Dyatlov Pass: Based on the true story that haunted Russia, page 1
DYATLOV PASS
A Novel by Alan K. Baker
First published by Thistle Books in 2013
Copyright © Alan K Baker 2013
This edition published in 2020 by Lume Books
30 Great Guildford Street,
Borough, SE1 0HS
The right of Alan K Baker to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.
My gaze slips sadly from hill to hill,
Slowly extinguished in the fearsome void.
–Fyodor Tyutchev, Solitude
Table of Contents
AUTHOR’S NOTE
PRINCIPAL CHARACTERS
PREFACE
DYATLOV PASS: AN INVESTIGATION OF THE CLAIMS OF VIKTOR STRUGATSKY BY DR. ANATOLIY BASKOV
PART ONE - AN OVERWHELMING UNKNOWN FORCE
ONE - BASKOV MONDAY 23 FEBRUARY 2009
TWO - VIKTOR WEDNESDAY 21 JANUARY 2009
THREE - VIKTOR WEDNESDAY 21 JANUARY 2009
FOUR - BASKOV MONDAY 23 FEBRUARY – TUESDAY 24 FEBRUARY 2009
FIVE - VIKTOR WEDNESDAY 21 – THURSDAY 22 JANUARY 2009
SIX - BASKOV WEDNESDAY 25 FEBRUARY 2009
SEVEN - VIKTOR THURSDAY 22 JANUARY 2009
EIGHT - VIKTOR FRIDAY 23 JANUARY 2009
NINE - BASKOV THURSDAY 26 FEBRUARY 2009
TEN - KHABAROV FRIDAY 27 FEBRUARY 2009
ELEVEN - KHABAROV FRIDAY 27 FEBRUARY 2009
TWELVE - VIKTOR FRIDAY 29 JANUARY 2009
THIRTEEN - BASKOV FRIDAY 27 FEBRUARY 2009
FOURTEEN - VIKTOR SATURDAY 30 JANUARY 2009
PART TWO: THE NUMBERS STATION
FIFTEEN - VIKTOR WEDNESDAY 3 FEBRUARY 2009
SIXTEEN - BASKOV SATURDAY 28 FEBRUARY 2009
SEVENTEEN - VIKTOR WEDNESDAY 3 FEBRUARY 2009
EIGHTEEN - BASKOV MONDAY 2 MARCH 2009
NINETEEN - KHABAROV MONDAY 2 MARCH 2009
TWENTY - VIKTOR THURSDAY 4 FEBRUARY 2009
TWENTY-ONE - VIKTOR THURSDAY 4 FEBRUARY 2009
TWENTY-TWO - BASKOV MONDAY 2 MARCH 2009
PART THREE: SVAROG
TWENTY-THREE - BASKOV SATURDAY 9 MAY 2009
TWENTY-FOUR - KHABAROV MONDAY 2 MARCH 2009
TWENTY-FIVE - KHABAROV MONDAY 2 MARCH 2009
TWENTY-SIX - KHABAROV MONDAY 2 MARCH 2009
TWENTY-SEVEN - LISHIN SATURDAY 31 JANUARY 1959
TWENTY-EIGHT - LISHIN SATURDAY 31 JANUARY 1959
TWENTY-NINE - LISHIN SUNDAY 1 FEBRUARY 1959
THIRTY - LISHIN SUNDAY 1 – MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 1959
THIRTY-ONE - LISHIN SUNDAY 1 MARCH 1959
THIRTY-TWO - KHABAROV MONDAY 2 MARCH 2009
THIRTY-THREE - BASKOV SATURDAY 9 MAY 2009
AUTHOR’S NOTE
An earlier version of this novel was published in 2013 by Thistle Publishing Ltd. The present version differs quite radically in its plot, and in the solution to the mystery it presents.
The novel is based on actual events. The so-called ‘Dyatlov Pass incident’, in which nine experienced ski-hikers died in unexplained circumstances, occurred in the Soviet Union in February 1959. Their abandoned camp was discovered by a search party on the southern slopes of Mountain 1079 (also known as Kholat Syakhl, or ‘Dead Mountain’) in the northern Urals. Later, the bodies of Igor Dyatlov and his eight companions were discovered at various locations in the vicinity of the camp. They appeared to have died from hypothermia, but evidence emerged to suggest that something altogether stranger happened to them. In the decades following the tragedy, many theories – some more plausible than others – have been presented to account for their deaths, which are still unexplained.
All of the circumstances surrounding the ill-fated journey of Dyatlov and his friends are true and accurately described in this novel. The modern story (and the solution to the mystery) are entirely my invention – with the exception, perhaps, of the Black Knight…
PRINCIPAL CHARACTERS
THE NOVEL
ANATOLIY BASKOV, Psychiatrist, Peveralsk Psychiatric Hospital
VIKTOR STRUGATSKY, Journalist with the Yekaterinburg Gazette
VERONIKA IVASHEVA, artist, Viktor’s ex-girlfriend
STANISLAV KHABAROV, Senior Investigator, Criminal Militia
GALINA KHABAROVA, Stanislav Khabarov’s mother
VADIM KONSTANTINOV, Professor of Anthropology (retired)
ALISA CHERNIKOVA, Physicist, Ural State Technical University
ROMAN BAKHTYAROV, Headman of the Mansi village of Yurta Anyamova
PROKOPY ANYAMOV, Mansi shaman
ILLARION KHABAROV, Pilot in the Red Air Force, Stanislav Khabarov’s father (deceased)
VITALY SHIROKOV, Lieutenant-General, Research and Trials Field *5 of the Defence Ministry
FYODOR PLETNER, Director, Peveralsk Psychiatric Hospital
SERGEI MAKSIMOV, Editor of the Yekaterinburg Gazette
GEORGIY CHEREVIN, Journalist with the Yekaterinburg Gazette
LEONID DELOV, Lecturer in Geography, Ural State Technical University (retired)
NATALIYA BASKOVA, Anatoliy Baskov’s wife
THE DYATLOV GROUP
YURI DOROSHENKO (1938 – 1959), Student of radio engineering
LUDMILLA DUBININA (1938 – 1959), Student of economics and construction
IGOR DYATLOV (1936 – 1959), Student of engineering
ALEXANDER KOLEVATOV (1934 – 1959), Student of nuclear physics
ZINAIDA KOLMOGOROVA (1937 – 1959), Student of radio engineering
GEORGY KRIVONISCHENKO (1935 – 1959), Student of construction and hydraulics
RUSTEM SLOBODIN (1936 – 1959), Graduate in mechanical engineering
NIKOLAI THIBEAU-BRIGNOLLE (1935 – 1959), Graduate in civil construction
YURI YUDIN (1937 – 2013), Student of geology (the only survivor of the Dyatlov group)
ALEXANDER ZOLOTAREV (1921 – 1959), WWII veteran, hiking instructor, student of military engineering
PREFACE
I have tried to think of an appropriate description of the following document. It has not been easy: to call it a psychiatric report (which it was originally intended to be) is no longer accurate, since I have included lengthy passages describing my own personal responses to the sessions I have conducted with the subject, Viktor Strugatsky, as well as the strange and unsettling discoveries I have made during the course of my evaluation of his mental state. For that reason, I have subtitled this document ‘An Investigation’, which seems somewhat more appropriate.
Of course, it goes without saying that a psychiatrist’s responses are of the utmost importance in the treatment of a patient; and yet, I realise that I have gone much farther than I intended in my evaluation of Strugatsky, to the extent that I have now become a part of his story. This is at least as troubling to me as the elements of the story themselves.
I should note here the preliminary facts of the case, and describe how I came to be involved. On Monday 23 February 2009, the criminal militia approached the Peveralsk Psychiatric Hospital just outside Yekaterinburg, where I work, asking for assistance in a possible homicide case which they were investigating.
Nine days previously, a man had entered the village of Yurta Anyamova, north of the town of Ivdel in the northern Urals. The village belongs to the Mansi people, who are indigenous to the area. The man was apparently in a state of profound shock, and was suffering from a fever from which he only recovered due to the care administered to him by the villagers.
It seems that on the previous Sunday, he had passed through Yurta Anyamova in the company of three other people. They were 68-year-old Vadim Konstantinov, a retired professor of anthropology; Veronika Ivasheva, 28, a police sketch artist; and Alisa Chernikova, 31, a physicist working at the Ural State Technical University.
According to the headman of the village, Roman Bakhtyarov, the group had claimed to be conducting research into the so-called ‘Dyatlov Pass incident’, which occurred on the slopes of a nearby mountain called Kholat Syakhl fifty years ago, in February 1959. The facts of the Dyatlov Pass incident are well known to the region’s historians and general public alike, and I will refrain from repeating them in this preface, for reasons which will become clear.
Five days after they left Yurta Anyamova, Strugatsky returned to the village alone; he was sick and incoherent, but in his infrequent moments of lucidity, he claimed that the others had been killed in the forest that lies to the south of Kholat Syakhl.
The Director of Peveralsk, Dr Fyodor Pletner, agreed to admit Strugatsky for observation, and asked me if I would undertake an examination of the subject. Strugatsky was brought to the hospital, and quarters were assigned to him in the secure wing.
Following treatment for his rather poor physical condition, the result of exhaustion combined with lack of proper sustenance (it seems that the villagers had not been able to get him to take any food, either during or immediately after his fever), I scheduled a session with Strugatsky for Wednesday 25 February.
What follows is, as I have already noted, difficult to describe. I suppose it would be most accurate to call it a chronicle of my evaluation of Viktor Strugatsky, a person al memoir, one might say. But it is much more than that: it is also the story of my own growing awareness of the true nature of what he encountered in the forest, and of his mental state. I believe that the people with whom he set out for Kholat Syakhl are indeed dead; but I do not believe that Strugatsky killed them.
I am equally certain that many will find the text which follows problematic, for several reasons. Those in the psychiatric community will doubtless comment on the style of the prose; I would respond to those concerns simply by saying that the style is fitting for my purposes in writing a personal chronicle. Those in the wider scientific community will, equally doubtlessly, treat its contents with incredulity, or even contempt. For them, I have no response, other than to say that I present this material for what it is worth.
I would make one final note on the text: the particulars of the Strugatsky case were gathered during the course of several sessions, during which our conversations were recorded. I have used these recordings to piece together his experiences, and have decided, for the sake of clarity, to present them in the third person. I have included many minor details and observations gleaned from Strugatsky’s conversation, which I have edited to form what is hopefully a coherent narrative.
In addition, this narrative includes material provided to me by Senior Investigator Stanislav Khabarov of the criminal militia, who was in charge of the Strugatsky case. This material has been instrumental in piecing together not only what happened to Viktor and his friends, but also what really happened to Igor Dyatlov and the other members of the group who met their terrible ends in the northern Urals fifty years ago.
I have also included certain material pertaining to the Dyatlov Pass incident which is in the public domain, as well as certain other material, which only came to light during the course of the research which Strugatsky and the others conducted. As mentioned above, I have also included my own responses and discoveries.
What those discoveries mean, for the world and for humanity, I am unable to say; but I believe the implications of what you are about to read are of the utmost seriousness and significance.
Anatoliy Baskov
Peveralsk Psychiatric Hospital
June 2009
DYATLOV PASS
AN INVESTIGATION OF THE CLAIMS OF
VIKTOR STRUGATSKY
BY DR. ANATOLIY BASKOV
PART ONE
AN OVERWHELMING UNKNOWN FORCE
ONE
BASKOV
MONDAY 23 FEBRUARY 2009
I went to the hospital’s secure wing and entered Viktor Strugatsky’s room. I instructed the two orderlies who had accompanied me to wait outside, and they assured me that they would come to my aid immediately, should I call for them.
The room was small and spartanly furnished, but clean and bright. Strugatsky had damaged nothing, which is not always the case with subjects whose mental state is in question, and who have been accused of serious crimes. There was a bed, an armchair, washing facilities and a small desk at which stood a wooden chair.
I smiled at him. ‘Good morning, Viktor. I am Dr Baskov.’
Strugatsky was lying on the bed. He immediately sat up and put his feet on the floor. ‘Good morning.’
He did not return my smile; but neither did his face display any hostility. In fact, his expression was blank, save for slightly furrowed brows, which gave him the appearance of someone pondering a minor problem of no particular significance. I noted the light tan on his face which had been remarked upon during his initial physical examination (and which suggested that he had recently spent an extended period of time in the open air), along with the numerous flecks of grey in his hair, which gave him the appearance of a man somewhat older than his twenty-eight years.
I indicated the chair by the desk. ‘Do you mind if I sit down?’
‘Please do.’
‘How are you feeling today?’
‘I’d like to get out of here.’
‘I’m afraid that’s not possible just yet,’ I said gently.
‘Not until you decide whether I’m crazy, or a murderer,’ he said; and now he smiled, but it was a very small, sad smile: an expression of resignation rippling on the surface of fear and uncertainty.
‘That’s correct,’ I replied, placing a DAT recorder on the desk.
‘I’ve got one like that,’ said Strugatsky. ‘Same make.’
‘You’re a journalist, aren’t you?’
He repeated: ‘Yes, I’ve got one like that. At least, I used to have one. It’s still there.’
‘Still there?’
‘In the forest. Unless they took it … yes, they probably took it.’
‘“They”? Who’s “they”?’
Strugatsky said nothing.
‘Do you mind if I tape this conversation?’
‘Would you refrain from taping it if I said yes?’
‘It is standard procedure.’
‘I don’t mind.’
‘Thank you.’ I switched on the machine. ‘How long have you been a journalist?’
‘About four years. You think I killed them, don’t you? You think I’m crazy, and I killed them.’ His voice was quite without inflection as he said this. Clearly for Strugatsky, it was merely a statement of fact, like saying that the sun rose this morning.
‘No, I’m not saying that. In fact, I don’t know. That’s why I’m here, why we’re talking.’
‘If I’m not crazy, then why am I locked up in a mental hospital?’
‘You’re here so that we can figure out what happened to you, and to your companions...’
‘They were killed.’
‘How?’
Strugatsky said nothing, he merely looked at me; but as he did so, I saw something in his eyes: a flash of trepidation, perhaps outright fear. ‘It’s all right, Viktor,’ I said. ‘You can tell me.’
‘That’s the problem, Doctor,’ he replied in a very quiet voice. ‘I don’t know if I can tell you. I might be doing you a big favour if I didn’t.’
‘How so?’
His frown returned, deeply furrowing his brow. ‘I don’t know who I can tell, and who I can’t. Do you really want to help me, or...?’
‘Or what?’ Silence. ‘Yes, I want to help you, Viktor. Everyone who works here wants to help you. You’re among friends. You’re safe.’
‘Safe?’ He gave a short laugh.
I decided to try a different approach. ‘Why don’t you tell me a bit about yourself?’
‘What do you want to know?’
‘Well ... are you from Yekaterinburg originally?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you work for the Yekaterinburg Gazette.’
‘Yes.’
Two monosyllabic answers on the trot. Clearly, Strugatsky considered the subjects of his personal history and occupation to be unworthy of conversation.
‘And you have an interest in the Dyatlov Pass incident,’ I said.
He looked up at me suddenly, as if startled. ‘Not at first. But that’s how it started.’
‘How what started?’
He smiled again, and this time the smile was broader, almost feral. ‘The train of events that have led me here, Dr Baskov.’
‘Would you like to tell me how it started?’
Strugatsky stood up slowly. I was ready to call out for the orderlies, but he merely went over to the armchair and sat down. ‘Don’t worry, Doctor,’ he said. ‘I’m not a violent man.’
It took me a moment to realise that he had known I was preparing to call for help. ‘That was very perceptive of you,’ I said.
‘Thank you.’
‘Well then,’ I said. ‘Why don’t you tell me how all this started?’
Strugatsky sighed, and looked up through the small window set high in the wall at the grey, overcast sky beyond. ‘All right, Doctor.’
TWO
VIKTOR
WEDNESDAY 21 JANUARY 2009
Viktor leaned over his desk with his head in his hands, staring at the notes he had so far assembled on the Borovsky story, the noise and bustle of the office grating on his nerves. He had just got off the phone with another potential witness who didn’t want to get involved, in spite of the promise of anonymity. The Yekaterinburg Gazette was a serious newspaper, Viktor had told him. There was nothing to worry about; his identity would not be divulged. But the man was terrified – Viktor had heard it in his voice. ‘I’m sorry,’ he’d said. ‘I can’t help you. Please don’t call me again.’ And he had hung up, leaving Viktor with a dead receiver in his hand, and the notes for a story that was going nowhere scattered across his desk.
