The avalanche explanation does not seem to be very viable for modern investigators of this mystery. The information sources in English are scarce, unfortunately

The avalanche explanation does not seem to be very viable for modern investigators of this mystery. The information sources in English are scarce, unfortunately, you have to read Russian discussions of the incident. A few decades ago, there was published a book that popularized the avalanche theory, and the book was translated into English too. However, many people including the participants of the search expedition are saying that it could not be an avalanche. The ski poles were standing around the tent vertically, not affected by the avalanche. There is an evidence that the tent was not really covered with thick snow, and there was a flashlight laying on top of this snow (belonged to the group leader Igor Dyatlov). The slope is not steep at all, maybe 15-20 degrees. There were found footprints of 8-9 people walking away from the tent in organized ordered fashion. It could not happen if 3 or 4 of them were heavily injured by an avalanche. Even if there was some sort of avalache in the area, it just does not explain the whole crazyness, imho. And it is very unlikely that just a noise could make 9 sane people run away from their only shelter, without putting on any warm clothes or boots.. yes, most of them were walking down the hill with only socks on their feet. In my opinion, it is more likely that they were killed by another group of people, but there is no direct evidence of that either. There are many other theories and possible explanations. The UFO theory is absurd of course, but, you know, people come up with such bizarre explanations because reasonable explanations are not very believable either. This is why many people are still trying to solve the mistery, they make expeditions in the area of Dyatlov Pass, trying to understand what could happen there in 1959. Probably, only new declassified documents, if there will be any, can shed some light on this mystery.. Btw, you can look at the photos taken by the group members (from the films found in their cameras): http://fotki.yandex.ru/users/aleksej-koskin/album/159799/ http://fotki.yandex.ru/users/aleksej-koskin/album/159799/