Dead Mountain: The Untold True Story of the Dyatlov Pass Incident

by Donnie Eichar

“If I could ask God just one question it would be what really happened to my friends that night?”

Their bodies were eventually found roughly a mile away from their campsite, in separate locations, half-dressed in subzero temperatures. Some were found facedown in the snow; others in fetal position; and some in a ravine clutching one another. Nearly all were without their shoes.

Before I could disappear into my room for the night, Borzenkov pulled me aside with one last bit of mountaineering wisdom, delivered in halting English. I was expecting another warning—a remember to, or never, or always—but instead he told me not to bother packing a toothbrush. He didn’t tell me why, but he said it with such gravity, that for a second I believed it to be sage advice. In the end, I made sure that my toothbrush was easily accessible in the side pocket of my pack. My new friend, after all, was missing a significant number of his teeth.

The hikers themselves would not have damaged their own tent in this way, even by accident, so this seems to suggest one thing: Someone from the outside knifed his way through the tent on that terrible night.

The worst night of their lives lay in front of them, and not one of them would live to see the sun rise.

Later that day, they hit upon a cache of clothing. What is odd about the articles is that they are abandoned in the snow, not attached to a person. Stranger still, some of the clothing looks to have been cut or shredded.

“When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”