https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/05/17/has-an-old-soviet-mystery-at-last-been-solved

Skip to main content
The New Yorker

  * Newsletter

To revisit this article, select My Account, then 

Close Alert
Sign In
Search

  * News
  * Books & Culture
  * Fiction & Poetry
  * Humor & Cartoons
  * Magazine
  * Crossword
  * Video
  * Podcasts
  * Archive
  * Goings On
  * Shop

Open Navigation Menu

To revisit this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories

Close Alert
The New Yorker
Dept. of Exploration
May 17, 2021 Issue

Has an Old Soviet Mystery at Last Been Solved?

The strange fate of a group of skiers in the Ural Mountains has
generated endless speculation.

By Douglas Preston

May 10, 2021

  *  
  *  
  *  
  *  
  *  
    Save this story for later.

The Dyatlov Pass Incident
The disappearance of a Soviet skiing party in 1959 has spawned many
theories.Illustration by R. Fresson

  *  
  *  
  *  
  *  
  *  
    Save this story for later.

Igor Dyatlov was a tinkerer, an inventor, and a devotee of the
wilderness. Born in 1936, near Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg), he
built radios as a kid and loved camping. When the Soviet Union
launched Sputnik, in 1957, he constructed a telescope so that he and
his friends could watch the satellite travel across the night sky. By
then, he was an engineering student at the city's Ural Polytechnic
Institute. One of the leading technical universities in the country,
U.P.I. turned out topflight engineers to work in the nuclear-power
and weapons industries, communications, and military engineering.
During his years there, Dyatlov led a number of arduous wilderness
trips, often using outdoor equipment that he had invented or improved
on. It was a time of optimism in the U.S.S.R. Khrushchev's Thaw had
freed many political prisoners from Stalin's Gulag, economic growth
was robust, and the standard of living was rising. The shock that the
success of Sputnik delivered to the West further bolstered national
confidence. In late 1958, Dyatlov began planning a winter expedition
that would exemplify the boldness and vigor of a new Soviet
generation: an ambitious sixteen-day cross-country ski trip in the
Urals, the north-south mountain range that divides western Russia
from Siberia, and thus Europe from Asia.

He submitted his proposal to the U.P.I. sports club, which readily
approved it. Dyatlov's itinerary lay three hundred and fifty miles
north of Sverdlovsk, in the traditional territory of the Mansi, an
indigenous people. The Mansi came into contact with Russians around
the sixteenth century, when Russia was extending its control over
Siberia. Though largely Russified by this time, the Mansi continued
to pursue a semi-traditional way of life--hunting, fishing, and
reindeer herding. Dyatlov's group would ski two hundred miles, on a
route that no Russian, as far as anyone knew, had taken before. The
mountains were gentle and rounded, their barren slopes rising from a
vast boreal forest of birch and fir. The challenge wouldn't be rugged
terrain but brutally cold temperatures, deep snow, and high winds.

Published in the print edition of the May 17, 2021, issue, with the
headline "Cold Case."
Douglas Preston has written more than thirty books, including "The
Lost City of the Monkey God."
More:RussiaMountainsSkiingSkiersMysteriesDisappearancesThe Fifties
Avalanches

This Week's Issue

Never miss a big New Yorker story again. Sign up for This Week's
Issue and get an e-mail every week with the stories you have to read.
Enter your e-mail address
[                    ]
Sign up

By signing up, you agree to our User Agreement and Privacy Policy &
Cookie Statement.

The New Yorker

Sections

  * News
  * Books & Culture
  * Fiction & Poetry
  * Humor & Cartoons
  * Magazine
  * Crossword
  * Video
  * Podcasts
  * Archive
  * Goings On

More

  * Customer Care
  * Shop The New Yorker
  * Buy Covers and Cartoons
  * Conde Nast Store
  * Digital Access
  * Newsletters
  * Jigsaw Puzzle
  * RSS
  * Site Map

  * About
  * Careers
  * Contact
  * F.A.Q.
  * Media Kit
  * Press
  * Accessibility Help
  * Conde Nast Spotlight

(c) 2021 Conde Nast. All rights reserved. Use of this site constitutes
acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie
Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. The New Yorker may earn
a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site
as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. The material on
this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or
otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Conde
Nast. Ad Choices

  *  
  *  
  *  
  *  
  *  

Do Not Sell My Personal Info