike with. Why would he have, I guess where I'm super confused is when they left in such a hurry it seemed that some people left without shoes.
01:08:19
Speaker
Why would he have been like, oh, you know what I need? I need my other camera, right, to take with me. What might've been interesting is if we could have seen what was on this other camera. Well, they found the camera on Sasha's body, but it was so water damaged from the melting snow that they weren't really able to save anything from it. But I know you're quick to judge Sasha
01:08:49
Speaker
but wait till you hear about his injuries. He had five broken ribs, fractured each in two places, and his eyeballs were missing. Oh my. Now I feel bad. You judged. Yeah. Cause of death, violent injury. Yeah, don't say. I know. Kalevitov,
01:09:15
Speaker
He was found, again, mostly warmly clad, but only wearing socks. He didn't have shoes on, but again, like a fair amount of dressing. His socks that he was wearing were scorched. So apparently in this den, they had tried to also perhaps make a fire. I don't know if it came from that fire, if it came from the other fire. And his coat, even though he had it on, was unzipped and unbuttoned.
01:09:42
Speaker
And again, at this point, I can only assume that they had been, you know, even if I'm running, once I got to where I was going to stop and build a makeshift den, I would zip up my coat and I would button my coat. But they found it unzipped and unbuttoned. Which I will say when the one time I went skiing, I did get kind of hard.
01:10:04
Speaker
Maybe he was like sweating cause they ran. But then it is negative like 20 degrees and he should know not. Cause he's experienced. He should know this. Kalevatov's eyebrows were missing. To go with his friend's eyeballs. Right. His nose was broken and he had and I quote, a deformed neck and an open wound behind his ear, which to me seems like his neck was broken.
01:10:33
Speaker
Cause of death? Any guesses? Hypothermia. Hypothermia. Not violent death.
Conclusion and Speculation
01:10:40
Speaker
Not violent death, even though we had a deformed neck. Finally, it's the body of Luda. The pants she was wearing also badly burnt.
01:10:53
Speaker
she had a sweater that had been torn to cover her socked feet. So I guess like she knew she needed something else on her feet. She had torn a sweater. I do that in the road. We're reading that and the man tears the blanket to put around their feet. Right. To keep it a little bit warmer. She also had a broken nose.
01:11:12
Speaker
She had four broken ribs on her right side, fractured in two places, so similar to Sasha's injuries. But she also had six broken ribs on the left side, fractured in two places. So that's 10 broken, I've never broken a bone. I can only imagine the pain of one, let alone
01:11:35
Speaker
10? And breaking ribs is really painful. Anthony was in a really bad car accident in high school and he broke several ribs on one side and like he said it was excruciatingly painful. I mean just think like to breathe, to laugh. Oh yeah, you're right. Yeah so 10 broken ribs. Just like Sasha, Luda's eyes were missing and so was her tongue. Oh my!
01:12:05
Speaker
crazy. Some who have analyzed the case, they have noted that what's interesting is that we talked about this. Everything about the autopsy is super vague that the doctor performing the autopsy said nothing about how her tongue was missing. Now this is a medical doctor. This doctor would be able to tell if her tongue had been
01:12:30
Speaker
eaten after death by scavenging animals. I mean, we have to, I know that's grotesque, but it would happen. But he didn't mention that in the report. He would be able to tell if her tongue had been cut out of her mouth. Again, no note of that. It just says that part of her tongue or her tongue is missing.
01:12:55
Speaker
Now, one thing that is noted on the autopsy is that Luda had blood in her stomach, which has led many to speculate that her tongue had been cut out before her death. Her cause of death was hemorrhaging in the right atrium of her heart, multiple rib fractures,
01:13:22
Speaker
and internal bleeding. And what's interesting is that the injuries of all of these people, Maggie, they were not consistent with falls because again, so you can't be like, oh, maybe they fell down into a ravine and broke their ribs. Because again, there was no bruising on the palms of their hands. So there was no evidence or even on their forearms like they had been reaching out to break a fall. My brain is like,
01:13:49
Speaker
going everywhere right now. All the possibilities to make it a little bit more crazy in that brain of yours. Additionally, many of the bodies showed no sign of external injuries, even though they had the fractured ribs. So there's not like some big bruise where the fractured ribs are. How could that be?
01:14:15
Speaker
Why are there so many different kinds of injuries to this group of nine people? If there would, I would assume be a common threat. Well, despite all of these questions, and again, Maggie's talking about questions swirling in her head, there are all of these unanswered questions. On May 28, just a couple of days after the bodies had been found, a couple of weeks,
01:14:41
Speaker
Just as mysteriously as all of this occurred, just as quickly, the Russian government officially closed the case. It wasn't until this year, March 15th of 2019, that the Russian government agreed to reopen the investigation. And oh boy, do the conspiracy theories abound.
01:15:08
Speaker
I can't imagine. I know. More about that next time. If you have questions now, my sleuthounds, you just wait until next week when Maggie and I will address even more questions surrounding this tragic event.
01:15:26
Speaker
What do the group's meticulous diaries and camera evidence show that has some speculate the supernatural? Why did Russian officials spot the Dyatlov tent and not immediately rush to it to investigate further, but according to some records, start off investigating in a different direction? Why did the bodies of the team seem unnatural at their funeral?
01:15:51
Speaker
Why did some articles of clothing test positive for radiation? Why was the funeral so controlled by the government? Why was one of the bodies exhumed to check for identity? And what exactly is a force that could kill with inhuman strength equivalent to an automobile accident?
01:16:17
Speaker
Next week, we will explore everything from the realistic to the fanciful. Avalanche to psychological trauma. Aliens to escaped prisoner. Secret Russian arms testing to ball lightning. Mansi attacks to Baba Yaga. No, you tell yourself again. There must be some logical explanation because legends and stories like those, they're not real.
01:16:47
Speaker
But what if, just what if you're wrong?
01:16:54
Speaker
Again, please like and join our Facebook page, Coffee and Case's podcast to continue the conversation and see images related to this episode. As always, follow us on Twitter, at Case's Coffee, on Instagram, at Coffee Case's podcast, or you can always email us suggestions to coffeeandcasespodcast at gmail.com. Please tell your friends about our podcast so more people can be reached to possibly help bring some closure to these families. Don't forget to rate our show and leave us a comment as well. We hope to hear from you soon.
01:17:23
Speaker
Stay together. Stay safe. We'll see you next week.