Speaker 1: Nothing's better than feeling comfortable in your own shoes. Maybe
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Speaker 1: comfortable in your actual shoes too. They're wool runners, pipers,
Speaker 1: and loungers are so cozy you might forget you're wearing them,
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Speaker 1: That's alllbi rds dot com. It could be said that
Speaker 1: the history of life is a history of movement, a
Speaker 1: vast dance of inexorable entropic change, from the propulsion of
Speaker 1: the stars and the planets to the vibrating of subatomic
Speaker 1: particles and the stretching of space itself. It's useful to
Speaker 1: remember sometimes, but even the most solid seeming of objects are,
Speaker 1: in one way or another, in a constant kinetic state,
Speaker 1: be that the glass in your window, the elements of
Speaker 1: a diamond, or even the earth under our feet. Let us, then,
Speaker 1: for a moment, take one singular place and look upon
Speaker 1: it as an ageless being of omnipotence might observe it.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Unexplained, and I'm Richard McClain Smith. At first,
Speaker 1: we see a minute speck hanging in the depths of space.
Speaker 1: Drawing closer, we see it is in fact a nameless
Speaker 1: planet moving around a nameless star. Drawing closer still, we
Speaker 1: see on the surface of that planet, two gigantic land
Speaker 1: masses are set on an imperceptible but devastating collision course,
Speaker 1: and on the edge of one we find our spot.
Speaker 1: The movement of the land is generated in part by
Speaker 1: the heat of the planet's core, a solid ball of
Speaker 1: iron nickel raging at almost five and a half thousand
Speaker 1: degrees centigrade that in turn heats a mantle layer below
Speaker 1: the planet's surface. This outer shell appears to be a
Speaker 1: static rock composed mainly of silicon, iron, magnesium, oxygen, and aluminium,
Speaker 1: but of course it is not still. Instead, it bends
Speaker 1: and creeps, cajoled by the planet's warm belly, expanding and
Speaker 1: contracting in convective circles as the heat rises and falls
Speaker 1: through the silicate layers. It is on this sea of
Speaker 1: rock and waves of heat that the two land masses
Speaker 1: are being thrown toward each other and on this planet.
Speaker 1: By our measurements, the days last just over twenty two hours,
Speaker 1: and oxygen levels in the air are fifty percent higher
Speaker 1: than anything we have ever experienced, and there is life
Speaker 1: in plenty across the continents. Owing to the humid climate,
Speaker 1: the land is smothered in vast swamps and enormous trees.
Speaker 1: Amphibious creatures dominate, while giant invertebrate arthropods wiggle and cruel
Speaker 1: in abundance. Some even fly too, their twitching segmented bodies
Speaker 1: lifted into the air by gossamer wings Over half a
Speaker 1: meter in span. The two continents draw ever closer, until
Speaker 1: finally they collide to form one giant singular mass. As
Speaker 1: they merge, our spot is pushed and pulled as vast
Speaker 1: splinterings of rock rise into the sky to form mountains
Speaker 1: and rolling hills. Over time, the land beneath continues to
Speaker 1: move and break apart into many separate pieces, and over
Speaker 1: the land above, more and diff front creatures are taking
Speaker 1: their place, entire species rising into falling, while the planet
Speaker 1: spirals on through space as it continues to orbit the
Speaker 1: nameless star, a mere three hundred million orbits later, and
Speaker 1: now the oxygen levels on the planet have depleted, the
Speaker 1: days have become longer, and from out of a central place,
Speaker 1: what was once four legs has become two. In herds,
Speaker 1: these strange bipedal creatures are dispersed throughout the planet. Eventually
Speaker 1: they will learn to give themselves names and names two
Speaker 1: for the many things around them, including the very planet
Speaker 1: they walk upon, which will become known as Planeta Zimna
Speaker 1: jigu hen Song, or to others, planet Earth, and those
Speaker 1: creatures will learn to tell stories, bringing ever greater potential
Speaker 1: for change. For now, not only does the material world change,
Speaker 1: but so too will the world that is mapped onto
Speaker 1: it in the minds of the creatures who walk upon it,
Speaker 1: Entire worlds that two can rise and fall in a
Speaker 1: matter of moments. As for our spot, it will eventually
Speaker 1: find itself nestled at the foothills of those same mountains
Speaker 1: formed three hundred million years ago, still surviving today as
Speaker 1: one of the oldest mountain ranges on the planet. Those
Speaker 1: mountains will eventually find themselves encased in a country named
Speaker 1: Rossia and will become known as Uralski Gorri, or as
Speaker 1: the Ural Mountains. So let us now get closer in
Speaker 1: time and space to the spot that we have marked.
Speaker 1: The Ural Mountains form a natural order between Europe and Asia,
Speaker 1: running two and a half thousand kilometers through western Russia,
Speaker 1: from the coast of the Kara Sea to the northwest
Speaker 1: border of Kazakhstan, and just to the east of the
Speaker 1: central Urals, we will find our region of interest. In
Speaker 1: seventeen twenty three, Peter, the great leader of the Russian Empire,
Speaker 1: establishes a town here that will be named Yachitterimborg after
Speaker 1: his wife Yiketerina. Due to the abundance of minerals, vast
Speaker 1: resources of timber, and the deep waters of the Ist River,
Speaker 1: the location was a place of great natural beauty, but
Speaker 1: also a prime location for what would become the administrative
Speaker 1: mining capital of the Russian Empire. Just under two hundred
Speaker 1: years later, and the city is firmly established as a
Speaker 1: focal point for the country's growing industrial appetite. And in
Speaker 1: that time so much has changed, not that we might notice. However,
Speaker 1: certainly the surrounding land and even the city, to all
Speaker 1: intents and purposes, has remained fixed. But even as we
Speaker 1: look upon it now, invisible changes are taking place. As
Speaker 1: a primary industrial hub, Yukaterimburg has found itself a beating
Speaker 1: heart of a new world that has materialized around it.
Speaker 1: Having been a town built by royal decree to excavate
Speaker 1: natural resources that would then be turned into capital and
Speaker 1: wealth for a fortunate few, it is now a symbol
Speaker 1: and ode to those that generated the wealth, not through
Speaker 1: some strange alchemy, but through the blood and sweat of
Speaker 1: the many hands that scraped it from the earth. And
Speaker 1: so it is that, at the beginning of the century
Speaker 1: we find in our spot the same furnaces burning, and
Speaker 1: the same coal brought from the land by the same hands,
Speaker 1: But the status of those hands has been elevated. Two
Speaker 1: thousand and two hundred miles away, on April sixteenth, nineteen seventeen,
Speaker 1: a train will pull into Finland Station in Saint Petersburg,
Speaker 1: carrying a man whose words, on stepping onto the station
Speaker 1: platform will bring further winds of change. We watch as
Speaker 1: they provoke an internacene war, turning the people of the
Speaker 1: nation against each other in brutal and devastating ways. Back
Speaker 1: in Yakaterinburg, there is a mansion house belonging to a
Speaker 1: merchant named Epatiev, but as we avert our gaze for
Speaker 1: a moment. A year has passed, and when we look
Speaker 1: again we see the same bricks and mortar standing in
Speaker 1: the same place, only now there is no Epatiev and
Speaker 1: the mansion has been renamed the House of Special Purpose
Speaker 1: of the Ural Soviet Committee. A year later, in the
Speaker 1: spring of nineteen eighteen, seven highly prized prisoners a family
Speaker 1: will be escorted to Yakaterinburg and imprisoned in this House
Speaker 1: of Special Purpose. We see them now in the early
Speaker 1: hours of July seventeenth, nineteen eighteen, as they are raised
Speaker 1: from their beds and taken to a small room. They
Speaker 1: are told to sit and wait for a truck to
Speaker 1: come and take them away. But the truck never comes,
Speaker 1: only a hail of bullets and thrusting bayonets that ends
Speaker 1: with the walls dripping in blood and the prisoners lying
Speaker 1: dead on the ground. We watch as the bodies are
Speaker 1: taken to an abandoned mine shaft and one by one
Speaker 1: are dropped to the bottom of it. It is the
Speaker 1: last time that Russia will ever know a royal family.
Speaker 1: Five years later, the war is over. Yukaterinburg remains, but
Speaker 1: now finds itself not in Russia but the Union of
Speaker 1: Soviet Socialist Republics, and though the name and rulers have changed,
Speaker 1: the minerals and oars in the ground are still very
Speaker 1: much in demand. To that end, a school has been established,
Speaker 1: named the euro Polytechnic Institute, to promote better skills in
Speaker 1: the working classes to aid with increased production. The following year,
Speaker 1: we return to find the city as it was, only
Speaker 1: now it has a new name, spurred Lovsk. In the
Speaker 1: blink of an eye, just over thirty years have passed.
Speaker 1: It is nineteen fifty nine, and both spurred Lovsk and
Speaker 1: the euro Polytechnic as much as we left it. We
Speaker 1: see the building's familiar majestic architecture colonnaded at the front,
Speaker 1: underneath a vast pediment bearing the large embossed symbol of
Speaker 1: a hammer and a sickle. But in those thirty years,
Speaker 1: as ever, so much has changed, and a new ruler
Speaker 1: has replaced the old, ushering an end to an era
Speaker 1: of almost unparalleled upheaval. In that time, an old enemy
Speaker 1: has risen and fallen from the west, and some considered
Speaker 1: enemies from within have fallen too, And now the deaths
Speaker 1: of over forty million people haunt the land. The mindset
Speaker 1: of an entire country has been altered, and a new
Speaker 1: war stalks the people of this vast nation, a Lognoya Voina,
Speaker 1: or the Cold War, as it will come to be known.
Speaker 1: The new leader, Nikita Khrushchev, has promised a thawing of
Speaker 1: the old ways, and a new generation are ready to
Speaker 1: embrace it, a generation embodied by the bright and enthusiastic
Speaker 1: students of the Ural Polytechnic Institute. And so it is
Speaker 1: that on Friday, January the twenty third, nineteen fifty nine,
Speaker 1: finally we arrive at the beginning of one more story
Speaker 1: to scatter across the foothills of the Ural Mountains, a
Speaker 1: story that is perhaps the most extraordinary of all the
Speaker 1: stories featured on the show so far, a chilling and
Speaker 1: profound mystery that remains to this day unexplained. We begin
Speaker 1: at the Ural Polytechnic Institute in Room five three one.
Speaker 1: Seven students are crammed inside the spartan dormitory, frantically shoving
Speaker 1: various bits and pieces into backpacks, cans of meat, followed
Speaker 1: by packets of oatmeal, survival nights, and even a cooking stove.
Speaker 1: Nothing is forgotten, but rather than chaos, it is the
Speaker 1: steady haste of a well oiled team. They are preparing
Speaker 1: for a difficult mountain hike deep into the euro towards
Speaker 1: O'tauton Mountain. The journey will involve at least sixteen days
Speaker 1: of trekking through the Siberian tundra on a path that
Speaker 1: many consider one of the toughest at this time of year,
Speaker 1: and it will need to be since all are hoping
Speaker 1: to achieve their Category three hiking certificate upon completion. It
Speaker 1: is the highest awarded category in the country and one
Speaker 1: that will require the team to cover over three hundred
Speaker 1: kilometers of ground, spending at least eight days incompletely uninhabited regions.
Speaker 1: One boy, Yuri Krivneshchenko, looks perturbed for a moment as
Speaker 1: he hunts around the room, his face brightening into a
Speaker 1: huge grin when he finally finds his leather boots. Yuri,
Speaker 1: also known as Gyogi, is the joker of the group
Speaker 1: and at twenty three, also one of the oldest. A
Speaker 1: recent graduate of construction and hydraulics. Back in September of
Speaker 1: nineteen fifty seven, Georgy had been assigned to work at
Speaker 1: a secret nuclear facility called Chelyabinsk forty when the plutonium
Speaker 1: plant experienced a catastrophic radioactive leak. Gyorgy was part of
Speaker 1: the team who was sent in to clean up the mess.
Speaker 1: He packs his leather boots away, then makes some space
Speaker 1: for his much loved mandolin. Do you think I can
Speaker 1: play it on the train? He asks, of course, shout
Speaker 1: the others in warm reply. In the corner of the dawn,
Speaker 1: keeping a watchful eye over the preparations is the diligent
Speaker 1: and methodical Alexander Kolovatov. At twenty four, Alexander is the
Speaker 1: oldest member of the group. A kind soul with a
Speaker 1: ponchon for smoking antique pipes. Alexander was a distinguished student
Speaker 1: in the field of nuclear physics who had also studied
Speaker 1: in Moscow at a secret institute known as the Ministry
Speaker 1: of Medium Machine Building before returning to Spurredlovsk to complete
Speaker 1: his physics major. Who has the salt shouted Zinaida Kolmogorova,
Speaker 1: or Zina as she is known to her friends. Although
Speaker 1: only twenty Zena is in her fourth year of radio
Speaker 1: engineering and is a tough and experienced hiker, known affectionately
Speaker 1: as the engine of the University, Zina's magnetic charm rarely
Speaker 1: went unnoticed, not least by a number of the boys
Speaker 1: in the team. Where at Doroshenko and Iger she asks, suddenly,
Speaker 1: let me have fifteen cents to call them. The question
Speaker 1: is directed at Ludmila Dubanina, the only other woman in
Speaker 1: the group. Luda is only twenty and the youngest in
Speaker 1: the team. A focused and committed communist, the athletic Luda
Speaker 1: is practically a poster girl for the party, and like Zena,
Speaker 1: is possessed of an inner steel equal, if not superior,
Speaker 1: to any of her male compatriots. On one expedition to
Speaker 1: the Sayan Mountains, she was accidentally shot by a tourist,
Speaker 1: but didn't complain once during her long and painful journey
Speaker 1: back home, except to apologize for troubling the group. Luda
Speaker 1: hands Seena the fifteen cents from the pile of cash
Speaker 1: she is diligently counting up. Meanwhile, Rustick is teasing Collier
Speaker 1: over who has more willpower to survive the trip without
Speaker 1: their beloved cigarettes. Rustick is Roostum Slobidin, another recent graduate
Speaker 1: of the institute. Unlike the others, Rustick comes from a
Speaker 1: wealthy family of academics, but he carries none of the
Speaker 1: sense of entitlement that such wealth can sometimes entail. As
Speaker 1: perhaps the most popular member of the team, it would
Speaker 1: seem that Rustick had lived up to the Tartan name
Speaker 1: that his father had bestowed on him as a symbol
Speaker 1: of international friendship to all men and women. In marked contrast,
Speaker 1: Nikolay beau Brugnol's background could not have been more different.
Speaker 1: Born in a concentration camp, Collier had been brought up
Speaker 1: by his mother on her own after his French communist
Speaker 1: father had been executed as part of Stalin's ruthless purges.
Speaker 1: Collier had graduated from the Institute in fifty eight after
Speaker 1: majoring in civil engineering, and with a reputation for unselfish behavior.
Speaker 1: Was a man always looking to help others. Today holds
Speaker 1: mixed emotions for Collier. He had promised to his mother
Speaker 1: that this trip would be his last, and he would
Speaker 1: miss moments like these the most. The giddy, nervous energy
Speaker 1: of the team. Just before the journey begins, someone throws
Speaker 1: a couple of bags to Yuri Yudin, who deposits them outside,
Speaker 1: ready to load onto the truck that will take them
Speaker 1: to the station. The twenty one year old Yuri, a
Speaker 1: geology student at the institute, had endured a tough and
Speaker 1: impoverished upbringing, and also suffered greatly from rheumatism in his
Speaker 1: leg joints, but Yuri had always determined never to let
Speaker 1: his affliction dictate his life. There is a great cheer
Speaker 1: when Yuri Dorishenko finally arrives to join the group. The
Speaker 1: much loved twenty one year old radio engineer had a
Speaker 1: fearsome reputation, having once successfully fended off a black bear
Speaker 1: with nothing but a geologist's hammer. His entrance is followed
Speaker 1: shortly after by Eager Diatlov, a student of radio engineering.
Speaker 1: Twenty three year old Eager was a formidable athlete and
Speaker 1: easily the most experienced hiker in the team. Strong, thoughtful,
Speaker 1: and confident, he was a natural fit as their leader.
Speaker 1: He was also prodigiously talented, having designed and assembled a
Speaker 1: radio at the age of twenty that would later be
Speaker 1: used on Class hikes. With the final checks complete, the
Speaker 1: group gather their things and move out. Twenty minutes later,
Speaker 1: after a short tram ride to the city station, the
Speaker 1: team are settled into a Class three cabin as the
Speaker 1: train pulls away from Sverdlovsk. Such moments are usually caused
Speaker 1: for reflection, to be leaving behind your home town on
Speaker 1: a treacherous journey into the wilderness, but in this moment
Speaker 1: they are distracted by a stranger in their midst Are
Speaker 1: you always taking care of your family? Do you often
Speaker 1: take care of others and not yourself? Now it's time
Speaker 1: to take care of yourself. To make time for you.
Speaker 1: You deserve it. Tele Adoc gives you access to a
Speaker 1: licensed therapist to help you get back to feeling your
Speaker 1: best to feeling like yourself again. With tell adoc, you
Speaker 1: can speak to a licensed therapist by phone or video.
Speaker 1: Therapy appointments are available seven days a week from seven
Speaker 1: a m. To nine p m. Local time. If you
Speaker 1: feel overwhelmed sometimes maybe you feel stressed or anxious, depressed
Speaker 1: or lonely, or you might be struggling with a personal
Speaker 1: or family issue, teledoc can help. Teledoc is committed to
Speaker 1: facilitating great therapeutic matches, so they make it easy to
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Speaker 1: teledoc dot com. Forward slash Unexplained podcast. Today to get started,
Speaker 1: that's teladoc dot com slash Unexplained podcast. Eager introduces his handsome,
Speaker 1: dark haired friend to the group as Sasha. At thirty seven,
Speaker 1: he is considerably older than the others, and although not
Speaker 1: by any means old, he appears as if from another age,
Speaker 1: so the young students might be forgiven their palpable sense
Speaker 1: of trepidation when Sasha reveals a mouth full of gold
Speaker 1: teeth from underneath his wolfish smile. Their sense of unease
Speaker 1: is not helped by the sight of a number of
Speaker 1: tattoos dotted about his body, but their unease is not
Speaker 1: out of rudeness, more from the tacit awareness that they
Speaker 1: are in the presence of a ghost. At thirty seven
Speaker 1: years old, Sasha is part of a generation of which
Speaker 1: only three percent remain, having been decimated by the brutality
Speaker 1: of the Great Patriotic War. Though it is unlikely he
Speaker 1: would have forgotten much from the five years he served
Speaker 1: from nineteen forty one to nineteen forty six, Sascha bears
Speaker 1: a constant reminder of those he had lost. Three initials
Speaker 1: inked onto his skin, followed by an equal sign and
Speaker 1: the symbol for friendship. Semion Zolotatov to give him his
Speaker 1: full name, has been working as a tour guide in
Speaker 1: South Siberia, and like the others, is desperate to achieve
Speaker 1: his Grade three certificate. Before long, the team recognize a
Speaker 1: kindred spirit, and any initial sense of unease is quickly
Speaker 1: banished by the sound of Gyorgy's mandolin as he strikes
Speaker 1: up to play together. As the train speeds on through
Speaker 1: the ural countryside, they sing all the songs that they know,
Speaker 1: while behind them Sverdlovsk recedes further and further until it
Speaker 1: has entirely disappeared from view. Ten hours later, and the
Speaker 1: train finally pulls into Serov, a small town three hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty kilometers due north of Zverdlovsk. With their next
Speaker 1: train not due to leave until six thirty pm. The
Speaker 1: exhausted team are hoping to escape the cold and maybe
Speaker 1: get some sleep in the station waiting room, but are
Speaker 1: disappointed to find it locked for the day. Georgi attempts
Speaker 1: to cheer up his friends with a comical bus routine,
Speaker 1: but his singing has attracted the attention of two guards,
Speaker 1: a sign perhaps that they have already entered a different
Speaker 1: world to the one encased within their dormitory walls. The
Speaker 1: guards grab Gyorgi from the platform and push him into
Speaker 1: their office. A short time later, and a somewhat stunned
Speaker 1: Gyorgi is returned to the platform after being let off
Speaker 1: with a stern warning for contravening Article two point three
Speaker 1: of the Internal Order at railway stations. Not wanting to
Speaker 1: hang around, the team head off in search of shelter
Speaker 1: when they come across an empty school hall. After knocking
Speaker 1: on the door, they are met by the kind face
Speaker 1: of the school's janitor. Much to their relief, she takes
Speaker 1: pity on the young hikers and divites them inside to
Speaker 1: rest and warm themselves, but there is one condition. In return,
Speaker 1: they must give a talk to the school children before
Speaker 1: they leave. A few hours later, and Zena and Sasha
Speaker 1: have the children hanging on their every word as they
Speaker 1: listen wide eyed and attentively to their tales of adventure.
Speaker 1: When it is finally time to go, the children have
Speaker 1: to be peeled sobbing and crying from Zena before finally
Speaker 1: accepting her promise to one day return. The children wave
Speaker 1: and shout goodbye to their ten new favorite heroes as
Speaker 1: they watched them head back to the train station. Finally,
Speaker 1: the team are on the move again, and by midnight
Speaker 1: they have arrived in the small town of Evedale. Since
Speaker 1: leaving spurred Lovsk, the gang had been shadowed by another
Speaker 1: team of hikers from the institute, led by their good
Speaker 1: friend Yuri Blinoff. That night of January the twenty fourth,
Speaker 1: they all sleep huddled together in the Evedale station waiting
Speaker 1: room until the following morning, when they catch the first
Speaker 1: tram to Evedale town center. The town is built on
Speaker 1: the confluence of the Evedeale River and the Lozla River,
Speaker 1: and like most towns in the region, Evedell had been
Speaker 1: established as a mining colony, in this case for gold,
Speaker 1: but in nineteen thirty seven the town had taken on
Speaker 1: a second purpose, becoming the location of Evedel egg Gulag.
Speaker 1: The term is an acronym that translates to main administration
Speaker 1: of corrective labor camps. The camps had been set up
Speaker 1: during Stalin's time partly as corrective facilities for criminals, but
Speaker 1: were often also used to dispense with political prisoners, a
Speaker 1: fact that would no doubt have crossed Collier's mind, at
Speaker 1: least as the hikers made their way into the town center,
Speaker 1: with some consideration perhaps for the desperate souls hidden away
Speaker 1: somewhere beyond the snow topped roofs of the town's outskirts.
Speaker 1: They don't have to wait long before their bus arrives,
Speaker 1: and soon after the team are moving through the white
Speaker 1: blanketed countryside. As the bus forges ahead towards Vizza, the
Speaker 1: next stop on their journey. But there is something wrong.
Speaker 1: Alexander is missing. They must have left him behind at
Speaker 1: the last toilet break. The team yelled to the bus
Speaker 1: driver to pull over. A quick headcount confirms their fears.
Speaker 1: Alexander is indeed missing, but there is nothing that can
Speaker 1: be done. With the bus on a tight schedule, the
Speaker 1: driver has no choice but to continue the journey. But wait,
Speaker 1: says Yuri. As far off, a small shape, steadily growing larger,
Speaker 1: reveals itself to be a fully laden Alexander, sprinting with
Speaker 1: all his strength toward them. I thought you'd left, he
Speaker 1: sputters between gasps for breath, Never say the others, as
Speaker 1: they haul his exhausted body back onto the bus. Just
Speaker 1: after two pm, they arrive at Viza, and the hikers disembark.
Speaker 1: The town is a woodcutting settlement that served as a
Speaker 1: central hub from which further outposts could be reached. From here,
Speaker 1: the two teams will go their separate ways. For Blinov
Speaker 1: and his team, a bus heading their way to Sector
Speaker 1: one oh five is due to leave late in the afternoon.
Speaker 1: For Eager's group, however, they will have to stop here
Speaker 1: for the night. That afternoon, the team's many cameras, vital
Speaker 1: for recording evidence for their Category three certificates, are whipped
Speaker 1: out as they say their final goodbyes to Blinov and
Speaker 1: his team. Despite the minus seventeen degree temperature, the classmates
Speaker 1: smile and fool around as they pose for one final picture.
Speaker 1: Moments later, Urient team scramble into the back of a
Speaker 1: flatbed truck and wave a fond goodbye to their friends
Speaker 1: as they pull away and out of the camp. For
Speaker 1: Eager's team, it will be one last night of domesticity
Speaker 1: before heading off into the wilderness. The team are especially
Speaker 1: excited to hear of a nearby screening room and will
Speaker 1: pile in later that evening to watch a film called
Speaker 1: Symphony and Gold. Rustick finds time to write a postcard
Speaker 1: to his mother and Dorishenko and Alexander make a number
Speaker 1: of final checks and adjustments to the equipment. That night,
Speaker 1: with two crammed to a bed and Georgi and Sasha
Speaker 1: taking positions on the floor, the team sleep soundly. The
Speaker 1: next morning, they are up and dressed early, eager to
Speaker 1: get on the road again. But something is bugging Yuri.
Speaker 1: A pain in his legs that had been steadily growing
Speaker 1: was threatening to become unbearable. Despite his misgivings, he was
Speaker 1: determined not to let the others down and decided to
Speaker 1: ignore it for now. But there is also something else.
Speaker 1: The previous afternoon, an experienced forester had expressed concern about
Speaker 1: the group's trip, thinking it too dangerous for them at
Speaker 1: this time of year. Eager had laughed it off in
Speaker 1: typically bullish style. After all, wasn't that precisely the reason
Speaker 1: that they were taking the trip in the first place.
Speaker 1: Yuri had laughed too, but as he prepared to board
Speaker 1: the truck for their ride out of Vizi, it was
Speaker 1: with the old man's words still ringing in his ears.
Speaker 1: The journey didn't help much either. Sitting at the back
Speaker 1: of the rickety open air truck, the team struggled for
Speaker 1: warmth and comfort, but as any traveler knows, it is
Speaker 1: from such experiences that true bonds are made, and before
Speaker 1: long the gang were once again singing songs and speaking
Speaker 1: of love and friendship as they traveled ever higher into
Speaker 1: the frost bitten ural Mountains. Sector forty one was a
Speaker 1: worker's outpost occupied by roughly fifty woodsmen stationed on long
Speaker 1: term contracts, many of whom had gone months cut off
Speaker 1: from the world. So it was with no little excitement
Speaker 1: that the new faces of the young students were welcomed
Speaker 1: into the worker's homes that evening. As for Datlov and
Speaker 1: his team, they were treated to a glimpse of another
Speaker 1: world revealed through the songs and poems shared by the
Speaker 1: workers that night, many of them illegal and punishable under
Speaker 1: Article fifty eight of counter revolutionary Crimes, but even for
Speaker 1: the committed communist Luda, it was a night to remember.
Speaker 1: The next morning, on January the twenty seventh, the team
Speaker 1: awake to find a beautiful, clear blue sky waiting for them.
Speaker 1: After eight hundred and fifty kilometers, finally the time has
Speaker 1: come to put on their skis and begin the trek
Speaker 1: to a tort and mountain. A local man named Slava
Speaker 1: offers to lend them his sled and horse to help
Speaker 1: carry their heavy equipment to their next stop, a settlement
Speaker 1: known as North two. The settlement is an older geological
Speaker 1: research site just twenty four kilometers to the north, now
Speaker 1: abandoned and home to a little more than two thousand
Speaker 1: dilapidated cabins. It is late in the afternoon when Slava
Speaker 1: returns with his sled, but after securing the luggage and
Speaker 1: fastening their skis, the team are finally en route towards
Speaker 1: North Two. The journey takes them over the frozen waters
Speaker 1: of the Ushma River, deeper and deeper into the forest,
Speaker 1: but the thin ice is proving tricky for the horse
Speaker 1: to negotiate. After two hours, the team have only made
Speaker 1: it a third of the way, but as the winter
Speaker 1: sun drops down behind a distant ridge, the team continue
Speaker 1: on unperturbed. Another four hours later, and eager spots something ahead.
Speaker 1: Under the soft light of the moon, they can just
Speaker 1: make out the shape of a hut against the tree line.
Speaker 1: As their eyes are just suddenly a sprawling pastoral ghost
Speaker 1: town has appeared before them. They have reached the North
Speaker 1: to settlement. The woodsmen had recommended one hut in particular
Speaker 1: that was still habitable, and somehow, after a short time
Speaker 1: stumbling around in the dark, they managed to find it
Speaker 1: that night. Approaching the log cabin on the edge of
Speaker 1: the forest under the moonlight, it is as if they
Speaker 1: have crossed some kind of threshold and stepped right into
Speaker 1: a fairy tale. Old Slavic folk stories tell of a
Speaker 1: grotesque witch with fearsome iron teeth by the name of
Speaker 1: Baba Yaga, who lives in a hut deep in the
Speaker 1: heart of the forest. She is a complex creature that
Speaker 1: is sometimes good, but at other times utterly monstrous, given
Speaker 1: to eating her victims without a moment's hesitation. It is
Speaker 1: said that she travels in a large pestle and mortar
Speaker 1: that flies through the trees with a sickening, grinding screech,
Speaker 1: and that her heart stands atop of a pair of
Speaker 1: chicken's feet. But there are no such feet under the
Speaker 1: cabin that night, and the air remains silent with the
Speaker 1: eerie quietude that only an abandoned village can conjure up.
Speaker 1: Before long, there is life once again, and sector north too,
Speaker 1: As the darkness of the cabin is illuminated by the
Speaker 1: sound of young voices, filled with the relief of finding
Speaker 1: shelter for the night, and then shortly after by the
Speaker 1: flickering glow of lamp light. A few of the boys
Speaker 1: volunteer to find firewood from outside by pulling up wood
Speaker 1: from some of the more dilapidated cabins. At one point,
Speaker 1: Rustick grabs at one, only to pull away in pain.
Speaker 1: He looks closely at his hand and sees a small
Speaker 1: pin prick from an old nail hidden in the dark.
Speaker 1: He watches for a moment as the prick becomes a
Speaker 1: drop of blood on the surface of his skin. A
Speaker 1: short time later and the fire is roaring and filling
Speaker 1: the room with the comforting, sweet smelling smoke off the hearth.
Speaker 1: The following morning and Yearie Eudin's legs are finally given
Speaker 1: in after struggling even to stand. It is clear that
Speaker 1: he is at the point of no return with Slava
Speaker 1: due to head back to Sector forty one that day.
Speaker 1: He has little option but to join him. With sincere disappointment,
Speaker 1: he breaks the news to the rest of the group,
Speaker 1: who are all equally devastated to be saying goodbye so
Speaker 1: early to their friend. As a keen geologist, Ury is
Speaker 1: determined not to return empty handed and manages to corral
Speaker 1: a small team to join him on the hunt for
Speaker 1: some interesting samples to take back home, But despite the
Speaker 1: area's abundance of precious stones and minerals, Ury is saddened
Speaker 1: only to find quartz and Fool's gold hidden under the snow.
Speaker 1: With Slava eager to get going, Ury loads his pack
Speaker 1: on to the back of the sled and gingerly steps
Speaker 1: into his skiths. The team say their final goodbyes and
Speaker 1: take one last picture of their friend before he leaves.
Speaker 1: And so it is that, on the morning of Wednesday,
Speaker 1: January twenty eighth, that the ten strong team led by
Speaker 1: Iger Diatlov becomes nine. Before he is out of sight,
Speaker 1: Yuri turns one last time to waive a final goodbye
Speaker 1: to the team. He couldn't possibly have known then that
Speaker 1: it will be the last time his friends will ever
Speaker 1: be seen alive again. All elements have unexplained are produced
Speaker 1: by me Richard McClain smith. Please subscribe and rate the
Speaker 1: show on iTunes, and feel free to get in touch
Speaker 1: with any thoughts or ideas regarding the stories you've heard
Speaker 1: on the show. Perhaps you have an explanation of your
Speaker 1: own you'd like to share. You can reach us online
Speaker 1: at Unexplained podcast dot com or on Twitter at Unexplained
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