Maddy Chapman

In January 1959, nine hikers died on the slopes of Kholat Syakhl Mountain in what is now known as the "Dyatlov Pass incident". In the latest series of True Detective, True Detective: Night Country, a team of researchers go missing in the Alaskan Arctic and are later found frozen together in a horrifying human “corpsicle”. The series contains spooky parallels to real life, and sparks some interesting questions around human cryogenics. In an interview with Vanity Fair, director and writer Issa López confessed to drawing inspiration from historical events in the new series. These include the mysteries of the Mary Celeste and the Dyatlov Pass incident. What was the Dyatlov Pass incident? On January 27, 1959, nine experienced hikers died on the slopes of Kholat Syakhl Mountain (which translates to "Death Mountain´ in the local Indigenous Mansi language). The team, from the Ural Polytechnic Institute in Russia, led by 23-year-old Igor Dyatlov, embarked on a 14-day expedition in the northern Ural Mountains, attempting to reach Gora Oterten Mountain. However, they never made it to their destination and all perished on the freezing slopes. A month later, rescuers searching for the hikers discovered their tent cut open from inside with most of their belongings still inside. Footprints in the snow led away from the tent and then disappeared, indicating that they were barefoot, wearing only socks or a single boot. The next day, February 27th, two bodies were recovered near the remnants of a fire. They were naked and had both suffered burns. One had bitten off his own knuckle. two more bodies were found scattered between the fire and tent three days later frozen in poses implying that they tried to return to camp. The others were discovered almost three months later in a ravine, two of them missing their eyes, one with no eyebrows and one had its tongue ripped out.