Lost and Found
The students were due to return on 12 February 1959 and send notice to the UPI sports club. There was no notice. Their worried families appealed to the authorities to search for the students. Search parties began looking for the hikers on February 20. They found the abandoned tent on the slope February 26, with food laid out, Dyatlov’s stove left disassembled, and a cup of hot chocolate prepared but not consumed. UPI, Mansi people, and Soviet officials searched the area. They found Krivonischenko and Doroshenko under a cedar tree 1.5 kilometers (.9 miles) from the tent, dead of hypothermia despite the small campfire they made. Searchers found Dyatlov, Kolmogorova, and Slobodin at various points up the slope, as if they were trying to make their way back to the tent.