I have had no problems reading Igor B's links. I am not sure what problem you guys are having with automatic translation.
I highly recommend reading it all to understand, it would save on all the questions.
From what I can astatine and in a very basic explanation , the ravine 4 were possibly the first to die. The area is very different today than how it was 60 years ago with vegetation. The nature of the wind would blow the snow over the ravine. (Igor shows an example photo) . It is possible that there was a natural snow cave over the ravine. It is suggested that the may have dug out some more snow and made the roof of the cave too flat which makes it more likely to collapse. The reason they are found the way they were is because they were sheltering themselves and using the coats to cover each other, or sharing them. It doesn't mean they were lying in the stream and there may have been some migration of the bodies when the thawing started.
If there was a couple of meters of snow above them and it collapsed , it could explain the broken ribs and maybe the eyes being forced out as Dona has suggested. Igor B explains a lot of this and why there are less damage to their hands and why only one side of the ribs are broken. Igor B explains the nature of the snow in a collapse and how it becomes harder and more compact.
It was identified at the time of digging them out that the snow was hard.
There is a lot of good information and research with photos and videos of the area. It is the best explanation that I have read hands down.
I've been reading through it, now that I've got a browser that translates. I had not personally thought about a snow cave with a roof, until now. I always assumed it was just a hole dug vertically into the snow, rather than a cave dug more horizontally. We used to dig crazy snow caves as kids every day, I just hadn't considered it this was, for whatever reason (I'm much less creative as an adult than I was in my immortal youth, lol!!) It makes sense. And the way it is presented makes sense. I've always felt that you can't judge the body positions in the ravine based on how they were found as snow and water can shift things, substantially. This is absolutely a plausible scenario, as presented.
Thank you for the synopsis!! It has been frustrating for me trying to translate various sources. Kindle has weird proprietary issues so being able to install a browser that supported a translation add-on took some time. Well, it took *me* time whining and took my daughter five minutes to hack, lol!!
Topic: They were NOT crushed by snow (Read 44501 times)
