Background
In January 1959 a ten-person group linked to the Ural Polytechnical Institute in Sverdlovsk set out on a long skiing route in the northern Ural Mountains. The leader was 23-year-old radio engineering student Igor Dyatlov; the group included eight men and two women. Their goal was Mount Otorten. They left Sverdlovsk on 23 January and began the trek from Vizhai on 27 January. Yuri Yudin fell ill and turned back on 28 January, so nine people continued. Yudin died in 2013.
The group was regarded as experienced, and its diaries and photographs survive. When they failed to report back on schedule, relatives pressed for a search.
What happened
The search began on 20 February. On 26 February the tent was found on the slope of Kholat Syakhl; it had been cut open from the inside. Several people had left it with little footwear or clothing for the conditions. Five of the nine bodies were found soon afterwards on the slope and near a pine tree, while the last four were not found until 4 May, in a ravine under about four metres of snow.
The deaths are believed to have occurred on 1 or 2 February 1959. According to the autopsies, six hikers died of hypothermia and three from injuries. These findings formed the basis of decades of debate.
Investigation and findings
The Soviet inquiry closed in May 1959, attributing the deaths to "a compelling natural force." The files were sealed and the area was closed to visitors for three years. The vague wording fed countless theories, from avalanches and storms to military tests and the supernatural.
Russian prosecutors reopened the case in 2019 and examined only three possibilities: an avalanche, a slab avalanche, or hurricane-force wind. In July 2020 prosecutor Andrey Kuryakov named a slab avalanche as the cause. A 2021 computer-modelling study by researchers at EPFL and ETH Zürich also suggested that a small slab avalanche could explain the tent damage and some of the injuries. Some relatives and researchers remain unconvinced.
Legacy
The group is buried together at Mikhailovskoe Cemetery in Yekaterinburg. The Dyatlov Foundation was established in 1999, and a rock outcrop near the final camp serves as a memorial. The official explanation is now an avalanche, yet details remain debated, and the story of the nine young people remains one of Russia's best-known mountain tragedies.