Madness on the Mountain
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What is the setting for the mysterious event in 1993?
Siberia, August 1993. The river is freezing cold. Snow melts from the Kamar-Daban mountain range, which looms overhead. Your kayak cuts through the water. You take in the fresh mountain air and the rugged landscape. It's a long overdue escape from the city. Out here, the only signs of civilization are power lines running over the mountains, which are easy enough to ignore. But out of nowhere, something catches your eye and the peaceful atmosphere dissolves. There's someone standing on the far shore of the river, framed starkly against the trees. It's a teenage girl. She's waving her arms frantically, screaming for you to stop. From this distance, you can't quite make it out, but it looks almost like her jacket is stained with blood. You don't hesitate.
You dive into the frigid water and swim to shore. And when you reach the girl, she collapses into your arms. She's delirious, inconsolable. You can barely make out half of what she's saying through her sobs. She says she's scared, that she's all alone. You wonder why this girl is out in the wild by herself. But what she says next answers your question and makes your blood run as cold as the river.
Who were the leaders of the hiking groups?
Everyone else is dead. a week earlier, August 2, 1993. Two hiking groups from Kazakhstan climb up a steep trail, away from the nearest town. They're heading into the wilds of southern Siberia's Khmar Dabon mountain range. They're a school-sponsored hiking expedition, mostly in their teens and early twenties. One group is led by a man named Konstantin Kazantsev. The other is led by Lyudmila Korovina, an experienced hiker who has traveled these mountains before and who also happens to be the mother of one of Konstantin's student hikers. Lyudmila's group will be taken a high altitude route across the mountain range, before descending back down towards civilization. On the map, their route follows a rough arc across the mountains and back to a small lake called Lake Padovoi. They have two tents and will camp along the 40-kilometer route. While Liudmila's group takes the summit, Konstantin will guide his group along a lower altitude valley route following the river.
Despite the lower elevation, Konstantin's group's route is technically the more difficult of the two. The difficulty of the Russian alpine routes are measured on a scale of 1 to 6, with 1 being a beginner slope and 6 being near vertical, only to be attempted by experts. Liudmila's route is rated a 3, which makes it a moderately difficult slope, around 35 to 45 degrees in icy. This requires confidence and sure footing, but it's not a grain that requires special equipment. Konstantin's route, by comparison, is a 4, which usually indicates some steep rocky sections at an incline of more than 55 degrees. The plan is for the two groups to begin and end the multi-day hike together, with several days in between, in which the two groups will separate and hike their respective routes. So when the trail forks, the valley group will take the low road, the summit group will take the high road, and on August 5th, they'll meet back up at the designated lake.
While it's still summer, weather up in the mountains can be fickle in Siberia, with snowfall beginning as early as late August. Anticipating this, Lyudmila contacted local weather monitoring stations ahead of time. They told her the worst she could expect is a mild chance of wind and rain. Nothing to be too concerned about. Well, except for this.
What challenges did the hikers face in the mountains?
They were given a stark, cryptic warning as they departed a nearby town for the mountains. One of the locals urged the hikers to be careful as wildlife in the area was behaving strangely, aggressively. No one could explain why, but something in the mountains was driving animals insane. And most recently, bears in the area had been witnessed throwing themselves in front of trains. Liudmila and Konstantin's groups arrive at the fork in the trail. Liudmila does a quick headcount of her six students. Sasha, Dennis, Timur, Victoria, Tatiana, and Valentina. They're all here, all ready to go. The groups say goodbye for now and part ways. Following her map, Liudmila guides her summit group along a river through a nearby pass.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
What is the setting for the mysterious event in 1993?
0:01–1:41
2
Who were the leaders of the hiking groups?
1:41–4:42
3
What challenges did the hikers face in the mountains?
4:42–7:27
4
How did the weather affect the hikers' journey?
7:27–10:59
5
What ominous signs did the hikers encounter?
10:59–13:58
6
Why did Natalia become concerned for her mother?
13:58–21:31
7
What happened when the group attempted to descend?
21:31–37:40