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Transcript

The Russian Death March · Crime and Horror

0:00
Speaker 1: Today's story is about an event that was so horrifying,
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Speaker 1: the one person who survived it couldn't speak when she
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Speaker 1: finally stumbled bloody and terrified out of the forest. But
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Speaker 2: All right, let's get into today's story.
0:50
Speaker 1: By 1993, Lyudmila Korovinna, who was a 41-year-old Russian hiking instructor,
0:56
Speaker 1: came under fairly intense criticism from her colleagues for being
0:59
Speaker 1: too survivalist with her students. They thought she was a
1:03
Speaker 1: little bit too aggressive with how she pushed her students,
1:06
Speaker 1: putting them in unnecessarily risky situations out in the wild
1:09
Speaker 1: where they weren't really ready for it, and at any point,
1:12
Speaker 1: she might push them too far and wind up getting
1:15
Speaker 1: someone killed. Her students, however, absolutely adored her. They said
1:19
Speaker 1: on the mountains, she was fearless and in tune with
1:21
Speaker 1: nature and they felt very safe around her. And then
1:24
Speaker 1: at camp, she was very motherly and tender and always
1:27
Speaker 1: took the time to make sure all of her students
1:29
Speaker 1: were taken care of well before she was. Former students
1:33
Speaker 1: have said the mentorship they received from Ludmila went well
1:36
Speaker 1: beyond just hiking instruction. They said she taught a mindset
1:40
Speaker 1: that they carried with them into adulthood. and they pointed
1:42
Speaker 1: to as one of the main reasons they were successful
1:45
Speaker 1: later in life. In the summer of 1993, Lyudmila was
1:48
Speaker 1: scheduled to lead an expedition up to the Hamar Daban Ridge,
1:52
Speaker 1: which is in eastern Siberia, and it's one of the
1:54
Speaker 1: oldest mountains on the planet. With her on this expedition
1:57
Speaker 1: would be six fairly experienced hiking students that ranged in
2:00
Speaker 1: ages from 15 to 24 years old. One of those
2:03
Speaker 1: six students was a 23-year-old young man named Sasha, who,
2:07
Speaker 1: although he was not Lyudmila's biological son, She called him
2:11
Speaker 1: her son because she had raised him ever since he
2:13
Speaker 1: was a young child, and he looked at Lyudmila as
2:16
Speaker 1: his mother. Sasha also happened to be the most physically
2:19
Speaker 1: fit and competent of all six hiking students, and he
2:23
Speaker 1: would function more like an assistant to Lyudmila on this
2:26
Speaker 1: particular hike rather than a pupil. The other five students
2:29
Speaker 1: were 24-year-old Tatyana, 19-year-old Dennis, 16-year-old Victoria, 15-year-old Timur, and
2:33
Speaker 1: 17-year-old Valentina, who she is the only reason we know
2:41
Speaker 1: anything about the horrible things that happened.
2:43
Speaker 2: To this group up on Hamar Daban Ridge.
2:46
Speaker 1: On August 1st, 1993, Lyudmila and her hiking group boarded
2:50
Speaker 1: a trans-Siberian railway car in Kazakhstan, and later that day,
2:53
Speaker 1: they arrived in a town called Marino, which is on
2:56
Speaker 1: the eastern side of Siberia on the southern end, and
2:59
Speaker 1: it butts up against the base of the Hamar Daban
3:02
Speaker 1: mountain range. The Hamar Daban mountain was not considered a
3:05
Speaker 1: very dangerous hike to make, It was relatively small.
3:08
Speaker 2: It was just under 2,400 meters in elevation.
3:11
Speaker 1: And in the summertime, you'd have scores of recreational hikers
3:14
Speaker 1: all over this mountain range. Plus the weather forecast for
3:17
Speaker 1: Lyudmila and her group's multi-day hike in that mountain range
3:21
Speaker 1: was gonna be incredibly favorable. It was gonna be warm, clear,
3:24
Speaker 1: nice summer weather. Lyudmila had charted a course that began
3:27
Speaker 1: just outside of the town of Marino, which is the
3:29
Speaker 1: town they were staying in that first night. They were
3:31
Speaker 1: gonna start next to Lake Baikal, which is the deepest
3:34
Speaker 1: lake in Russia. from the lake, they were gonna move
3:37
Speaker 1: north and inland over the stretch that was totally barren,
3:41
Speaker 1: there was no trees, it was just rocks and grass,
3:43
Speaker 1: before ultimately reaching the Hamar Dabon Ridge, which was their destination.
3:47
Speaker 1: And at that point, there would be shelter and firewood,
3:50
Speaker 1: and they could take a break before ultimately descending. And
3:52
Speaker 1: so in total, from the lake all the way to
3:55
Speaker 1: Hamar Dabon Ridge was approximately 50 miles. Ludmila's group would
3:59
Speaker 1: not be the only group making this particular movement towards
4:02
Speaker 1: Hamar Dabon Ridge. They'd be taking their own path, but
4:05
Speaker 1: there'd be two other groups that were on similar courses,
4:08
Speaker 1: basically parallel to them, making their way up to the ridge.
4:12
Speaker 1: And one of those groups was actually led by Ludmila's
4:15
Speaker 1: 16-year-old biological daughter, and they had actually made plans to
4:18
Speaker 1: meet up on one of the last days of this
4:20
Speaker 1: multi-day hike. As they were making their descent, there was
4:23
Speaker 1: a forest they were going to meet up in. So
4:25
Speaker 1: Ludmila and her six students stayed the night in Merino,
4:28
Speaker 1: and the next morning they got up early and made
4:30
Speaker 1: their way over to Lake Baikal. The weather's beautiful, they're
4:32
Speaker 1: excited to start their journey, and they take off. And
4:35
Speaker 1: everything was going great until the late afternoon. It would
4:38
Speaker 1: turn out the weather forecasters were just completely wrong, and
4:42
Speaker 1: as soon as the group climbed above the treeline, The
4:45
Speaker 1: temperatures plummeted.
4:46
Speaker 2: And it started raining and snowing on them. It was
4:49
Speaker 2: just absolutely miserable.
4:50
Speaker 1: This treacherous weather would persist over the next few days
4:53
Speaker 1: and it really started to destroy the morale in the group.
4:56
Speaker 1: But Lyudmila, she was a pro and she had hiked
4:59
Speaker 1: in far worse conditions than this. And so she made
5:01
Speaker 1: a point of telling the group that this stuff happens.
5:05
Speaker 1: Bad weather happens. We are prepared. We are trained.
5:08
Speaker 2: We're going to be fine. You need to have a.
5:10
Speaker 1: Positive attitude about this. We need to just keep pushing
5:12
Speaker 1: forward and not play a victim here. And that was
5:15
Speaker 1: enough to inspire the group to just keep on going.
5:17
Speaker 1: You know, they believed in Ludmila and she's telling them
5:20
Speaker 1: to keep going, so they kept going.
5:22
Speaker 2: By the evening of August 4th, so this is.
5:24
Speaker 1: Three full days of hiking later, they were only about
5:28
Speaker 1: 30 minutes away from the summit. They have now reached
5:31
Speaker 1: the point where they are in the open section of
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Speaker 1: the mountain where there is no reprieve from the wind
5:36
Speaker 1: or the.
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Speaker 2: Rain or the snow. There's no trees to block anything.
5:39
Speaker 1: And so it's just an absolute abomination trying to climb
5:42
Speaker 1: this last stretch. Every step is like an eternity as
5:46
Speaker 1: the wind just cuts through their clothes and they're soaking
5:48
Speaker 1: wet and miserable. Ludmila's students were not about to ask
5:51
Speaker 1: for a break. They knew how she operated. She was
5:54
Speaker 1: someone that really believed in pushing through your own pain
5:57
Speaker 1: and fatigue and misery.
5:59
Speaker 2: And she always led by example.
6:01
Speaker 1: And they saw her right out in front leading the
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Speaker 1: charge up towards the Hamar Daban Ridge. And so they
6:06
Speaker 1: were very surprised when she stopped And she turned around
6:10
Speaker 1: and told them, we're taking a break. And in fact,
6:13
Speaker 1: we're actually going to camp out for the night right
6:15
Speaker 1: where we are right here. No one knows why Lyudmila
6:17
Speaker 1: made this decision. You know, on the one hand, it
6:20
Speaker 1: does make sense to take a break and say, you
6:22
Speaker 1: know what, we'll reach the summit tomorrow. We've had a
6:24
Speaker 1: really hard couple of days here with the bad weather.
6:27
Speaker 1: We'll make camp and we'll get some rest and we'll
6:29
Speaker 1: hit the summit tomorrow.
6:31
Speaker 2: That makes sense.
6:32
Speaker 1: But where she elected to make camp does not make sense.
6:35
Speaker 1: She had them stop right smack dab in the middle
6:38
Speaker 1: of of this totally open section of the mountain where
6:41
Speaker 1: there are no trees, there's no objects to protect them
6:44
Speaker 1: from the horrible wind and snow and ice and rain
6:47
Speaker 1: that's just gonna be pelting them all night. And so
6:49
Speaker 1: some people have speculated that when she looked at her
6:52
Speaker 1: crew of hikers, they were so badly beaten down and
6:56
Speaker 1: tired and miserable that she knew.
6:58
Speaker 2: She could not ask them to go any further.
7:00
Speaker 1: And so that was why she said, let's just make
7:02
Speaker 1: camp here, we'll make do. Others have said her map
7:05
Speaker 1: may not have been very accurate. And so she didn't
7:07
Speaker 1: know how close she was to the summit. where at
7:10
Speaker 1: the summit there was literally a shelter that had firewood
7:13
Speaker 1: and a place for you to rest. Maybe she didn't
7:15
Speaker 1: know she was so close. Perhaps she thought she was
7:17
Speaker 1: much farther away, and this is the best we can do.
7:19
Speaker 1: But what the inaccurate map theory does not account for
7:23
Speaker 1: is Ludmilla would have known there is a forest about
7:25
Speaker 1: two and a half miles down the mountain, because the
7:28
Speaker 1: whole time they've been on this hike, they've tried to
7:30
Speaker 1: stay up above the tree line as they make this
7:32
Speaker 1: final approach up to the ridge, and so she would
7:35
Speaker 1: have known there's a forest right down there. And if
7:37
Speaker 1: I wanted to, I could go down there and seek
7:39
Speaker 1: shelter in the trees. And so for whatever reason, she
7:42
Speaker 1: decided that we can't go down to the forest.
7:44
Speaker 2: We got to stay here.
7:45
Speaker 1: And so perhaps that lends more credibility to the idea
7:48
Speaker 1: that the group was far more beaten down than maybe
7:52
Speaker 1: we even realize. And she thought they can't make the
7:54
Speaker 1: two and a half mile journey. We're going to have
7:56
Speaker 1: to just make camp here and make do. But regardless
7:59
Speaker 1: of her reasoning, they did make camp right in the
8:01
Speaker 1: middle of this open section. They set up two wet,
8:04
Speaker 1: crappy tents. And they used their little kerosene stoves to
8:07
Speaker 1: make a tiny meal. And then they all crammed inside
8:10
Speaker 1: of these two tents and huddled as the wind howled outside.
8:13
Speaker 2: That night, the storm got much worse. The wind picked up.
8:16
Speaker 1: And again, they're totally exposed on this open section of
8:18
Speaker 1: the mountain. And so they're just getting destroyed by this wind.
8:22
Speaker 1: And at about 2 a.m., the wind actually broke the
8:24
Speaker 1: ropes that were holding the tents down. And they had
8:27
Speaker 1: to go outside and retie them.
8:29
Speaker 2: And they were able to do that.
8:30
Speaker 1: And then a couple hours later, at about 4 a.m.,
8:32
Speaker 1: the wind actually lifted up. section of the tent that
8:35
Speaker 1: was facing where the wind was blowing and it pulled
8:38
Speaker 1: the tent up in such a way that water rushed
8:40
Speaker 1: into the tent and soaked their sleeping bags and they
8:43
Speaker 1: were able to go outside and they put the stakes
8:45
Speaker 1: back down in the ground but you know they were
8:47
Speaker 1: sleeping in wet sleeping bags in the middle of this
8:50
Speaker 1: mountain in the middle of a storm so this is
8:51
Speaker 1: getting quite dangerous at this point but they were able
8:54
Speaker 1: to eventually fall asleep and at about 10 a.m the
8:56
Speaker 1: next morning Ludmilla gets up and looks outside and she
8:59
Speaker 1: can see that everything's frozen that it snowed and the
9:02
Speaker 1: temperatures have dropped again and everything is just snow and ice.
9:06
Speaker 1: And she knows that, you know, we're actually reaching very
9:09
Speaker 1: dangerous hypothermia territory.
9:11
Speaker 2: And if we don't warm up soon, this could be life-threatening.
9:14
Speaker 1: And so she woke everybody up and she said, we
9:16
Speaker 1: need to go down into that forest and we need
9:18
Speaker 1: to start a fire as soon as possible. And so
9:20
Speaker 1: everybody said, all right, they got up, they started packing
9:22
Speaker 1: up their things, rolled up their tents, and they began
9:25
Speaker 1: walking down the mountain in a line. Although this was
9:27
Speaker 1: not intended, When Lyudmila had said, we will reach the
9:30
Speaker 1: summit tomorrow, that had delayed their schedule, and it meant
9:34
Speaker 1: they were not going to be able to meet up
9:35
Speaker 1: with her daughter the next day.
9:37
Speaker 2: But now in the morning, when.
9:39
Speaker 1: They're deciding basically to abandon the summit and turn around
9:42
Speaker 1: and head down again, they were now back on schedule
9:45
Speaker 1: to meet up with her daughter down in the forest. However,
9:47
Speaker 1: her daughter said she was at the rendezvous point in
9:50
Speaker 1: the forest, and Lyudmila and the six other hikers never showed.
9:54
Speaker 1: Four days later, on August 9th, a group of Ukrainian
9:57
Speaker 1: kayakers were making their way down this river and saw Siberia,
10:01
Speaker 1: and they were passing by.
10:02
Speaker 2: The Hamar-Daban mountain range.
10:04
Speaker 1: And so as they're kind of slowly moving their way down,
10:07
Speaker 1: it's this beautiful morning, and they're looking up at the
10:08
Speaker 1: mountains all around them, the leader of this group happens
10:11
Speaker 1: to see something move on his left side. There's a
10:14
Speaker 1: forest right up against the left side of this river,
10:16
Speaker 1: and he turns his head, and he has to do
10:18
Speaker 1: a double take Because there is this girl who's standing
10:21
Speaker 1: there at the edge of the forest looking out at
10:23
Speaker 1: them totally expressionless.
10:24
Speaker 2: And she's covered in blood. And she's not doing anything.
10:28
Speaker 2: She's just standing there.
10:29
Speaker 1: And at first he actually thought, like, we need to leave.
10:32
Speaker 1: His first thought was we need to just get away
10:34
Speaker 1: from this person. There's something wrong with this person. But
10:38
Speaker 1: very quickly the group realized, like, we cannot abandon this girl.
10:41
Speaker 1: This is a young girl who should not be out here.
10:44
Speaker 1: I don't know what she's doing out here. And so
10:46
Speaker 1: they turned around and they went on shore and they
10:48
Speaker 1: yelled to her and they said, are you okay? And
10:51
Speaker 1: she just stood there not reacting. And they tried a
10:53
Speaker 1: couple more times to say, you know, hey, we're not
10:55
Speaker 1: going to hurt you. We just want to know what's
10:57
Speaker 1: going on. And she didn't say a word. She just
11:00
Speaker 1: stood there in shock. She looked very scared.
11:03
Speaker 2: They finally got up right next to her and they
11:05
Speaker 2: asked her, you know, what are you so scared of?
11:07
Speaker 1: Where are you coming from? And they just could not
11:09
Speaker 1: get her to speak. But they're up close looking at
11:12
Speaker 1: her and, you know, she's got blood all over her.
11:14
Speaker 1: She looks dirty. She looks like she might be sick.
11:17
Speaker 1: And so they decide that, you know, this girl needs help.
11:19
Speaker 1: And they had blankets. And so they threw blankets over her.
11:22
Speaker 1: They put her in one of the kayaks and they
11:24
Speaker 1: brought her back to town. Once in town, the Ukrainian
11:27
Speaker 1: kayakers went and got authorities and said, hey, we found
11:29
Speaker 1: this girl.
11:30
Speaker 2: You know, she was covered in blood walking out of
11:32
Speaker 2: the forest. We have no idea what's going on with her.
11:34
Speaker 2: And so authorities came over to speak to her.
11:36
Speaker 1: And although she barely spoke, she would finally say that
11:40
Speaker 1: she was 17 years old, her name was Valentina Yudachenko,
11:43
Speaker 1: and that she had been a part of a seven-person
11:45
Speaker 1: hiking group up along the Hamar Daban Ridge. And then
11:48
Speaker 1: she paused and they said, well, where's your hiking group?
11:52
Speaker 1: How did you get separated? This is what she told them.
11:54
Speaker 1: Back on the morning of August 5th, so this would
11:56
Speaker 1: have been the morning after that terrible night's sleep on
11:59
Speaker 1: the mountain where the tent ropes are breaking and their
12:01
Speaker 1: sleeping bags are getting soaking wet. Well, Valentina wakes up
12:05
Speaker 1: and she looks outside of the tent And she sees
12:07
Speaker 1: Lyudmila and she's standing there with her hands on her
12:09
Speaker 1: hips and she's looking around.
12:10
Speaker 2: She looks very concerned.
12:12
Speaker 1: Valentina goes out there and Lyudmila turns to her and says,
12:15
Speaker 1: we need to leave. We need to go down to
12:17
Speaker 1: the forest and we need to make a fire. Can
12:18
Speaker 1: you help me wake everybody up and start having them
12:21
Speaker 1: pack up their stuff so we can get moving? So
12:23
Speaker 1: Valentina goes in, she starts waking people up and everybody
12:26
Speaker 1: very quickly packs up the tent, packs up their things
12:28
Speaker 1: and they're in a line and they start walking down
12:30
Speaker 1: the mountain. They had only made it about 10 meters
12:33
Speaker 1: into their descent and when Sasha, the 23-year-old young man
12:37
Speaker 1: that Lyudmila considered her son, he just suddenly falls. And
12:40
Speaker 1: the other hikers, Valentina included, run over and they help
12:43
Speaker 1: get him up again and he looks kind of shaken.
12:46
Speaker 2: He takes a couple more steps and he falls again.
12:48
Speaker 1: And this time, when Valentina goes over to try to
12:51
Speaker 1: help him up with the others, they see his eyes
12:53
Speaker 1: are wide and he looks like he's really terrified and
12:56
Speaker 1: then blood starts rushing out of his nose and his
12:58
Speaker 1: ears and his mouth and then he just suddenly dies.
13:01
Speaker 1: and Lyudmila runs over, and she grabs him, and she's panicking,
13:05
Speaker 1: and she's trying to feel for a pulse, and she's
13:06
Speaker 1: checking for his heart, and then she screams out in
13:09
Speaker 1: pain and anguish, and she yells he's dead. The other
13:12
Speaker 1: hikers can't believe this is happening.
13:14
Speaker 2: They can't even process that someone, any of them, had died,
13:18
Speaker 2: let alone it be Sasha, the most physically fit and
13:21
Speaker 2: healthy one of all of them, including up until a
13:24
Speaker 2: few minutes ago. He wasn't showing any signs or symptoms
13:27
Speaker 2: that something was wrong. He was perfectly fine. What's going on?
13:30
Speaker 2: Ludmila was in shock.
13:32
Speaker 1: She's on the ground and she's holding on to Sasha
13:34
Speaker 1: and she's telling the group that she's not going anywhere.
13:36
Speaker 2: She's staying with Sasha.
13:38
Speaker 1: And Valentina would say the group is just falling apart
13:40
Speaker 1: at this point.
13:41
Speaker 2: You have some of them that are crying, others who
13:43
Speaker 2: are just standing there looking around like what's happening to
13:46
Speaker 2: us right now? And at some point Ludmila collects herself
13:48
Speaker 2: and she says to the group, go down to the forest.
13:51
Speaker 2: go down to the forest and start a fire.
13:53
Speaker 1: And Valentina said they didn't want to leave her and
13:55
Speaker 1: they were pleading with her to let them stay.
13:57
Speaker 2: And she said, no, go down to the forest and
14:00
Speaker 2: start a fire. And finally, Valentina said the group would.
14:03
Speaker 2: They'd get together and they'd turn around and not really
14:06
Speaker 2: knowing what was going to happen next, they just begin
14:08
Speaker 2: walking down this mountain and they only get a few
14:11
Speaker 2: steps before they hear Ludmilla yell out to come back.
14:14
Speaker 2: She's saying, I can't move.
14:16
Speaker 1: And they turn around and Valentina was towards the front
14:18
Speaker 1: of the returning group as they're going back up the
14:20
Speaker 1: mountain back to Ludmilla. And she's now bleeding out of
14:24
Speaker 1: her nose and her ears and her mouth. And she's
14:26
Speaker 1: heaving like something's going on inside of her. And then
14:29
Speaker 1: all of a sudden she keels over on top of Sasha.
14:32
Speaker 1: And she dies right in front of them. And now,
14:35
Speaker 1: now the group is in hysterics. And Valentina's in the front.
14:39
Speaker 1: She can't see anybody else.
14:40
Speaker 2: And then she turns around and she can't believe what
14:42
Speaker 2: she's seeing to her side. Now everybody else is bleeding
14:46
Speaker 2: from their nose and their ears and their mouth.
14:48
Speaker 1: And some of them are frothing from the mouth. Valentina
14:51
Speaker 1: reached for her mouth and her ears and her nose
14:52
Speaker 1: to look for blood and there wasn't any. And then
14:54
Speaker 1: she turned and she saw 16-year-old Victoria and 24-year-old Tatiana
14:59
Speaker 1: suddenly fall to the ground just like Sasha had, except
15:02
Speaker 1: they weren't just laying there. They began rolling around and
15:05
Speaker 1: ripping their clothes off and clutching at their throats and
15:08
Speaker 1: they're frothing at the mouth. And so Valentina reaches down
15:11
Speaker 1: to try to help Victoria, the 16-year-old, And Victoria bites
15:14
Speaker 1: her on the hand and she pulls her hand back.
15:17
Speaker 2: And then Victoria curls into a ball and then goes still.
15:20
Speaker 2: And then Tatiana begins hitting her head on a rock
15:23
Speaker 2: over and over and over again until she goes still.
15:26
Speaker 1: At this point, Valentina is in pure survival mode. And
15:29
Speaker 1: so she looks at the other two, which was 15-year-old
15:31
Speaker 1: Timur and 19-year-old Dennis. Everybody else is down on the
15:34
Speaker 1: ground at this point. And she sees Dennis is moving
15:37
Speaker 1: behind a rock and he looks like he's not.
15:39
Speaker 2: Acting as erratic as everybody else.
15:41
Speaker 1: And so she starts making her way over to Dennis
15:43
Speaker 1: to see if he's going to be OK. And on
15:45
Speaker 1: the way, she sees 15 year old Timmer fall to
15:47
Speaker 1: the ground and he's suddenly lying there still. And so
15:50
Speaker 1: she believes he's dead, too. She gets over to Dennis
15:53
Speaker 1: and he's bleeding profusely from all of his orifices in
15:56
Speaker 1: his head. But he's talking to her and he's saying, OK,
15:59
Speaker 1: you need to go back to your bag, get out
16:01
Speaker 1: whatever you can that is essential, ditch the rest. and
16:04
Speaker 1: run down to the forest and I'll meet you down there.
16:06
Speaker 1: And so Valentina says, okay. She makes her way up
16:08
Speaker 1: to her bag. She gets her sleeping bag and a
16:10
Speaker 1: couple other small items. And when she turns around to
16:13
Speaker 1: go back to Dennis, she sees that he's now slouched
16:15
Speaker 1: over his backpack and now the blood is just pouring
16:18
Speaker 1: out of his head.
16:19
Speaker 2: And she can tell that almost certainly he's dead as well.
16:21
Speaker 1: And so not only is she all alone, she's now
16:24
Speaker 1: totally traumatized and believes whatever has happened to them is
16:27
Speaker 1: going to happen to her. And so she runs down
16:30
Speaker 1: the mountain, and she goes into the forest, and she
16:32
Speaker 1: gets underneath this rock overhang, she puts her sleeping bag.
16:36
Speaker 2: Down, she crawls inside, and she drifts in and out
16:39
Speaker 2: of consciousness for the rest of the day.
16:41
Speaker 1: And then that night, she's still laying there, and the
16:44
Speaker 1: storm picked up dramatically, and she could hear all night
16:47
Speaker 1: these huge trees all over the mountain falling and slamming
16:51
Speaker 1: all around her. And so she's thinking, if I don't
16:53
Speaker 1: die from whatever killed my friends, I'm going to get
16:56
Speaker 1: hit by one of these trees.
16:57
Speaker 2: But she manages to get through the night.
16:59
Speaker 1: The next morning, the storm had cleared, and so Valentina
17:02
Speaker 1: gets up, and she's thinking to herself, maybe by some miracle,
17:07
Speaker 1: one of them is still alive. And so she climbs
17:10
Speaker 1: back up the mountain to where they were, and she
17:12
Speaker 1: finds all of them still laying exactly where they were
17:15
Speaker 1: when she left them, all motionless, all deceased. And so
17:19
Speaker 1: she decides to go one by one and close each
17:21
Speaker 1: of their eyelids, and then she says her goodbye, and
17:24
Speaker 1: then she turns and kind of wanders back into the forest.
17:27
Speaker 1: where she would stay for the next four days, desperately
17:31
Speaker 1: walking around, hoping to be rescued at some point the
17:34
Speaker 1: whole time, just expecting to die, either from exposure.
17:38
Speaker 2: From an animal attack, from whatever killed my friends.
17:42
Speaker 1: Eventually she does hear voices and she starts making her
17:44
Speaker 1: way towards where they're coming from. And that's when she
17:47
Speaker 1: gets to the river and she sees the Ukrainian kayakers
17:50
Speaker 1: who ultimately pick her up and bring her back to town.
17:52
Speaker 1: After authorities heard Valentina's story and realized there were other
17:56
Speaker 1: hikers out there, They launched a search party and it
17:59
Speaker 1: would take them a month to locate them. Their bodies
18:02
Speaker 1: were contorted and their faces were locked in these grimaces
18:06
Speaker 1: that looked like they were in absolute terror and agony
18:09
Speaker 1: right as they died. In addition to missing most of
18:12
Speaker 1: their clothing and their shoes, they were also all missing
18:15
Speaker 1: their eyeballs. The autopsies were only able to conclude that
18:18
Speaker 1: hypothermia contributed to their death, although it wasn't the only factor.
18:22
Speaker 1: as well as a protein deficiency, despite the fact that
18:25
Speaker 1: they had all eaten well over the course of their
18:27
Speaker 1: trip and that all of their lungs were very bruised.
18:30
Speaker 2: But they didn't know what that was from.
18:32
Speaker 1: But nothing the autopsy concluded could reconcile what Valentina said
18:36
Speaker 1: she saw happen, which was a sudden violent death of
18:40
Speaker 1: six healthy people with no signs and symptoms leading up.
18:44
Speaker 2: Suddenly, they are bleeding.
18:46
Speaker 1: Out of every orifice and they're falling to the ground,
18:48
Speaker 1: tearing their clothes off, grabbing at their throats, frothing at
18:51
Speaker 1: the mouth, and then dying. And whatever happened to them,
18:54
Speaker 1: why didn't it happen to Valentina? To this day, we
18:57
Speaker 1: don't really have a good answer why that happened, and
18:59
Speaker 1: the case is closed.
19:00
Speaker 2: It was ruled they mostly died of hypothermia, and it
19:03
Speaker 2: was an accident, and that's that.
19:05
Speaker 1: But this isn't the first time something like this has
19:07
Speaker 1: happened in Russia. In 1959, nine very experienced Russian hikers
19:12
Speaker 1: set off on a 16-day expedition into the Ural Mountains
19:15
Speaker 1: in the Soviet Union. And about 10 days into their hike,
19:18
Speaker 1: they reached a part where they needed to crest over
19:21
Speaker 1: this mountain before some bad weather rolled in. And they
19:24
Speaker 1: started moving up this mountain, which would be renamed the
19:27
Speaker 1: Dyatlov Pass after the leader of this group. His name
19:29
Speaker 1: is Dyatlov. They started making their way up the Dyatlov
19:32
Speaker 1: Pass and they were going too slowly and the weather
19:35
Speaker 1: was coming in too quickly. And so they had to
19:37
Speaker 1: make a critical decision, stay put, but be in this
19:40
Speaker 1: totally exposed open mountain face, much like the Hamar Daban
19:44
Speaker 1: situation where they were up on that open mountain face.
19:47
Speaker 1: either hunker down there and get ruined by weather, and
19:50
Speaker 1: the weather was a lot worse for the Dyatlov Pass group.
19:52
Speaker 1: It was sub-zero temperatures and just snowing ruthlessly. Or they
19:57
Speaker 1: could go down and give up ground and go down
20:00
Speaker 1: to the forest at the base of this mountain where
20:02
Speaker 1: you'd be sheltered from the storm with some trees. And
20:05
Speaker 1: so these hikers who might be a little bit overconfident
20:07
Speaker 1: in their ability to decide to stick it out right
20:10
Speaker 1: on this mountain face. And over the course of that night,
20:13
Speaker 1: at some point, they cut open their tent with a
20:16
Speaker 1: knife from the inside and ran out into sub-zero temperatures,
20:20
Speaker 1: most of them not wearing shoes, not wearing jackets, not
20:23
Speaker 1: wearing pants. They're basically in underwear. And they calmly walked
20:28
Speaker 1: down the mountain all the way down to the forest.
20:31
Speaker 2: And once they got down there, two of them tried
20:33
Speaker 2: to desperately climb this big tree where there wasn't any
20:37
Speaker 2: low-hanging branches. and so they couldn't climb up it.
20:39
Speaker 1: We don't know what they were trying to climb up
20:41
Speaker 1: it for, but they ended up building this little tiny
20:44
Speaker 1: fire that could not have provided very much warmth at all,
20:47
Speaker 1: and they were found deceased lying around this fire. Seven
20:50
Speaker 1: other hikers were found in two different areas. One that
20:54
Speaker 1: appeared to go down to that tree where those two were,
20:56
Speaker 1: but then doubled back and tried to get up to
20:58
Speaker 1: the campsite, but didn't make it and fell to the
21:00
Speaker 1: ground and died there. The other group was not found
21:03
Speaker 1: for a couple of weeks later. They were found At
21:06
Speaker 1: the mouth of this river, they were inside of this den,
21:09
Speaker 1: and they were wearing the clothes of the other hikers
21:12
Speaker 1: that were deceased. And the clothes they had on had
21:14
Speaker 1: traces of radiation on them. And the ones that were
21:17
Speaker 1: in the den had these devastating chest and skull injuries,
21:21
Speaker 1: and one of them was missing their eyeballs. And the
21:24
Speaker 1: official statement by the Soviet Union was they died from
21:27
Speaker 1: an unknown compelling force. which is a really mysterious way
21:31
Speaker 1: to describe how someone might die. This case was actually
21:34
Speaker 1: reinvestigated in 2020, and the new cause of death is
21:39
Speaker 1: death by avalanche, except loads of people disagree with that.
21:43
Speaker 1: In fact, experts have gone out to where this happened,
21:46
Speaker 1: and they say not only was there no avalanche, there's
21:50
Speaker 1: never been an avalanche in this area.
21:52
Speaker 2: There's literally never been one. So what do you think?
21:54
Speaker 1: Is there a connection between Hamar Daban and the Dyatlov
21:57
Speaker 1: Pass incident? Is there a cover-up in both cases where
22:00
Speaker 1: something far more sinister has happened to both groups that we.
22:03
Speaker 2: Don't know about? Or are they unrelated and these are
22:06
Speaker 2: just both examples of Mother Nature being far more powerful
22:09
Speaker 2: than we even realize? So that's gonna do it, guys.
22:12
Speaker 2: I hope you enjoyed today's story.
22:13
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22:20
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