Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dyatlov Pass Accident

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was Keep, Consensus is that the sources are sufficient to write an encyclopedic article. Davewild (talk) 20:27, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Dyatlov Pass Accident

Dyatlov Pass Accident (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) (delete) – (View log)

Extremely outlandish claims which are mostly unverified, or verified from extremely poor quality sources. Majority is unsalvagebly PoV. Jefffire (talk) 10:34, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

  • Comment - I've added a link to a February 27, 2008 article in the San Francisco Chronicle.[1] Surely the San Francisco Chronicle is NOT a "poor quality source." --AStanhope (talk) 16:05, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
    I'm in favor of keeping this article, but to be fair, the San Francisco Chronicle article is based completely on Wikipedia. The author picked up the story from MetaFilter, and links to the Wikipedia article in his post. utcursch | talk 16:18, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep. Lack of English-language sources doesn't mean that the information is unverifiable. There are books and documentaries in Russian language about the incident. As for POV, that's not a valid reason for deletion -- just tag the article with {{npov}}. utcursch | talk 10:52, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
My issue is that once all of the blatent PoV is removed there will be about half a dozen sentences left. The issue of the references is that they are basically all exceedingly poor quality. Jefffire (talk) 10:54, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete news story plus speculation plus bizarre theories does not make an encyclopaedia article, at least until there are reliable sources for the bizarre theories. Guy (Help!) 13:39, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep If anyone is worried that it will turn out that the St. Petersburg (Florida) Times was the victim of a hoax, then I can only say, that in itself would be notable. As Jefffire points out, there are other sources besides the Tampa-area paper. It's important to remember that the Soviet Union didn't have a free press, and that there were a lot of disasters that were covered up and didn't get publicized until after the end of the Cold War, such as the 1957 nuclear accident at Mayak, or the 1960 Nedelin catastrophe. It's too bad there isn't a separate category for Soviet-era events like these. Mandsford (talk) 14:20, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
That doesn't address the rational for deletion, namely the extremely poor quality of the references . Claiming a conspiracy to repress the information is also not a reason to keep. Jefffire (talk) 14:54, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Also, as mentioned on the article talk page, the newspaper article appears to have been heavily drawn from the Wikipedia article. Jefffire (talk) 15:00, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
FYI, it's the other St. Petersburg Times, which is actually the parent paper to the Moscow Times. Note the dot-ru. --Dhartung | Talk 20:01, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep This was recently featured on Metafilter, which is presumably why it popped up here. It definitely happened, although it's almost certain merely a case of a group of skiers becoming disorientated after fleeing their tents at night to escape an avalanche and either dying of exposure or being caught up in it or a later one and killed. There are good Russian sources out there and a good article can be written on it, a poor article is no rationale for deletion in itself. What's wrong with an article with half a dozen good sentences pray tell? Mandsford is right in pointing out the large number of little known Soviet disasters which were covered up at the time. Towns getting covered with anthrax after fires in biological weapons labs, little things like that. Wikipedia shouldn't disregard things merely because they happened in other times and other countries. Had nine skiers disappeared in mysterious circumstances in Nevada in the same way nobody would be saying delete. Nick mallory (talk) 15:49, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep Lots of verifiable information from reliable sources, though not all of it English. If you have a problem with people making wild claims, don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. —dgiestc 16:23, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Would someone be so kind as to tell me which of the sources are reliable? I was under the impression we had a collection of inaccurate newspaper articles, opinion pieces and quack books. Jefffire (talk) 16:28, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
What is your basis for this presumption? Are you able to read Russian? (I can make out the odd word, but not fluent reading.) --Dhartung | Talk 20:08, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
WP:AGF only applies to editors, not to references. The onus is entirely upon the editors in favour of a reference to demonstrate it's reliability. Jefffire (talk) 23:04, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment Google search showed this, the most recognizable item being "Novaya Gazeta". For those of you who might not be old enough to understand claims of a conspiracy to suppress information, a history lesson is probably in order. It wasn't so much a conspiracy, but rather government policy of that time. What is now simply Russia was once part of what was called the "Soviet Union", and the government of that nation was controlled by what was called the "Communist Party". There were some people-- mostly professors and American government officials and that type-- who claimed that the newspapers in the Soviet Union suppressed information. They had nothing to go on for this wild claim, other than that publications such as "Pravda" and "Izvestia" (these were newspapers published there) wouldn't report the same news that was being reported in the Western press. But a lot of Americans thought that the Soviet Union didn't have as open a society as Americans did. That was more than 20 years ago, of course. Mandsford (talk) 21:16, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
I'm sure most people are aware of the general standard of journalistic freedom in soviet Russia. However, Wikipedia is based on what can be reliable verified. If the commies managed to repress it, then it can't be reliable verified. Wikipedia is based on verifiability, not truth. Jefffire (talk) 23:09, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep While I agree that the article needs some serious editing, this is as far as I have managed to find out a well known event in Russia. All the paranormal stuff should probably be either removed or moved to a separate header, and not be a part of the serious investigation parts.

There is no doubt that 9 people died, where they died and much of the events up to their deaths. But just about everything I've seen on internet sites where there has been any critical thinking at all say that they most certainly ran from an avalanche, or at least though they where in danger of being hit by it if they stayed in the tent. Several of them got caught by the avalanche and was buried beneath the snow (the missing tongue probably having been bitten of during either during the violent avalanche, falling while running down the mountain etc.), while the others froze to death. But still, the article should be kept, and the paranormal stuff should be mentioned as well, though not as facts, just as with many other wikipedia articles about 'mysteries'. 213.89.222.42 (talk) 23:26, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

'trying to look up additional information about " Dyatlov Pass Accident" with google turned up an almost 100% circular reference, with everything going back to the Wikipedia article.
I obviously didn't read every link google turned up, but Wikipedia's references are all either in Russian or are dead links.
The best you can say about this story is it's poorly referenced and HIGHLY suspect'.

References all appear to be circular to me as well, I suspect viral marketing. -Mask? 02:02, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

  • Keep - strange claims and the bulk of references being in a different language are not really good grounds for deletion. It certainly needs a tidy though. If people want more sources then there are people trying to translate some of the Russian material [2]. Even that Skeptic forum points to a 2000 truth-based novella [3] giving more weight to the story. So I think grounds for removing it now are unfounded but it is something I'd want to come back to and re-examine somewhere down the line. (Emperor (talk) 04:39, 2 March 2008 (UTC))
  • Keep - Non-english sources cannot be a reason for deletion. One of the sources ("Matveyeva") is in fact, a collection of quotes from an official 1959 case (plus other documentaries) that was verified by other researches (who have the photocopies of the case). This book is also valuable as a critical overview of different existing "explanation theories" with their pros and cons. Generally, this source have never be disputed as non-reliable among russian researchers community. Geekzoo (talk) 08:00, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment The fact that the sources are not in English is not the reason this is listed, it is because the sources are generally very poor quality. Jefffire (talk) 08:03, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment Please provide a better explanation of 'poor quality'. They are the printed books written by by professional writers/journalists. How do you estimate a level of quality? Geekzoo (talk) 08:10, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
An author so well respected that this article is the second highest google result for his name? Anyway, please see WP:Reliable sources for further information. Jefffire (talk) 08:16, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
http://www.google.com/search?&q=%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%BD%D0%B0+%D0%BC%D0%B0%D1%82%D0%B2%D0%B5%D0%B5%D0%B2%D0%B0 Geekzoo (talk) 08:20, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
List of publications : http://magazines.russ.ru/authors/m/matveeva/ Geekzoo (talk) 08:22, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
If you would be so kind as provide evidence of he is an authoritative source, rather than Russian language webpages, that would be more convincing. After all, any Daily Mail journalist probably has an even longer publication list, but we wouldn't consider any of them reliable. Jefffire (talk) 08:30, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
AFAIK, this author has no publications in English. "rather than Russian language webpages" - do you mean that the fact that personally you cannot read Russian is the reason to reject all Russian sources? Sorry, but I doubt in your own neutrality. Geekzoo (talk) 08:41, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Ah, I tracked down an English translation. The book is a fictional account of a Mary Sue investigation. Reliable source, it is not. Jefffire (talk) 08:36, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I don't know about English translations. The question is a certain book in Russian, isn't it? Let's not to mix the things. Geekzoo (talk) 08:41, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Dude, the book is a fictionalised account. Fiction is not a reliable source. Jefffire (talk) 08:43, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
First, I'd ask you to not call me "dude". We have never take a beer together or so. Second, this is disclaimer from the Matveyeva book (my translations): "For the readers who are interested in documentaries only: please avoid the normal font". The book is clearly separated to two parts: All documentaries are printed with italic, and "fiction line" (author thoughts and commentaries) with normal font. As I told above, the "documental" part is verified by independent competent people. Geekzoo (talk) 08:53, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Do you have any evidence that "the "documental" part is verified by independent competent people"? I don't know about you, but a fictional narrative is never part of any source I would regard as authoritative. Jefffire (talk) 08:56, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I could provide you with links to researchers communities where this question has been disputed, but I'm not sure it would persuade you. Geekzoo (talk) 09:09, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
As someone involved in real research, I doubt it. I think I've heard all I need to about the book's reliability. Jefffire (talk) 09:13, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
They are russian communities. But many people speak English there, so if you would ask a question, you get an answer. You can write to either LJ community or to the forum, links to which you have removed as "inappropriate". Geekzoo (talk) 09:31, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
BTW, the Gushchin's book never be claimed as a "fictional". But the problem with it is that the author tries to promote a certain explanation ("weapon tests") - not NPOV. And he cited the same documentaries as Matveyeva. Geekzoo (talk) 09:36, 2 March 2008 (UTC)


  • Comment I suggest to undo all destructive changes until the question with article deletion is not solved. Geekzoo (talk) 09:44, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep - I found this via a story in a reputable US newspaper, so seems to have achieved worldwide notoriety. --Gene_poole (talk) 10:06, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep and edit mercilessly. The so-called "destructive changes" have considerably improved the article, and a further abbreviation to perhaps three paragraphs would improve it much further. Given a choice between the article as it originally stood and deletion, the choice would be deletion. fortunately, we can edit--if necessary down to a stub saying what is known to have happened and the books that were written about it. The details of the hikers and their injuries and all the peculiar theories are not needed. DGG (talk) 16:10, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
The problem is that if we consider the sources unreliable, we have NO sources at all - even for those three paragraphs. I think we cannot extract the claims we would find appropriate by some our private reasons, while ignoring other claims as long as they are existed in the same documents. Geekzoo (talk) 16:30, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete To those who would say to keep this article: which single primary source (in any language) do you suggest would best withstand a challenge to its credibility? Best secondary source? Further debate can center upon the credibility of each. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 218Ithink (talk • contribs) 05:36, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep - fascinating story. Non-English sources are perfectly fine here. Let's not be too Anglo-Centric or Google-Centric here on the Wikipedia. --AStanhope (talk) 15:28, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment Sorry to belabour this point, but the language of the references is irrelevant and no-one has raised them as a reason for deletion. Jefffire (talk) 19:42, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep I found this article fascinating and did some independent Googling - there's no doubt this accident happened, you can find pix on line easily enough. Article obviously needs tons of cleanup but I found it informative and forwarded it to a bunch of people —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.57.245.11 (talk) 22:48, 3 March 2008 (UTC) \]
  • Keep. If the sources are in Russian, they need to be looked at by somebody fluent to source the article, but deleting it is hardly the solution. --mordicai. (talk) 16:18, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep. Argument for cleanup (which this article needs) is not the same thing as argument for deletion (which this article does not). Ford MF (talk) 18:52, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep, clearly notable. Everyking (talk) 07:23, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep, Deletion of the entire article seems an extreme and unjustified step as long as the fact that 9 people died in mysterious circumstances, and the basic account of how they were found, are not in dispute. WolfmanSF (talk) 17:11, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.