Aleksandr Vinogradov about Nikolay Ognev and much more

Aleksander Viktorovich Vinogradov, 1963

A few months ago, information appeared on the Internet about the memoirs of geologist A.V. Vinogradov, in which he talked about Ognev Nikolay Grigorievich, or "Beard", as the Dyatlov group called him in their field diaries.

"One day, the Vasilievs told me that an old lathe had been abandoned at one of the Ural geologists' bases - it was in great shortage at the time. I contacted the expedition, and they sent me a tractor driver to go there. The tractor driver turned out to be Ognev Kolya - a stocky, red-haired guy, an inveterate gambler, whom I knew in Saranpaul. He was almost a local from the cooperative. At one time, he headed a section in the village of Khurumpaul for burning quicklime from limestone, and brought its cost price to double the price of granulated sugar. In fairness, it should be noted that this was not only his "merit" - in winter, sometimes we had to carry the stone on a reindeer sled for 150 km. In the evenings, he would sit down to play cards with me - there was absolutely nothing to do in the evening. By the light of a kerosene lamp, we played preferans, poker, twenty-one. He always tried to win, because he knew for sure that I would always give up the loss. However, in the end, he lost a very large sum to me, and for several years afterwards he promised to give it back, but never did. But that's just by the way."

The memories themselves made a strong impression on me, I love memoir literature. And, in addition to the short story about Ognev, I found many other moments in the stories of A.V. Vinogradov that interested me, and somehow seemed related to our topic.

I decided to ask A.V. Vinogradov to tell me everything he knows about Nikolay Ognev and answer a few questions. Aleksander Viktorovich responded to my request and kindly agreed to share his memories. For which I am grateful to him and express my deep gratitude on behalf of the entire Dyatlov community.

The result of our correspondence was this interview, which I am pleased to present to the reader's judgment.

M.P.: Aleksander Viktorovich, it turns out that today you are the only person who knew and communicated with Nikolay Ognev, and so far no other witnesses have been found. Please tell us everything you know and remember about him. Due to the lack of information and the absence of interrogation protocols for workers from the 41st quarter, many different versions have been put forward about Ognev and his comrades, that they could have been involved in the death of the Dyatlov group. And it is very important for me to find a witness who met with him and could tell people the truth about Nikolay. And if possible, confirm or, on the contrary, destroy these myths.

A.V.: Maya, I never thought that there would be people who would be interested in Kolya Ognev. I first met him at Khobe-Yu, where we started working. He worked as a gateman in the pits. He was a stocky guy, a little over 30, with thick, dark-dark-red hair. I remember that his face was slightly marked by smallpox. Before our expedition, he worked as a section chief in the settlement of Khurumpaul from the Berezovsky District Industrial Complex. His section carried limestone stones on reindeer sleds along the winter road from the lime quarry on the Yatriya River, and they were burned to lime. As he himself said, the cost of 1 kg of lime exceeded the cost of sugar, and his salary was a pittance. So he returned to geology. It turned out that we had two points of contact. The first was a petty passion for gambling cards for money - preferans and twenty-one. The second was his work before 1957 in the Tolya party of the Uralgeolupravlenie. When I was sent as the head of the "Turman" section, the settlement of Tolya was transferred to me for management as well. It was meant that if mineralization was confirmed in the mountains on Turman, the site would be transformed into a geological exploration party with a base in the settlement of Tolya. Then Kolya came up to me and asked to go with me to Tolya, and at the same time told me that he knew where an abandoned lathe was lying near Tolya, and it could be brought to the settlement on a tractor. I don’t know whether he had a tractor driver’s license or not, but he said that he knew how to drive a tractor. I agreed with the head of the expedition to take Kolya with me to bring the lathe. I have described this entire epic with the sinking and pulling out of the tractors. I am still amazed at how we, without any outside equipment, together, practically with our bare hands, managed to get them out of the swamp. Then we played cards with him more than once in Saranpaul, when I was transferred there again. I don't have any photographs of him from those years, but I remember his face very well.

The Vasilievs had known him for a long time from his work in the Tolyinsk party, they didn't scold him, but they didn't express any admiration either.

M.P.: You say that Ognev worked for several years - until 1957 - in the Tolyinskaya geological exploration party. An interesting point. Why did Nikolay suddenly enlist in 1959 to cut down trees? Or he could have been there for geological reasons, he had his own work connected with the Second Northern. I wish I knew... What could be done in a mining village abandoned in winter?

A.V.: In 1957, the Tolyinskaya party was transferred to the Tyumen Geological Administration, and the work was closed, and all the workers were fired. Kolya wanted to eat and found work cutting down trees.

M.P.: What year did you meet Nikolay Ognev? Did he say anything about being acquainted with the deceased students of the Dyatlov group?

A.V.: From January 1962 to January 1966. He never mentioned the Dyatlov group, although there was time and place for it. We lived together for a month in the empty settlement of Tolya. I think he might have signed a non-disclosure agreement.

Of course, I also know about the tragedy of the Dyatlov group, since that year I graduated from the institute in Sverdlovsk, and I myself am from Severouralsk. I heard about a group of UPI students getting lost on a route in the Northern Ural Mountains for the first time in February 1959 from a UPI student in Sverdlovsk, and in February and May there was a rumor that the guys had died. About some details, such as the tent being cut in several places, even exotic fantasy versions of the reasons were told and discussed, such as testing a special bomb that takes heat from the surrounding air. Of course, about such a bomb, these are fantasies of people who are not very technically savvy.

When the bodies of the guys were found, a group of doctors was brought from Severouralsk to Ivdel by helicopter, from whom they took a non-disclosure agreement. However, when I came to Severouralsk in the summer, they repeated to me the story about the cuts in the tent, running down the slope, and the unusual color of the bodies of the dead.

M.P.: A very interesting remark about the fact that a group of doctors was brought from Severouralsk by helicopter. How did you find out about this?

A.V.: About the doctors, the whole city knew about it. Severouralsk was small then, and what was said in one corner could be heard in another.

M.P.: What kind of person was Nikolay Ognev, in your opinion? What do you think, did he have any education, or just primary school?

A.V.: He was a normal guy, without any quirks, moderately well-read, since there was no Internet or television then. I did not notice any bad inclinations or aspirations in him. I do not know what kind of education Kolya had, but he was a guy with a fairly broad outlook and thinking for his status. In addition, he did not allow familiarity in our relations, although the age difference was insignificant. If he did not possess these qualities, then it is unlikely that only preference could unite an engineer and a worker. I do not know whether he was married then, but he did not say anything about his wife. Although he told a lot about himself, but it's all been forgotten.

M.P.: You say that you lived with Nikolay Ognev for a month in the empty settlement of Tolya. What did you talk about? I was a little surprised that Nikolay didn't mention that he had communicated with the dead students, but he could have told a lot about them. Do you suppose that he signed a non-disclosure agreement... What could he have disclosed? The students passed through their settlement, well, they passed and moved on. What kind of secret could there be in the fact that they met Ognev and his workmates on the way?

A.V.: A non-disclosure agreement could have been taken from all the people who had some kind of contact with the group. I think that during the investigation, all the loggers from the area were questioned by investigators, and they could have signed a non-disclosure agreement. Why is it needed? During the interrogation of witnesses, the investigator, voluntarily or involuntarily, gives out his own versions of what happened. And until the end of the investigation, all conversations of those questioned with strangers can only harm the investigation. Especially in such a tragedy, which even after half a century is kept under two secrecy classifications, if not higher. But this is my personal opinion. I think that Ognev would have told me this story, and I would have questioned him carefully. Since only three years had passed and everything was still on everyone's lips.

M.P.: In the diaries of the Dyatlov group, we found respectful mentions of Ognev, and even his address, apparently they were planning to visit him later, if their future route passed through the place where he lived, or write him letters...

In general, I wonder why people take the addresses of other people they don't know, whom they met maybe for the first and last time in their lives? What do you think about this, why did the guys write his address in their diaries?

Apparently, Ognev made a strong impression on the guys with his stories about life. Usually people tell the same thing, what impressed them, the plots do not change, details are added. Please, remember what Nikolay told you personally, or in company? He could have told the same stories to the Dyatlov group!

Dyatlov group at District 41 with lumberjack workers

A.V.: Your group photo is unique. I have never seen it anywhere, because I would have definitely recognized Ognev. Without seeing Ognev's photo among Igor Dyatlov's group, I would never have believed that such a meeting took place. Kolya is the only one with a gorgeous beard. Perhaps he told me something about this meeting, but I have completely forgotten everything. The only thing I remember from his adventures is when he took a murdered cook from Man-Nyaysa to Ivdel in a reindeer sled in the winter of 1962, and buried her there. I have written about this incident.

"It happened in the upper reaches of the Nyaysa. Less than a year ago, in December 1961, a ground detachment of geophysicists from A.A. Latypov's party was stationed here and a tragedy occurred - the detachment's cook, a middle-aged woman, died. As an eyewitness, Kolya Ognev, said, they were running out of food, there was no helicopter, and an AN-2 plane came to drop supplies. Apparently, there was no prior agreement on safety measures between the participants in the operation. The cook left the hut, began to watch the drop and overlooked something. At one point, a frozen pork carcass flying from above hit the corner of the log crown of the hut and knocked a piece of wood out of the log cup. This piece hit her right in the temple and killed her instantly. After that, she was placed in a snowdrift and covered with more snow. They reported what had happened to the party base. From there, apparently, more somewhere. No one came to investigate, and later they sent a reindeer team and took the body to the city of Ivdel for burial. This was exactly the period when the party from Salekhard had already left, but had not yet arrived in Saranpaul - anarchy. Therefore, no one was even punished and the man was "written off". The place of the chip on the corner of the hut was clearly visible even today. And in general, such stories, even those that happened a year ago, do not add optimism when spending the night in such godforsaken places."

Kolya could have easily finished 8-9 grades, since he had good, literate speech, with coherent logic. And naturally, when the Dyatlov group approached the barracks, Ognev conducted the main conversations with them. The other guys were below him in intelligence. And they could have written down his address with views on the future. He, apparently, had already agreed to move to work in the Subpolar Urals, in one of the ground detachments of the Aeromagnetic Party, which were based close to the center line of the Ural ridge in the area of ​​the peaks of Turman-Nel and Yaruta-Syakhal. And these places along the mountains of the Subpolar Urals are extremely attractive for winter hikers - they rarely go along the eastern slope of the ridge - the route is difficult. The Dyatlov group could well have planned to go this route in a year or two. And Kolya soon left for work there. The bulk of the workers on our expedition had been through the camps and couldn't leave for the mainland, so they lived in the North.

As for the involvement of these guys from the barracks in the deaths of the hikers, I completely rule it out! Look at their clear faces in the photo. I don't know Lombroso's theory, but there is no hatred or any hidden dark intentions on their faces. And most importantly, there was no reason to harm the hikers. There couldn't have been any dark secrets near this barracks, except for the toilet with a latch on the street. The story with pyrite and chalcopyrite is also meaningless - you can collect as much of this stuff as you want in the old dumps near Berezovsky. Most likely, this tragedy was a coincidence of two accidents - an emergency fall of a step, people ran out of the tent in fear, and then other people came. But not lumberjacks.

M.P.: Did you ever get the impression that he had been in prison? What did Ognev do in geological parties? Did he talk about his previous places of work, about the places he had visited?

A.V.: Did Kolya do time? More likely no than yes. Criminals who have been in prison have a very specific jargon, and communication between them and the engineering and technical workers. This was not observed in him. But in his youth, he could have foolishly gone to prison for a year or two, but he did not have time to acquire any bad habits. Kolya worked in the Tolyinsk geological exploration party for several years, until 1957. In the parties, he worked in blue-collar positions. Although in this Aeromagnetic he could have been a caretaker.

Page from Zina Kolmogorova's diary

Tolya is a meltwater river with lots of huts...

M.P.: Look, Zina's diary mentions Tolya, apparently Ognev told them that he worked in Tolya in 1957, if Zina wrote down the name.

A.V.: "From Burmantovo to Volenpaul by plane" - this entry is about nothing at all. However, there was no overland runway for the AN-2 in Burmantovo, much less in Volenpaul. The latter is not even a village, but a transshipment base for cargo delivered by barges along the Volya River 160 km upstream from the Severnaya Sosva River. The cargo was going to the Tolyinskaya geological exploration party, which was located 40 km away from Volenpaul.

In addition to water transport, aviation was also operating.

Only planes could land on the river on floats. The land strip was in the village of Tolya.

IL-14s flew from Tyumen to Berezovo, and AN-2s flew from Berezovo to Saranpaul, and in the summer there was a float version that landed directly on Lyapin. There were land airfields for AN-2s in Tolya, Nyaksimvol, Ust-Manye and Ivdel. But only our special flights flew from Ivdel, there were no passenger flights.

M.P.: Vladimir Androsov was also very surprised by this entry in the diary, he said that planes did not fly from Burma, he had never heard of such a thing.

Nikolay Ognev's address, given by him to the Dyatlov group

A.V.: After this entry in the diary, it became absolutely clear to me that my version about recording Ognev's address in one of the hikers' diaries was correct.

Nyaksimvol is a Mansi settlement on the Severnaya Sosva River, and the Aeromagnetic Party base was located there, where Kolya had agreed to go. He was definitely taken there as a quartermaster, and he supplied the detachment on Man-Nyaisa (with the cook) with materials and food. So he called them on a new route to the area of ​​the Man-Pupa-Nyor idols. And this is almost on the traverse of Nyaksimvol. Sobolinoe Pleso - I think this is a translation from the Mansi word Nyaksimvol.

M.P.: You write that there was very little aviation in those years, it was expensive and was used only in the absence of other routes.

A.V.: In those years, mainly piston planes with a small cabin for 21 or 28 people flew. These were LI-2 (a copy of the American Douglas), or IL-14. There were few of them, as well as airfields. All people traveled by trains with steam locomotives. Some on horses, and some on donkeys - whoever had what. Moreover, plane tickets were very cheap. For example, a flight from Berezovo to Saranpaul on an AN-2 lasted 2 hours and cost 10 rubles.

"We need to talk about the role of aviation in the development of these wild places. It can be said with complete confidence that in terms of cargo turnover, aviation firmly occupied second place after water transport. Field work in the mountain taiga conditions of the foothills and mountain part of the ridge in such volumes was simply impossible without aviation. Airfields for AN-2 in the area of ​​the expedition's work were in 4 villages - Saranpaul, Nyaksimvol, Ust-Manya and Tolya. Only Saranpaul accepted seaplanes on floats, but pilots with the right to select sites could find here a lot of places for splashdown. The AN-2 aircraft, a propeller-driven biplane, with a lifting capacity of one ton, with a flight speed of about 180 km/h. The aircraft engine is the ASH-82 with a capacity of 1700 hp - two seven-cylinder stars folded onto one shaft, it worked on B-91 gasoline. An exceptionally reliable machine both in terms of engine and airframe. It has been operating in the country since 1946 to the present day and there are no such reliable modern replacements yet."

M.P.: Aleksander Viktorovich, you say that Ognev was moderately well-read. What did he read? What were you reading back then in the 50s? After all, you probably discussed some books with him, or noticed that he read the same things that you read?

A.V.: In those years, we read mainly thick periodicals: Roman-newspaper, Novy Mir, Oktyabr, Znamya. The most popular authors of those years were A. Solzhenitsyn, Yu. Bondarev, V. Pikul, V. Rasputin, O. Kuvaev with his story "Territory" and geological stories.

Kolya had a good memory for people - names, surnames, positions. In my life I have only met one other person with such abilities.

M.P.: This is what is written in the Dyatlov group's field diaries about Ognev and his fellow workers:

"Everyone is singing, the workers living in the barracks did not go to work, they are singing. We are sitting and writing songs.

There are so many very talented and smart people among the workers. Especially 'Beard', he knows a lot, and the beard is red, red, and his eyes are also red, brown.

****

On the 41st we were greeted quite warmly, given a separate room in the hostel. We talked for quite a long time about all sorts of things with the local workers, of which one red-bearded "Beard", as they call him, was especially memorable comrades.

The guys started rewriting songs. One guy sang beautifully. They heard a number of songs banned by prison (Article 58). Ognev told Igor how to find a hut in which to spend the night.

****

And the guys are all generally good, they dance, they are musical. We talked with Ognev. He already knows a lot and it is interesting with him, now he is talking about our path and in general a lot of such things. This, in my opinion, is the most interesting object here on the site. He has such a long red beard, although he is only 27 years old, but he looks older.

Now most of the guys are sitting here and singing songs with a guitar, since they are not working today. In general, it seems like this is the last time we've heard so many new good songs.

We'll learn some Mansi words from the guys...

Ognev Nik. Since 1931 - long beard. Knows the entire Northern Urals region. Has been a participant in several geological expeditions. He understands many issues. Graduated from the Ufa College. (and this entry is from the diary of Yu. Yudin)"

Aleksander Viktorovich, did Nikolay Ognev know the Mansi language? The Dyatlovites recorded many Mansi words in the 41st quarter.

A.V.: The entire Mansi language is basically composed of the names of the surrounding nature - rivers, lakes, mountain peaks, birds, animals. He certainly could not speak the Mansi language, but he certainly knew the translation of many rivers, peaks, etc. Approximately the same as me - (oyka - bear, Sangitur - duck lake, Turvat - black lake, Saran-hap-nyor - place where the Zyryan wrecked his boat, Nyor-Oyka - bear-mountain, Sarapaul - large Zyryan village, mansin - wood grouse, Turman-Nyol - black nose, etc.)

M.P.: Oyka-bear? Interestingly, I heard another version that oyka is an old man.

A.V.: According to their religion, these people descended from the bear, so it is considered a sacred animal that cannot be killed. But living in such a wild wilderness, encounters with a bear were inevitable. Sometimes they were critical for a person's life and they had to shoot to kill. In such cases, rituals were held as if to cleanse oneself from sin - a "bear holiday" was held. In a residential area, the head of the animal was placed on a plate, all the residents walked around and sang: "Don't be angry with us, Oika! We are not guilty. It was not we who killed you, but the gun! And the gun was invented by a Russian!" For the Mansi, as indigenous people, it was allowed to get one moose per year for their family without any licenses. And everyone who could caught fish for their own needs, despite the presence of fishery inspectors. And in general, it should be noted that in such remote corners, fishery inspectors were not raging. They understood that people caught fish for themselves, for food, and it makes up a significant part of their diet.

M.P.: In your memoirs, I came across a mention of the Khatanzeev family name, as common among the Khanty and Mansi peoples. The Dyatlov group's criminal case file contains a very strange interrogation report of F. M. Zhiltsov, and he mentions the name Khatanzeev there. Please read it, I'm interested in your opinion, what could have happened in that hotel?

The content of Zhiltsov's story:

"Yesterday, March 11, 1959, he was in the guest house of the Northern Expedition. In the evening, two people unknown to Zhiltsov, Mansi nationality, came into the house, one dressed in a demi-season coat, the other in a short coat. "One of them began to write something, and when he finished writing, he sealed the letter in an envelope, did not write the address and handed the envelope to another Mansi. Also: when the Mansi was writing the letter, I saw the name Kurikov. I don't know what the letter said, the Mansi left immediately. In the corridor of the guest house I met our party organizer Karpov and said that there were unknown Mansi and they wrote something. I did not meet these Mansi this morning. I did not tell Karpov the name of Khatanzeev, and Khatanzeev was not in the guest house that day. At least, I did not see him. It was written down correctly and read to me."

A.V.: It is difficult to imagine what the Mansi letter was about. They could have offered someone to buy venison or elk meat from them for 50 kopecks per 1 kg. There are a lot of Khatanzeevs in principle. But I will look up Zhiltsov - my father had such a friend before the war and there is even a joint photo with him.

There were many Pauls in the Berezovsky district - Yanypaul, Nervatpaul, Suevatpaul, Timkapaul, etc. Paul in Mansi means a large village. This is where the name Saranpaul comes from - a large Zyryan village. With a total population of about 3,000 people, more than 70% were Zyryans and Mansi. The Zyryans (Komi) came to Saranpaul from areas west of the Ural Mountains, having crossed them in the 17th century through pass called the Sibiryakovsky tract. They still have their own national autonomy there. In Saranpaul they are engaged in reindeer herding, fishing, and some people work in expeditions. The most common surnames are Rochev, Khatanzeev, Vokuev, Kanev, Filippov, Semyashkin.

Mansi (Voguls) are a small nationality. According to the 1958 census, there were only about 6,000 of them. They live mainly on the banks of the Severnaya Sosva River and its tributaries, very few in the north of the Sverdlovsk region. For example, in the village of Solva in the Severouralsky district, only 4 families lived. The most common surnames are Kurikov, Nomin, Anyamov, Khatanzeev, Bakhtiyarov.

I would like to note one more feature - exceptional honesty towards others, and they often did not even understand when they encountered deception. In earlier years, they did not have locks on their forest huts, but having encountered more than once acts of vandalism and looting of supplies from all sorts of "tourists", they began to lock them.

They had their own sacred places on their territory - for example, the Yalbynya River, where they sometimes celebrated their rituals and hung ribbons on tree branches. When you ask them about such places, they do not support the conversation and avoid answering.

M.P.: What you said about Ognev reveals him as an interesting person, removes suspicion from him.

There are many variations on the criminal outcome of that tragedy on the Internet, one appeared where the leaders of the Vizhay colony are accused. I met the son of the head of that colony, Gennadiy Kusov, he told me about his father.

Boris Matveevich Kusov is standing in the back. Photo from Gennady Kusov's archive.

In the back of the truck, Boris Matveevich Kusov. At one time, he was the head of the colony. He was fond of hunting and fishing. He studied his region. He called it "Tsar's Gate" together with his son Gennady and hung a plaque on the rock.

A colony is a series of camp points (Vizhay, 100th, 83rd, etc.) A camp point is a specific zone with its own head. B.M. Kusov was the head of the Vizhay camp point.

Nikolay Gasimovich Hakimov was the head of the colony, i.e. several camp points.

Gennady Kusov told a little about his father:

"My father and I arrived in Vizhay in January 1956 with chickens, goats and other things, from Ponila. My mother and sister Galina arrived in May, when they renovated the apartment. My father was promoted. And until 1969 (until demobilization) he remained in this post. My father died in June 1991 at the hands of a nurse who ineptly gave him an injection into a vein and let air in. Not only acquaintances and co-workers, but also former 3/k remembered my father with kind words. Postcards, letters - with gratitude. Letters came even after his death. He was a good teacher, although he was an officer and graduated from an artillery school. Probably, the war taught him. And after the war he was sent by the party to this front, although he was against."

Nadezhda Winter, a former resident of Vizhay, who was friends with the daughter of Comrade. Hakimova, writes:

"The main question is why? Why did the leadership have to kill them? This is utter nonsense. How can I raise my hand to write some accusations to those who are very, very far from this. The Hakimovs and I lived next door. Their eldest daughter Valentina was my classmate and friend. In addition to Valya, they had three more children: Vera and Boris (twins) and Natasha. Their grandmother lived with them, who ran the household and helped with raising the children. Their mother (Nadezhda) worked as a doctor (I don’t remember who), but in a hospital. They were a very decent family. Somewhere in the mid-60s, they moved to the village of Shipichnoye, where their father was also a boss. I don’t know how such impeccable people can be accused of anything without reason.

I want to tell you one incident from that distant life. Not far from Vizhay there was camp point 70. Naturally, there were zones and prisoners there. In the 50s (in the first half) the taiga was burning, the fire was moving with incredible force towards this settlement 70. And it was from the side of the zone where political prisoners were sitting under Article 58. When the zone started to burn, the chief of this camp point took such courage upon himself: he opened the gates, telling everyone: "Save yourselves, we'll meet you when everything is over." And what do you think, everyone returned except one. But then he called, said that he was in the settlement of Burmantovo and would return, and 2 days later he arrived at the designated point. That chief got it pretty bad. Unfortunately, I don't know his last name.

We didn't have wholesale murders and atrocities there, as young people describe now."

My note: Ushma was founded in 1961 by transferring prisoners from the 70th camp point to a new location.

And people continue to make up versions that the authorities killed the Dyatlov group because they could somehow offend the head of the colony with a word! That's how things are in Dyatlov studies...

Although I adhere to the criminal version of the development of events, it is still unclear to me who could have killed. Who needed to kill student hikers? An illogical murder, no motives are found, as if a maniac was at work. But the injuries are obvious - they were caused by people. Prosecutor Ivanov himself spoke about this at the beginning of the investigation, but then, after being summoned to his superiors, he changed his mind and warned other searchers on the slope to keep their tongues down about the murder version.

A friend of mine contacted the FSB through his own channels, and they told him that they had nothing on the case (although they could have concealed it, I admit this option), the only thing they could say is that such cases are usually connected with illegal gold mining, they are difficult to solve, almost never solved, the chain goes up. They are immediately hushed up at the scene. Who knows, maybe gold is involved there too...

Aleksander Viktorovich, did Nikolay Ognev say anything about him personally mining gold? Have you been to the Second Northern Mine, which is located on the Lozva River?

A.V.: No, I haven't. I don't think he's such a fool to get involved in such adventures. The fact is that in the Northern Urals the content of placer gold is extremely small, and in order to wash a gram of metal, it is necessary to wash 5 cubic meters of gold-bearing sand, which also needs to be extracted from pits with a raft from a depth of up to 10 meters. The Severouralsk expedition conducted exploration of placers on the Vagran and Sosva rivers, and handed over polygons with a content of 200 mg per cubic meter. Such meager contents can ensure profitability only for a large, well-mechanized mine. Therefore, 2-3 prospectors without mechanisms, but with a shovel and a pick, will not earn even a can of condensed milk per day.

Naturally, there are exceptions - you can accidentally find a small placer or a nest with a hurricane content of metal. However, these are just exceptions. (See the story of pit 92, described by me in book 2 - Saranpaul expedition.)

The Second Northern Settlement stood on this site. Photo from the archive of V. Androsov. July, 2013

Second Northern. Ditch.

I have not been to the Second Northern Mine. They could have mined gold there, but in the 19th century. If there was gold there, the Yuzhno-Zaozersky mine would have come there with its powerful equipment.

M.P.: But local residents say that gold was mined there and taken away by small aircraft.

"Gold was mined there in mines. The mines were right in the rocky ground. Vertically down, how they cut it, is unclear, on rocks measuring 1.5 x 1.5, so about. We have gold lying around there. Old men washed everything, and Pashin I.F., and Mokhov P.T. - they knew a lot."

And recently former Vizhayets Vladimir Androsov visited the place where the Second Northern stood, and brought back photographs of those places, it turns out that gold is still being sought there in our time! He categorically refuses to tell me where the gold is, he says it's not a woman's business, you never know, the less I know, the better I sleep. But he knows about these places from the forester Pashin, he says that the Dyatlov group died not far from the place where there is gold. He himself has never dealt with gold, he doesn't want to get involved, but he says that they have gold and quite a lot of it, people look for it and find it. But all this is secret, of course.

M.P.: Look at this photo. Did they look for gold here?

A.V.: I seriously doubt it - a completely ordinary exploratory trench for geological survey, most likely even unfinished.

M.P.: I kept hoping that maybe Ognev could tell something about gold in those places and maybe connected the death of the Dyatlov group with the gold version. And such cases are very difficult to unravel, classified as secret. And local important officials are often involved in them.

A.V.: The native gold is mainly found in quartz veins in the form of small inclusions, and the veins are in rocky soils such as granite. The excavation of pits in such rocks can only be carried out using drilling and blasting operations. The specified size of the pits one and a half by one and a half with manual winches for lifting the rock rather indicates the extraction and washing of placer gold in the 2nd Severny. There was probably gold there, but in very small quantities. If there was industrial gold there, the Yuzhno-Zaozersky gold field would have come there long ago.

M.P.: Aleksander Viktorovich, what do you mean - placer and primary gold deposits?

A.V.: Primary gold is found mainly in quartz gold-bearing veins, which lie in hard intrusive rocks such as granite and the like. During the weathering and erosion of these gold-bearing rock massifs, gold is carried away by streams of ancient and modern rivers and streams over significant distances, and settles in the bottom part, forming the so-called sands with different vertical thickness and gold content. The larger and more angular the gold grains, the closer the gold-bearing massif from which they were washed away.

River terraces can be like "traps" for placer gold.

In those years, it can be said with absolute certainty that the best geological organization for prospecting for placer gold in taliks was the Sosvinskaya party of the Severouralsk expedition.

Diggers can work anywhere where there is good gold. But it is difficult to find good content.

M.P.: Have you personally met these diggers in the taiga who were engaged in illegal gold mining? Are meetings with them very dangerous?

A.V.: I wandered a lot through the taiga, mountains and rivers of the Northern Urals, but I did not see any gold prospectors. There are still many such people today in places where there are large gold deposits with a high content in the rock and the presence of nuggets there - these are Yakutia, Kolyma, Severo-Yeniseisk and somewhere in the Far East. I don't think they pose a danger to others unless provoked. And if they carry mined gold with them, they themselves avoid meeting people.

M.P.: Aleksander Viktorovich, tell me, as a specialist, as a geologist, do they wash gold in winter? Or is it only in summer?

A.V.: Yes, they wash. In winter, it is easier to dig pits "for freezing" - less water. In my book "Subpolar Urals" there is a good description of winter digging of pits for gold, washing of rock. In the Severouralsk expedition, the Sosvinskaya party worked all year round for placer gold, and carried out continuous washing of soils from the pits on industrial devices with a capacity of 6 cubic meters per shift.

"Beginning of the work of the Khobeinskaya party in Saranpaul.

We began preparations for the excavation of pits. Geologists agreed on the locations of their laying on both banks of the river and laid a couple of pits in the riverbed itself at a shallow depth. On land, the pits were driven in the permafrost first for "burning". The snow was cleared and dry logs were laid along the contour of the pit, the damp ones on top and the lower ones were set on fire. In the morning, a miner came, removed the unburned remains, loosened the thawed soil with a pick, and threw it out with a shovel. During the cycle, the 20 cm, and again it was necessary to lay firewood. One miner had several shafts at work at once. The permafrost layer reached 2 meters or more. After the shaft reached a depth of more than 2 meters, a manual winch of the well type was installed above the shaft. The rock at the face was placed by the miner in a bucket, which the winch operators raised to the surface, poured out in a certain sequence and returned the bucket back down.

In river beds, the excavation was carried out using a different technology - for "freezing". The method is applicable only in winter in severe frosts. The ice on the riverbed is cleared along the perimeter of the shaft and it is excavated to the full depth, with the exception of 6-7 cm, and left for further freezing. After a day or two (depending on the severity of the frost), the miner removes the newly frozen layer again. The thickness of the pillar is determined by drilling a control hole in the ice, which is then plugged with a wooden dowel. Usually, little was frozen in a day or two, and besides, winter was already coming to an end and there was no chance to finish the pit for freezing. In principle, this method is used. To enhance the freezing effect, axial fans can be used to supply cold outside air to the face and enhance the freezing effect.

A considerable responsibility lay on the washers of the concentrate samples. Before washing, the rock stacks had to be thawed with fires, and then washed in wooden trays in the river winter water until the concentrate was gray. Then further finishing was carried out until it was black. Nelya Katina did this, sitting in a small tent over a river hole. Her hands were constantly red from the cold river water. I decided to try this myself and collected sand from the ice hole at the bottom of the river in a tray. I washed it until it was grey and counted about 200 gold symbols. Apparently, the entire Hobe-yu basin was "infected" with fine, dusty gold.

Once a rather curious story happened. A geologist came with washed concentrate - in it a good weighed gold grain with sharp edges was visible. Moreover, its color and texture were very similar to high-grade red gold. I immediately sent a radiogram to the head of the expedition, and he ordered to immediately send the concentrate to Saranpaul by the nearest helicopter. Which we did. And he himself flew out on some business. I brought the concentrate to Chepkasov V.A., he unfolded the package, immediately saw the gold grain, was amazed at its size. He immediately called Kameneva S.N., who was engaged in concentrates, and ordered her to make all the measurements, weigh them, etc. After some time, he called her again and asked what the gold grain weighed. For some reason, she was very embarrassed and quietly said that the gold grain was no longer there. Chepkasov V.A. was surprised and exclaimed: "How so? Why not?" She answered that the gold piece had dissolved in acid. A silent scene ensued. Everyone knew that real gold only dissolved in "royal" aqua, but not in any acid. Then he laughed and turned to me with a question: "What kind of trash could have ended up in our concentrate?" I thought about it and said that it was probably a piece of copper casing from the body of the electric detonator that was used to blow up the boulder in the pit. Everyone agreed with this."

M.P.: Aleksander Viktorovich, did gold have some kind of code sign if they reported about it in telegrams? Was it called "iron"? I have not found any confirmation yet. Do you know anything about this?

A.V.: Regarding the encryption of the word "gold", this is more likely a fairy tale from the times of "Dalstroy". In our time it was called "gold", or simply "metal".

M.P.: The Criminal Code has a protocol of interrogation of a business traveler from Ivdel, Dryakhlykh, so he said that horses were sent to the abandoned settlement of Vtoroy Severny to bring pipes from there. What kind of pipes can be brought by horse?

A.V.: The driver carried either casing or drill pipes. They are 3-4 meters long and weigh 15-20 kg. He could have been carrying core back. Apparently, a core drilling rig was working there.

M.P.: I don't understand why the driver would have to carry the core back? It was stored in a core storage facility there, the village was abandoned, as everyone said. The driver was sent for the pipes. You say "koshevka". Is that a sledge, or exactly a koshevka? Core drilling - was it also used for gold?

Core (a sample of rock removed from deep within the earth by drilling). Photo from the Internet.

A.V.: The core is needed for study by geologists, and it is better to study it in a warm room at the party's base. At the drilling rig, the geologist examines the core only to determine the strength of the rocks and close the drillers' orders. In the photo, it is not a sledge, but a sledge for transporting goods, filled with backpacks of hikers, and he could easily transport casing and drill pipes on it. About 60 years ago, horses transported not only drilling equipment, but also disassembled machines.

Core drilling is carried out mainly for native gold. And extremely rarely for placer gold. For the search and exploration of placers, percussion-rope drilling was more often used, about 50 years ago the 'Empire' drill. One of the best ways is to use a grabber with the UBSR-25 installation.

M.P.: You mention your workmate, G.E. Kovalev, who published the "Map of Geochemical Anomalies of Russia." at a scale of 1:5,000,000. The map was published in 1995 in collaboration with G.I. Khorin. Aleksander Viktorovich, do you have these maps? I would like to look at the Kholat-Syakhl and Otorten area for geochemical anomalies.

A.V.: I did not find this map on the Internet, but I do not advise using it - it is a very small scale, and the entire Ivdel region will fit into one point.

M.P.: A topic of interest to many - alcohol. A very unclear situation. You write that alcohol was sold freely in stores in Yeniseysk, but it was brought to the drilling rigs in the taiga by helicopter and distributed to each person by bottle. This is understandable. I am interested in the following question: was there a shortage of alcohol in Sverdlovsk? Could it be bought freely in a store in 1959?

A.V.: Alcohol was specially brought to the North, where there were severe frosts, and where bottles of vodka and wine simply burst. I remember that in Sverdlovsk alcohol was not sold in stores. And alcohol was never brought to the drilling rigs.

And in Yeniseysk...

I went to the store - I see that there really is real 96-degree alcohol. A half-liter bottle costs 6.54 rubles.

In general, alcohol in the North is such a powerful factor that it is simply impossible not to take it into account. And woe to the head of the enterprise who does not take it into account or treats it half-heartedly one day.

"The holiday of November 7th arrived... Two days of holidays passed. November 9th was already a working day. In the morning, leaving the house, I saw a crowd of people near the office and my workers too, although they were supposed to go to the site. I asked: "What's the matter?" They told me that they were waiting for the party chief. Soon Gubanov came up and they immediately attacked him so that he would allow them to sell the remaining alcohol from the store. It turns out that they brought in more bottles than the number of people. Information on this topic, of course, came from the store from the seller or from the loaders who delivered the alcohol from the helipad. The rest was a simple matter - to calculate how much was left in the store. Gubanov flatly refused. Then the crowd split - some stayed near the office, the other part sat down on the firewood near the store and refused to go to work until their demands were met. No persuasion from the engineering and technical workers were not perceived. A little later, some of the most active ones began to climb into the boss's office. He left the office and hid somewhere. But you can't hide from such a situation. It was actually a strike, which had never officially happened in the USSR and could not even theoretically (according to the ideological postulates of those years). If such information got to the party organs, Gubanov could part with his party card. Expulsion from the party in those days meant the end of a leadership career. Apparently, the party leadership was actively negotiating with the expedition leadership and there, having weighed everything, they advised to meet the demands of the workers. Only after lunch did they open the store and sell the rest of the alcohol. As a result, they did not work not only on the 9th, but also on the 10th of November.

In December of the same year, preparations were underway for elections to some Soviets. All the leaders were gathered by the chairman of the executive committee, I. N. Malyugin, with a representative of the district party committee who had flown in from Berezovo. Previously, these problems had not affected me or worried me. This time, Kobozev had flown to Tyumen, and I had to organize this matter. The conversation was strict and we were warned that there should be no refusals to vote, or voting "against". As a newcomer, I was left behind and asked how I thought I would organize this matter. In my simplicity, I said that I would use two helicopters: one MI-4 would fly with the commission and the ballot box over large areas, and a small MI-1 would carry the ballot box to the points where the clearing cutters walked in pairs. They nodded their heads in agreement and asked: "What else will I bring them?" I answered that letters, fresh newspapers, and, where necessary, food. They looked at each other and someone asked: "Aren't you going to bring some vodka?" I answered that I would never do that! We don't bring alcohol to the polling stations. Then they shook their heads and looked at me as if I were a young and unreasonable child. One of them said quite firmly that it was absolutely necessary to bring vodka along with the ballot papers and the ballot box, at a rate of a bottle per "nose". Otherwise, most people would simply refuse to vote. And they gave me an example of how last year at the Neroika polling station, expedition #105 failed to elect our club manager, V. Klyapyshev, solely because they didn't bring alcohol on election day. Then I promised them I would do it. True, I had heard requests from polling stations before about bringing alcohol on election day, but I considered these conversations to be a joke.

It turned out that this was not a joke at all. On election day, I sent a large MI-4 helicopter to large parties and polling stations with one of the leaders from Saranpaul. I myself got into the MI-1, put two boxes of vodka in it, took a map of the area with site marks and flew to the clearing cutters. They had already been warned in advance about the voting day and everyone had gathered at their sites. We landed on the first one. Two shaggy guys came up and held out their hands. I tried to hand them the ballots, but they didn’t take them and kept holding out their hands. Then I realized what was going on. I took out two bottles of vodka and gave them to them, and they signaled with their hand for me to put in the ballots myself. The same story happened at other sites where I landed. The large helicopter also flew around the other sites, and people voted everywhere. This business ended without incident everywhere, with the exception of one of the geophysics teams. They drank everything quickly, someone thought it was not enough - and there are always such people in nature, and some incident happened there. Today I can't even remember, but it happened. Otherwise, we can consider that we got away with it."

M.P.: You mention that many prisoners who had served their sentences worked in geological parties. Were any special administrative rules and restrictions applied to them, were their rights infringed?

A.V.: The former prisoners had no restrictions on their rights - they could move anywhere at any time convenient for them, they voted in elections without restrictions. They were quite normal people, except for the obvious criminals - they were an absolute minority. However, most of these former prisoners had one major disadvantage - they drank a lot and spent their entire salary drinking away at places where alcohol was sold. They worked well in the fields in geological parties, but once a season they needed to quench their thirst, and under any pretext they would go to Saranpaul for two or three weeks. Most of them had neither family nor home. After the end of the field season, many declared that they were going to the mainland, but many could not go further than the regional center of Berezovo - they ran out of money. And with their last money, they sent a telegram to the expedition asking to take them back to work. And we took them and sent them to year-round parties. And only a few of them reached Tyumen, spent the winter there and were recruited again for work in the North in the spring.

Restrictions on movement were imposed on the so-called parasites, who began to be sent en masse to the North in 1963 for correction. I met one such "parasite" in the restaurant "Sosva" in the village of Berezovo. I invited her to work on the expedition, but she refused.

"I went down to the Sosva restaurant. I ordered and waited. Then a young girl, quite pretty, with reddish hair, sat down next to me. She also ordered something small and started talking to me. At first I didn't quite understand the subject of her interests, but when I figured it out, I began to find out who she was and where she was from. It turned out that a month ago a decree "On the fight against parasitism, etc." was issued. According to this decree, she was sent from Saratov to Beryozovo, as she claimed, for having a relationship with a university professor (she was supposedly a student). When I suggested that she go on our expedition, go to the field, and start earning money the normal way, she giggled and said that she would earn more here."

M.P.: Aleksander Viktorovich, in your memoirs about Tolya, you mention Abram Sulman, the head of the Northern Geological Expedition. Did you know him? He provided radio communication with the slope where they were searching for the bodies of the dead at that time, from February to May 1959.

A.V.: Of course, I knew Sulman, because I had the chance to work in the geological exploration parties that he created, and which at different times were subordinated to the Northern Expedition. What else can be said about him? A brilliant organizer of the geological exploration process, the best head of the Northern Expedition in its entire existence. I thought that he worked as the head of the Northern Expedition since 1950, but I decided to clarify. He worked since 1958, i.e. he came under fire in connection with the organization of the Councils of National Economy - he gave two parties - Tolyinskaya and Ust-Maninskaya in 1957 to Tyumen, then the party - Sosvinskaya for placer gold, and Karpinskaya - for non-ferrous metals - he gave in 1960 to the Severouralsk Expedition. Accordingly, all the excellent bases of these parties were created not under him, but under his predecessor. But the people who worked with him gave him very good reviews. And before that, he managed two geological exploration trusts.

M.P.: Your memoirs talk about the extraction of piezo-optical raw materials and graphite. That these raw materials were of great importance for the country's defense capability. Piezo-optical raw materials are ordinary rock crystal, that is, quartz. Quartz has long been used in radio engineering and precision automation for watches (quartz), all kinds of time devices. All rocket trajectories were tied to internal clocks that were launched on the "Start" command. You say that two of the deposits were located on Neroika, and one on Narodnaya. This is a mountain in the Subpolar Urals, and students went there in February 1959, and Semyon Zolotarev was going to go with this group, but at the last moment he refused and went with Dyatlov's group.

Expedition work area map

A.V.: It is used in radio-technical devices, and not only in the defense industry, but also in civilian products. There is no graphite in the Urals. It is mined in Siberia.

M.P.: You wrote about prisoner escapes that "many people in these parts got lost every year and died from poor orientation in the taiga and the associated hunger and cold. And there are still plenty of wild animals there. Even greater danger was posed by prisoners of the camps, who escaped from there every summer. They often had weapons and made their way through the forests in groups or alone to their habitats. The entire Northern Urals is still filled with camps, although fewer than in Stalin's time."

Have you ever met such escapees? Were there cases when escapees went on an expedition? Were there cases when escapees killed geologists they met in the taiga?

A.V.: We never had to meet them head-on, but in 1949, a secret guard stopped us outside the city, took our gun and told us not to go in that direction any further - there were escaped prisoners there, surrounded by guards. There were rumors in the city that hunters and mushroom pickers died in the forest from encounters with escapees. We have not heard about geologists. I think that the escapees still tried to avoid people and leave no trace. However, many times we were going to the Lozva River to catch nelma, but every time knowledgeable people dissuaded us for this very reason.

The Ivdelsky District has always been noted for the fact that there were many camps there. Therefore, this version about the involvement of escapees has already flashed somewhere - it seems to be among many in the latest investigations of the KP. However, everyone knows that it is impossible to escape in winter for many reasons. But the option of an autumn escape with wintering nearby - it seems that no one has thought of it. I admit that escaped prisoners could have been involved somehow. They always escaped in the summer and autumn, and went west through the passages south and north of Denezhkin Stone. These could have escaped too late, early snow fell, and they were forced to winter in some dugout and wait for warmth. I think that your generation will live to see the truth about this tragedy.

M.P.: It seems to me that the prisoners could hardly have run for so long - from autumn to winter, unless they had an accomplice on the outside who would have given them bread and shelter. And the prisoners would have tried to leave for the city faster, to get lost among the people.

M.P.: You mention the explosion of a powerful thermonuclear charge conducted over Novaya Zemlya. On that day, for several hours in a row, a wind blew from the north with a force unprecedented for these places. It seemed that you could lie on it and it would not let a person fall to the ground.

"It turns out that in the North it was a major event. All the residents of Salekhard were taken out of their houses, some of the windows were pushed out by the shock wave. In the village of Amderma, windows and doors were blown out. All the geologists were taken out of the field from the areas threatened by the shock wave. I think that the shock wave was already dying down, in the form of a strong wind on October 30, it reached Severouralsk. On that day, for several hours in a row, the wind blew from the north with an unprecedented force for these places. It seemed that you could lie on it and it would not let a person fall to the ground. I knew about the air blast, because it was announced on the radio, but it did not even occur to me that its echoes could reach Severouralsk. Later, these events were described by other geologists-surveyors who came to work with us from the Polar Urals. They They said that a flash was visible in the distance, but it was no longer bright, and a loud hum came."

Aleksander Viktorovich, please tell me, what year was it approximately?

A.V.: It was exactly October 31, 1961. The most powerful explosion of our thermonuclear bomb of 55 megatons in the north of Novaya Zemlya, dropped from a TU-95 aircraft. And only this explosion caused major disturbances in the atmosphere. Before that, the explosions were an order of magnitude weaker and did not have a significant impact on the continent. All the locals talked about was only the consequences of the explosion of the superbomb. Everything about it is written on the Internet. In 1959, such explosions were not carried out.

M.P.: You worked in the Subpolar Urals, have you heard talk about a change in the weather after some tests on Novaya Zemlya? Usually the locals notice this. It seems to me that something was blown up in the air at the test site in February 1959, which is why a strong hurricane arose in the Otorten area and all the way to Ivdel, which also affected the Dyatlov group.

A.V.: It is impossible.

M.P.: Why? Tests were conducted on Novaya Zemlya every year, starting in 1955, they exploded underwater, underground, in the air... Before the Tsar Bomba was detonated, other bombs were detonated. But that is my guess, the wind appeared there on the pass too suddenly, first there was a sharp warming, and then a sharp cooling. Usually warming occurs after a large release of heat into the atmosphere, i.e. after some powerful explosion. Here after the Battle of Borodino so much heat was released that there was a heavy downpour afterwards.)

A.V.: All air explosions on Novaya Zemlya before 1961 were more than an order of magnitude less powerful than this superbomb. And local residents on the mainland did not feel any abnormal phenomena, and there were no conversations about these topics. If on October 31, 1961 a strong wind came to Severouralsk, then the wind of the same strength could have been in Otorten - it is nearby, and it could not have created any critical incidents on the Ural peaks, except for avalanches on high peaks. And there are few such peaks in the Urals, and the Dyatlov group was far from such peaks. What can then be said about February 1959, when the largest explosion could have been 2-5 megatons? The shock wave will not even reach the mainland. And there are still about 1,500 km to Otorten.

Sharp warming and freezing in winter in the Northern Urals is a completely normal thing, and no one is surprised by it. Here, in my opinion, the strictly meridional extension of the ridge plays a significant role, and the isotherm in any place makes a dip downwards - cold air masses from the north descend along the ridge as a conductor, and the temperature is always higher on the sides. And warm air masses can also come from the south along the ridge. The alternation of these masses creates sharp temperature jumps.

M.P.: About the missing Leningraders. You remember that "around mid-March, Leningrad hikers finally approached us. There were 7 of them, led by Rudolf Nikanorov, and one girl among them. Their route was of the highest difficulty category in those years. They left the Ivdelsky district of the Sverdlovsk region and walked along the Ural ridge with two intermediate stops near people. The first was our site, the second was a weather station on Mount Telpos-Iz. The total length was about 600 km. Travel time was about 20 days, not counting rest days. The group was well equipped with everything necessary for such a hike. Six first-class athletes and one master of sports. They walked mainly along the borders of forests and the goltsy part. Then their route ran again north to Mount Telpos-Iz, from there to the area of ​​Mount Neroika and then a descent along the western slope to the station Synya, Pechora railway. We met us well. We washed ourselves in the bathhouse, replenished our food supplies, rested for a couple of days and went on. At my request, they sent us a telegram from Synya station that they had arrived safely."

In this message, I was interested in the phrase "they finally approached us." Had these Leningraders gotten lost somewhere before? What year was it? The thing is that there are persistent rumors. It is not known who started them, that a group of Leningraders also disappeared in the area of ​​Mount Kholat Syakhl in the early 60s. As if the same story happened as with the Dyatlov group, but this story was hidden from the people.

E.V. Buyanov found information about one of the Leningrad tourist groups that went to the Northern Urals in 1959:

"There was a rumor that another group of 9 hikers from Leningrad died in the area of ​​Mount Kholat Syakhl. St. Petersburg resident Sergei Frolov established contact with Voronkov O.K. - the author of the article in the EKS magazine, issue 41 "On the fate of the UPI tourist group (in 1959)". Sergei found out that Voronkov took part in the 1959 hike along the Subpolar Urals in February-March 1959. Moreover, this hike was very long - 33 days, and they covered about 600 km. When they returned, rumors about a group of hikers that disappeared in the Northern Urals had already reached Leningrad - some people thought that it was about their group (from Leningrad). Apparently, this is where the rumor about another group of hikers from Leningrad that went missing in those places came from. Voronkov was a member of the regional route commission, and he writes in his article that there were no such groups from Leningrad that went missing in those years. So now the roots of this "rumor" are visible - thanks to Frolov..." We see the treacherous trail of an avalanche...

And here, too, some Leningrad group flashes by in your area.

A.V.: No, these guys never got lost. They approached us in March 1963, and in the fall, the expedition forwarded their letter to me with a request to let them rest and refuel with food. I replied to Nikanorov R. and indicated the rules for approaching our base, because we were drilling and blasting in the ditches. From us they went north, and at my request, when they reached the station of Synya, they gave me a telegram about the successful completion of the expedition.

M.P.: About a cold night. Aleksandr Viktorovich, you describe a very remarkable episode about spending the night in an unheated shawl. I immediately remember the Dyatlov group and their assurances that sleeping in a tent without a stove, at -20 and a strong wind, in the conditions of the beggarly student equipment of 1959, is normal.

A.V.: My daughter told me that somewhere on your forums there is a discussion about a cold overnight stay. I recommend reading my experience of this matter in book 2 "Subpolar Urals" and chapter 3.

"I decided to try sleeping in a cold tent, without a stove. I chopped some spruce branches and laid them on the frozen ground. I made a double sleeping bag - I stuffed a small tourist one into a large, regular one and lay down in warm Chinese underwear. I fastened all the fasteners and breathed inside this structure. I fell asleep and slept all night. In the morning I woke up and couldn't move my arms or legs - all my joints had lost their former mobility. I started moving them very slowly. After about 15 minutes they acquired the ability to bend and unbend. I quickly got out of the bag and got dressed. The impression on my body from this overnight stay was not very pleasant, but I got enough sleep and rested. Another worker slept in the tent with me, who also could not stand the heat. And on the third night he decided to sleep in a cold tent. I, after some thought, decided not to repeat this experiment, considering it dangerous not only for a living organism, but for life in general. Of course, northern peoples sleep this way and even in the snow, but they wear a malitsa, and on top of that a kukul made of reindeer skins, which retain the heat of the human body many times better and do not allow such hypothermia of the body as sleeping in a wadded sleeping bag. The young man who came to sleep in a cold tent the next night also refused to participate in such experiments later."

M.P.: About the sore subject.

"Often in the dark we observed glowing traces and lights in the sky that moved from south to north. There were suggestions that these were traces of moving missiles, but no one could say anything definite. Spacecraft were launched only once in those years, and they went in circular orbits around the Earth. We received confirmation that this was related to the defense industry at the end of March. That day we were waiting for an MI-4 helicopter with cargo. It was not there all day and only in the evening we heard the roar of the propellers. I automatically glanced at my watch - it was about 8 o'clock in the evening, and the question immediately arose: "Whose helicopter is this?" Civil aviation at this time of year flew only until 7 pm (helicopters). After a while we saw it - it was zigzagging and passed over us - everyone saw the star on the fuselage - belonging to the Ministry of Defense. Then it turned west of us and landed, even turning off the engine. They took off somewhere an hour later, which was clearly audible. Apparently, they were looking for something that had fallen from above."

Approximately what size were these lights? And approximately at what speed were they moving?

Have you read the memoirs about the glowing balls that student searchers saw? Did they resemble what you observed?

A.V.: Only at the end of the century did I learn that one of the design bureaus in the Chelyabinsk region was developing tactical missiles of the SKAD type, and test launches were conducted along the Ural ridge from south to north.

These lights on the tumbler moved at a speed of 1 mach, and quickly disappeared from sight.

M.P.: This is what I read in the memoirs of journalist Grigoriev:

"In 1990, after the publication of the materials "The Secret of the Fire Balls" by S. Bogomolov in "Uralsky Rabochy", I met a retired major on the train. He read this material and said that the luminous balls were released by [guided] ballistic missiles that were tested without warheads and flew to the Arctic Ocean. And the luminous balls were released so that their flight could be monitored. By the way, such balls were also released in those years by Soviet artificial satellites so that the whole world could see them"

A.V.: I have never heard of rockets or satellites throwing out any balls to track their flight. I think that they have completely different systems for tracking the flight of ballistic missiles or satellites. This is something from the realm of science fiction.

M.P.: About the sad. You mentioned in passing that in order to bury your grandmother in the closed Ivanovskoye cemetery, you had to give a bribe. And they immediately allocated a burial site. So, it was possible to give a bribe and bury any person in this cemetery.

A.V.: Apparently so, it was a long time ago - in 1955. My grandmother's grave is located near the burial place of the famous Ural writer P.P. Bazhov.

M.P.: I would really like to quote from your memoirs, a kind of sketch about Sverdlovsk in the 50s:

"Already in the 50s, Sverdlovsk was a large industrial and cultural center of the Middle Urals with a population of about 800 thousand. Many rightfully called it the capital of the entire Urals. The city had more than 10 higher educational institutions, a university, a conservatory, military schools and many technical schools. The city was located in an ellipse elongated from north to south with axes of 10 by 8 km. Its central part was most densely populated - Lenin and K. Liebknecht streets and several adjacent streets. Several kilometers from the center in different directions were industrial giants - Uralmash, Elmash, Kalinin Plant, Uralkhimmash, Verkh-Isetsky Plant with adjacent residential areas, some of which surpassed individual regional centers in terms of the number of people working and living there.

The connection between the city center and the industrial outskirts was carried out mainly by trams and trolleybuses. The longest tram route was N5 from Shchorsa Street in the south to Uralmash in the north. Later, it was extended further in the south to the meat-packing plant and the South stop. I also saw old-style tram trains with two and three carriages, unheated, with wooden seats. In the winter cold, their windows were covered with frost a finger thick and nothing could be seen. In order to see something, you often had to blow on the chosen place in the window or apply a warm coin to melt the ice and get a small hole for viewing. Otherwise, it was difficult to navigate the route, since stops were not announced.

In those years, there were no winter boots with fur or shoes. And men wore rubber boots nicknamed "Goodbye youth" over regular boots, where very thin felt plates were glued inside the rubber base. In light frosts, they created a normal temperature for the feet, especially when walking. But in severe frosts, you had to wear felt boots. About two years later, new Riga tram cars appeared, which were a little warmer. And by the end of my studies, several Czech trams came out on the road, which in all respects were much superior to everything that had been there before. The largest trolleybus line was the N1, which connected the city center with the Uralkhimmash plant.

Undoubtedly the best architectural structure of the city was the main educational building of the Ural Polytechnic Institute named after S.M. Kirov, crowning Lenin Street at its highest point, with an adjacent square and other educational buildings. The architectural thoughtfulness, engineering execution, materials used and decoration of this ensemble give it a unique and completely inimitable appearance.

Yakov Mikhailovich Sverdlov pointing at "Dynamo"

The city had its own unique smells both in summer and in winter. In summer, the smell of heated machine oil and emulsol was clearly audible, and in winter, the air was permeated and densely saturated with smoke from numerous boiler houses operating on low-grade coal from the brown coal deposits of the cities of Karpinsk, Volchanka, and Yegorshino. These were the normal smells of an industrial giant with large volumes of metalworking. In addition, piercing northern winds often blew in winter, freezing your forehead and eyebrows. The Iset River flows through the very center of the city, blocked by an 18th-century dam, as a result of which a fairly large city pond with good embankments and a boat station was formed. In some years, a citywide skating rink was flooded on it. Unfortunately, the water in this river was so dirty and gave off such an unpleasant smell that you didn’t want to go near its banks.

Page from Lyuda Dubinina's notebook. She writes the shows she wanted to see at the theatre.

Sverdlovsk was already considered a major cultural center in those years. The opera house, drama theater, the very famous in those years Musical Comedy Theater, the philharmonic society with its symphony orchestra, the summer circus - tent had been operating for a long time. In the center of the city, literally next to each other, there were three movie theaters: "Sovkino", "October" and "MYUD", not counting several more in different palaces of culture. The city has its own permanent zoo, and up the Iset River, an excellent Mayakovsky Park of Culture and Recreation was equipped with a summer theater, attractions, sports grounds and cafes. In the summer, mass festivities with concerts and performances of local and visiting celebrities were constantly held there. We, students, each according to our interests and free time, regularly visited these cultural centers for all 5 years of study.

They tried to introduce us, students from different universities and technical schools, to high culture in different ways. There was a system of season tickets to the Philharmonic, where you could go to symphony concerts for a symbolic fee. I did not buy them, but one day I decided to go with a friend on someone else's season ticket. The Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra was performing. I can't say that I don't like all such music, but from that evening we left during the first intermission. I once listened to the opera "Prince Igor" at the opera house - after that I was no longer drawn to opera. I watched the ballet "Swan Lake" and also remained indifferent.

I appreciated ballet art in a new way only after watching Khachaturian's ballet "Spartacus" staged by Y. Grigorovich on TV - this was simply a rediscovery of this art form for me. Compared to old ballet performances, where men looked only as support for the main heroine and were static, then in this ballet the magnificent dancers V. Vasiliev, M. Liepa played a completely independent, almost leading role. The performance was so dynamic that it was watched in one breath. The musical comedy theater, although considered the third in the country, but after two visits there was no longer a pull - there was a lot of outright hackwork in the productions.

The main educator and ruler of thoughts for us, young people, was still cinema. In the mid-1950s, a continuous stream of new films by previously unknown directors hit the screens. These were family and industrial comedies, films about collective farm life and musical comedies - "Test of Loyalty", "Battle on the Road", "Spring on Zarechnaya Street", "Girls", "A Simple Story", "It All Starts with the Road", "Carnival Night", "The Unyielding", "Girl with a Guitar", "Girl Without an Address" and many, many others. A galaxy of very talented, young and beautiful actors immediately appeared - N. Rybnikov, Yu. Belov, V. Lanovoy, M. Ulyanov, T. Semina, L. Gurchenko, A. Larionova, I. Makarova and others. New films appeared literally every week and I think that 80-90% of the population watched every single one of them. Sometimes the same film was shown in three central movie theaters at once. There were huge queues for tickets, especially for evening shows. And it was not always easy to get into daytime shows. In the evening, in large central movie theaters, as a rule, small jazz ensembles played in the foyer half an hour before the start, and local pop singers performed. Songs from modern films and pre-war jazz classics like "Unsuccessful Date" by A. Tsfasman and others were performed. It was a real "feast" for both cinema and distributors. I think that nothing like this will ever happen again in any country.

Due to its extreme popularity, cinema in those years was under the close supervision of the party and carried a very large ideological load, subject to strict censorship. Only "correct" relationships between people were promoted in films, and if some kind of industrial conflict arose, the innovators always won. All the heroes spoke normal language. However, the people were quite literate and distinguished well between "movie" life and real life, in which there was plenty of drunkenness, absenteeism, rudeness and swearing.

Detective films were very popular. Very few of them were released, 2-3 per year, but they were made very well and truthfully, and the people believed in these stories, because serious crime was strongly suppressed in those years, and a happy ending was perceived as normal."

M.P.: About the mysterious. I was interested in your story about Morse code:

"Once we were sitting on a fallen tree near a log house where the office of the section with the radio station was located. At one point in the conversation, I suddenly clearly heard the sounds of Morse code. I asked the head of the section when they had their next communication session with Saranpaul. He answered that in 2 hours. Then I told him that I heard Morse code. He said that it couldn't be. I went into the house - the radio was turned off and the radio operator was off to the side doing other things. I went back outside again. After 10 minutes I heard Morse code again. I went in and looked - the radio was turned off. This story repeated itself a third time. I never heard these sounds outside of the radio stations again. And those events remain a mystery to me to this day."

Didn't you ever think that the radio operator was transmitting something? How far was it from where you were to the radio operator's house? Could he quickly turn off the radio and go out? Or was there a second backup radio that the radio operator used in secret, it was not turned off, but was not visible to anyone.

This was my imagination running wild after Komsomolskaya Pravda reported that in the winter-spring of 1959, a radio operator spy was caught in Saranpaul. Have you heard of this story?

A.V.: I have not heard the story about the radio operator in Saranpaul.

We were sitting next to the door of the house on the street. I specifically went in quickly once to catch the radio operator at work - the radio was turned off. This story is still unclear to me. The thing is that the real Morse code was transmitted in groups, and I was absolutely sober.

The story with this Morse code is incomprehensible - on the verge of paranormal phenomena. It couldn't have been heard on the radio for so long, and there was no radio in the area, besides, I went into the house and came back out two or three times - and it was heard again. I don't know Morse code myself, but I have heard such transmissions from professional radio operators many times.

M.P.: Aleksander Viktorovich, this mysterious story can be solved. There is no paranormality in the phenomenon. Here is what V.M. Askinadzi explains about this Morse code:

"I think there is no mysticism in the story with the geologist. Such cases are especially clearly observed in winter. The log house works like the deck of a string instrument, and the antenna is like a string. A resonant signal is induced in it, and the house resonates. And in winter, due to the greater tension of the antenna, this is heard more clearly. This phenomenon can only happen with Morse code - the transmission is carried out on one frequency. And in this case, both the signal frequency and the natural frequency of the "instrument" accidentally hit the resonance. Music and speech cannot be heard this way because of the wide spectrum of frequencies."

A.V.: It is clear that the commentary is from a radio technician. The radio operator himself did not hear anything, and did not ask him. The radio was RPMS, quite weak, but the Morse code from it was received at 50-200 km. The explanation received can be accepted, because I was there in March, and in March it only gets warmer during the day, and frosty at night. The only "but" for this comment is that the antenna was not stretched according to all the rules, but was made in the form of throwing an antenna wire on nearby trees.

M.P.: But I am still pleased that the long-standing mystery has been solved!

Aleksander Viktorovich, thank you for the conversation. We have not yet discussed many issues. For example, about the secret settlements of Old Believers in Siberia. If they were in Siberia, why wouldn't they be in the Urals? I am also interested in your stories about the local Nyaksimvol Mansi Anyamovs, about hunting polar wolves, about geologists hunting bears and elks from a helicopter and what came of it. That the special services monitored and listened to the airwaves in the region, and detected a radiogram from your drilling rig about a fire that the administration wanted to hide. All this, and much more interesting about the 50-70s, the reader can read on your website:

I recommend everyone to read the memoirs of geologist Aleksander Viktorovich Vinogradov!

Notes of a Geologist. Subpolar Urals. Saranpaul Expedition. Book 2.