K. A. Kokorin, Kezhma

Interviewed by E. L. Krinov, 1930:

Kokorin doesn’t remember the exact day and year of the impact, but he remembers that it was three or four days before St. Peter’s, no later than 8 or 9 in the morning. The sky was completely clear, there were no clouds. He had gone into the bath-house (in the yard), and had just taken off his outer shirt, when suddenly he heard sounds resembling cannon fire. He immediately ran out into the yard, which opens to the southwest and west. At that point, the sounds were still continuing, and he saw in the southwest, at a height approximately half the distance between the zenith and the horizon a flying red sphere, and to its sides and behind it there were visible rainbow streamers. The sphere flew for 3 or 4 seconds, and disappeared to the northeast. The sounds were audible during the sphere’s flight, but they ceased right away when the sphere disappeared beyond the forest. [1]

Agronomist Kokoulin, Nizhne-Ilimsk

Letter to A. V. Voznesenskii, 25 July 1908:

On the 17th of June,[1] at approximately 7:15 in the morning, the workers building a bell tower saw a fiery block, flying, it seems, from the southeast to the northwest. At first, two bangs resounded (not unlike gunfire), then an extremely strong bang accompanied by shaking. More bangs were heard. They noticed a shaking of the earth. One girl (the priest’s maid-servant) fell off a bench. The populace became frightened. They saw that fiery sphere [there is an unclear word in the original, something like “meteor”] in Karapchanskii, and heard the bangs. The day was clear, and for that reason the thunder put the public in a state of bewilderment. In Nizhne-Ilimsk two Tunguses[2] recounted that the meteor had, in falling, formed a lake which boiled for two full days. The Tunguses were prepared to show people that lake, but no one believed their story.

Supplementary report to A. V. Voznesenskii, 14 September 1908:

Succeeded in more exactly delineating the region over which the sounds accompanying the phenomenon were spread. It turns out that the din was audible near Verkholensk (in the village of Chelpanovaya) on the one side, and in Mukhtuye on the other — i.e., for a distance of nearly 1,300 versts[3] along the Lena [river]. On the side away from the Lena, the phenomenon was more or less basically observed in Nizhne-Ilimsk. The eyewitnesses say that at the place where the body fell (or, what is perhaps more precise, at the place where it went behind the horizon) there arose puffs of black smoke like a column. The Tunguses who wander beyond the Nizhne-Karelinsk settlement (to the west-northwest of Kirensk) say that the thunder was horrible, but the reindeer did not show even the slightest agitation, as they would during a normal thunderstorm. No earthquake in the usual sense was observed; only a quivering of structures from the din was noticed well (here and there all too well). The meteor moved from the east-southeast to the west-northwest.

I. V. Kolmakov, Panovskoye

Letter to L. A. Kulik, 10 February 1922:

I was in the taiga in the north, in the Stony Tunguska [basin], in the Baykit locality at a distance ... of 600 versts[1] from the village of Panovskoye ... There in 1908 in the middle of June[2] at eight in the morning an unbelievable phenomenon took place, resembling the sound of cannon shots and the rumble of powerful thunder, which brought with it a quaking of the earth. The day was clear at that time, with bright sunshine. This [rumbling] continued nearly a quarter of an hour. During my ride out into the inhabited areas I came to talk with several individuals about this, and it turned out that, at the same time, this phenomenon had occurred across an enormous distance. And besides that, I had a conversation on this subject with an aborigine (a Tungus), who recounted the following:

Along the same Tunguska [river], in the place where the Chambe creek flows into it ... at the time of that same storm or thunder several aborigines had had up to a thousand of their reindeer killed, and the remainder severely injured, and also the aborigines themselves had suffered from the powerful impact and, besides that, for approximately 70 versts all around, the whole forest was destroyed, and right there the impact tore a tumult of water out of the ground which dried up after several days, but the aborigines didn’t examine the place where the water was drawn out.

P. P. Kosolapov, Vanavara Trading Post

Interviewed by L. A. Kulik, 1927:

In June of 1908, around 8 in the morning, he intended to go haying from that same [Vanavara] trading post, but he needed a nail. Not finding one in his rooms, he went out into the yard and began to pull a nail out of a window frame with pliers. All of a sudden, it was as if something was intensely burning his ears. Grabbing them and thinking that the roof had caught fire, he raised his head and asked S. B. Semyonov, who was sitting on the porch of his house, “Did you see anything?” “How could I not see it,” replied the other, “It seemed to me as if I too had been enveloped by heat.” P. P. Kosolapov went into the house then and there, but he had only just entered the room and wanted to sit on the floor and get to work, when a boom resounded, dirt came sifting down from the ceiling, the screen flew off the Russian oven onto the cot standing opposite the oven, and one pane from the window was knocked out into the room. After that a sound resembling peals of thunder resounded, receding toward the north. Once it quieted down, P. P. Kosolapov went outside, but didn’t notice anything else.[1]

G. K. Kulesh, Head of the Kirensk Meteorological Station

Letter of 23 June 1908[1]:

On 17 June OS[2] to the NW of Kirensk a phenomenon was observed which lasted approximately from 7:15 to 8 a.m. I did not get to observe it, since, after recording [the readings of] the meteorological instruments, I had sat down to work. I heard hollow sounds, but took them for salvos of weapons fire on the military field beyond the Kirenga river. Having finished work, I glanced at the barograph tape and to my surprise I noticed line after line recorded at 7 a.m. It surprised me because throughout my work I did not get up from my place, the whole family slept, and no one entered the room.[3]

Here is what happened (I pass along the essence of the eyewitnesses’ stories). At 7:15 a.m. there appeared in the northwest a fiery column with a diameter of about four sazhen’[4], in the form of a spear. When the column disappeared, there were heard five strong, abrupt bangs, like from a cannon, following quickly and distinctly one after another; then there appeared in that place a dense cloud. After about 15 minutes the same sort of bangs were heard again, and after another 15 minutes it repeated as well. The ferryman, a former soldier and in general an experienced and knowledgeable person, counted 14 bangs. In keeping with the duties of his job he was on the shore and observed the whole phenomenon from beginning to end. The fiery column was visible to many, but the bangs were heard by an even larger number of people. The peasants form the village nearest the city drive into the city and ask: “What was that? Doesn’t it mean war?” In the city there were also peasants from the village of Karelina, lying 20 versts[5] from Kirensk on the nearer Tunguska river; they pass on that there had been a strong shaking of the ground, such that the [window]glass was broken in the houses.

From other sources it has been passed on that in the mountains seven versts from the village of Karelina a lake formed. According to the peasants’ stories there was a flat place there, a marshy one. Out of that swamp there rose up summer and winter some sort of vapors. And this swamp became a lake. These stories have not been verified.

Now this phenomenon has engendered in the people a mass of the most fantastic stories and suppositions ... It is probably established that a meteor of very enormous dimensions fell, because, in completely clear sunny weather, the column seemed to be of a diameter of four sazhens. There was seen a cloud of gray color, which then turned dark; crashes were heard, 14 in number in three stages; there was a vibration of the ground — the lines on the barograph tape serve as proof of this. Besides this, in the neighborhood of the junior high school there lives the contractor Yashin. He was outside when a board leaning against the fence fell, even though it was completely calm outside. Or, perhaps, there took place a strong shaking of the air, because the last bangs were the most powerful.

According to the story of one inhabitant of Kirensk, he had gone to get something out of a steamer trunk. He had just opened it when crashes resounded and shoved him into the side of the trunk, as if from a strong wind.

Undated supplementary note:

I have received new information about the meteor from students. Two students reported to me that peasants from the village of Bur (on the Pepe river, a tributary of the Tunguska) got the following picture from the Tunguses[6] who were eyewitnesses to the fall of the meteor: When the meteor fell, a dense smoke arose, bangs resounded, the peat and the forest caught fire such that it took the Tunguses three days to put out the blaze.

Note appended to undated questionnaire:

Much has been reported to the Observatory about the former earthquake, although many eyewitnesses along the Lena [river] paid no attention to the earthquake and did not notice it, being astonished by the unusually powerful crashes. Now it has become clear that the crashes were heard in localities far removed from one another; there is fully trustworthy information that there were bangs [heard] in Bodaibo, in Vitim and upstream on the Lena as far as Ust’-Kut, and in Nizhne-Ilimsk. In Nizhne-Ilimsk, the bangs were in the direction of the village of Tub on the Ilim river. The fiery column was seen by many, its shape in the form of a spear has also been established. The smoke or gray cloud which thereafter turned into a dark one was also noted by many. I could not establish when the shaking of glass in the houses made itself felt — before, during, or after the crashes. The most powerful bangs were the last ones, the vibrations of the air were strong. The stories that a lake had formed on the nearer Tunguska and the village of Korelina turned out to be untrue. The peasants of that village were so stunned by the bangs that they sent a deputation to town to the local archpriest to ask if the end of the world wasn’t beginning, [and] how they were preparing for it in Kirensk. That there was a shaking of the ground I was able to conclude from the fact that the barograph marked lines on the tape, and I firmly remember that no one else entered the room and I did not rise from my place, and could not have jarred the instrument. I heard the bangs, but because the windows were closed on the NW and open only on the S, I took the bangs for salvos of weapons fire on the military field.

S. Kulesh, north of Kirensk

from the Irkutsk newspaper Sibir’, 2 July (Old Style) 1908[1]:

On the morning of 17 June[2], just after 9 a.m., some sort of unusual natural phenomenon was observed in our area. In the settlement of N[izhne]-Karelinsk (about 200 versts[3] to the north of Kirensk) the peasants saw in the northwest, quite high above the horizon, some sort of body glowing with an extraordinarily intense (such that you couldn’t look at it) blue-white light, moving downwards from above over the course of 10 minutes. The body took the form of a “pipe”[4], i.e., cylindrical. The sky was cloudless, only low on the horizon on the same side on which the luminous body was observed, there was noted a small dark cloud. It was hot, dry. Nearing the ground (the forest), it was as if the shining body spread out, in its place there formed an enormous puff of black smoke and there was heard an extraordinarily powerful rumble (not thunder), as if from large falling stones or cannon fire. All the structures shook. At the same time a flame of undetermined form began to break out of the cloud.

All the inhabitants of the settlement ran into the street in a panicky fear, old women cried, everyone thought that the end of the world had come ...

The writer of these lines was at that time in the forest, about 6 versts to the north of Kirensk and heard to the northwest something like cannon fire, which repeated (with interruptions) no fewer than 10 times over the course of 15 minutes. In several homes in Kirensk, the glass tinkled in the walls facing the northwest. These sounds, as has now become clear, were heard in n[orthern] Pokamennii, Chechuisk, Zavakomnii, and even in Mutinskii station, about 180 versts north of Kirensk.

In Kirensk at that time, several people observed in the northwest something like a fiery-red sphere, moving, according to the testimony of some, horizontally, but according to the testimony of others, at a steep incline.

Near Chechuisk, a peasant, driving through the fields, observed the same thing in the northwest.

Near Kirensk, in the village of Voronina, the peasants saw a fiery sphere falling to the southeast of them (i.e., to the side opposite the one where N[izhne]-Karelinsk is situated).

The phenomenon has aroused a mass of interpretations. Some say that it was an enormous meteorite, others, that it was ball lightning (or a whole series of them).

At 2 in the afternoon of the same day there was between Kirensk and N[izhne]-Karelinsk ([on the side] nearer to Kirensk) a normal thunderstorm with pouring rain and hail.

T. N. Naumenko, Kezhma

Correspondence with L. A. Kulik, 1935-36:

I don’t remember exactly, it was the 17th or 18th of June 1908[1], around 8 o’clock in the morning that comrade Grabovskii and I were planing boards with a “two-hander.” The day was uncommonly sunny and so clear that we didn’t notice a single cloud on the horizon, no breeze was stirring, absolute silence.

...I was sitting with my back to the Angara river, to the south, while Grabovskii was facing me... And then around 8 in the morning (the sun had already risen rather high) suddenly there was heard a distant, barely audible sound of thunder. It made us look around on all sides involuntarily. The thunder sounded as if it were coming from the Angara, so right away I had to turn abruptly in the direction that I’d had my back to, but in the sky around us not one stormcloud was visible anywhere, all the way to the horizon. Assuming that the thunderstorm was still somewhere far away, we went back to planing boards again. But the sound of thunder began strengthening so rapidly that we didn’t manage to plane more than three or four strokes before we had to throw down our planes and no longer sit, but rise up from the boards, since the sound of thunder already seemed to us to be something unusual, inasmuch as no stormclouds were visible on the horizon.

At the moment when I arose from the boards, amid the rapidly intensifying sound of thunder, there resounded the first, comparatively small crash. It made me quickly turn halfway around to the right, that is, to the southeast, from whence there fell on me the beams of a bright sun, and I had to raise my eyes a little upwards in the direction of the crash of thunder I’d heard, in precisely that direction from which the sunbeams were shining on me. This somewhat hindered my observation of that phenomenon which, all the same, showed itself visible to the eye the moment after the first peal of thunder — namely, when I quickly turned in the direction of the crash, the sunbeams were cut through by a wide, white-hot streamer from the right side of the beams, while from the left in the direction of the north (or, as seen from the Angara, beyond the Kezhma field) there went flying erratically into the taiga an even more white-hot (paler than the sun, but almost the same as the sunbeams) somewhat elongated mass in the form of a cloud, with a diameter far bigger than the moon....without any regularly defined edges.

After the first faint crash, in about two or three seconds, or maybe more (we had no watches, but the interval was on that order), there resounded a second, rather loud thunderclap. If you compared it with a normal thunderclap, then it would be as loud as the ones that happen during a thunderstorm. After that second crash... the mass was no longer visible, but its tail, or more correctly its streamer, now found itself all on the left side of the sunbeams, having cut through them, and having become many times broader than it had been on the right side. And right then, in a shorter interval of time than between the first and the second crashes, there followed a third thunderclap, one so strong it was as if it had several crashes mingled together inside of it, with such a crash that the ground shook, and throughout the taiga there reverberated such an echo, and not even an echo, but some sort of deafening solid roar. It seemed that that roar enveloped the whole taiga of unencompassable Siberia.

It should be mentioned that, after the first and second thunderclaps, the carpenters working on the construction of the barn crossed themselves in total amazement (there were six or seven of them, all local peasants...), and when the third crash resounded, the carpenters fell off the building backwards onto some woodchips (not too far, about a meter and a half), and it was necessary to bring them to their senses and calm them, saying that everything was already over. But they expected a continuation and said that probably the end of the world had already come and there would be a terrible judgment and so forth.[2]

N. N. Polyuzhinskii, Observer, Ilimsk Meteorological Station

Letter of 21 June 1908[1]:

On 17 June 1908,[2] at 8 hours and 30 minutes in the morning, there was heard a powerful noise and a sound resembling strong thunder and cannon shots, following one after another (like small shot), probably from the meteor (aerolite) flying through.

Supplementary report to A. V. Voznesenskii, one month later:

30 June New Style (17 June Old Style), on Tuesday around 8 o’clock in the morning, with 10 degrees of cloud cover in the air, thunder was heard from the south-southeast, not unlike rapid-fire pistol shots, then the thunder grew stronger and stronger, not unlike powerful gunpowder explosions and cannon shots, which in nearing Ilimsk went over into a horrible crashing, just as there came a small earthquake (swaying of the icon-lamps and jolts felt by people who were sitting peaceably). After the crashing (in the air) there rushed a noise (a roar), and the thunder began to move off in a north-northwesterly direction; the thunder continued around 20 minutes, during which time there was no lightning.

During the thunder one Ilimsk petty bourgeois was 4 versts[3] outside of Ilimsk up the Ilim river and saw “a flying star with a fiery tail,” which fell into the water, but its tail disappeared into thin air.

In the village of Yarskaya (about 60 versts downstream from Ilimsk on the Ilim river) three women saw a “fiery sphere” (a flying one); where it disappeared to is unknown, since the women became frightened of it and ran home from the field.

In my first report on this, the time of the thunder’s appearance was indicated incorrectly, by mistake.

N. Ponomaryov, Nizhne-Ilimsk

from the Irkutsk newspaper Sibir’, 2 July (Old Style) 1908[1]:

The population of Nizhne-Ilimsk and surrounding villages was alarmed on 17 June[2] by an unusual phenomenon. At 7:20 in the morning, all around Nizhne-Ilimsk there was heard a powerful noise, going over into the rumble of thunder. Meanwhile, the sky was cloudless. Several houses began to sway to and fro from the crashes, above the earth “some sort of fiery body resembling a beam[3]” rushed headlong from the south to the northwest. Immediately after that a crash resounded, and in that place where the fiery body had vanished there appeared a “fire,” and then “smoke.”

Undated correspondence cited by A. V. Voznesenskii:

The population of Nizhne-Ilimsk and surrounding villages was alarmed today (17 June) by an unusual phenomenon. At 7:20 in the morning, above Nizhne-Ilimsk, by very good weather conditions (the sky was covered with cloudlets here and there), there was heard approaching the village an out-of-the-ordinary noise, which went over into the rumble of thunder as it drew nearer. After the rumbles, throughout the whole district there resounded a most powerful crash, evoking a near-panic in the population.

I was sleeping. When the rumbles of thunder were heard, I woke up and, at the moment of the crash, felt how my house began to sway; in the kitchen, the dishes came crashing down, and the chair standing close by the wall was moved a couple of inches[4] toward the middle [of the room] by the vibration of the wall; a servant who happened to be standing on a bench nearly fell from the shaking.

Quickly getting dressed, I run out on the street, I read great alarm on the faces there, here and there the population have climbed on the roofs of houses and are looking in the direction where the crash resounded. One approaches me and reports that he saw, before the thunder rumbles appeared, that some sort of fiery body resembling a beam rushed headlong over the earth and vanished; all at once the crash resounded. Some other muzhiks[5] reported the same thing, having seen it together with a contractor. A fellow rides up astride a horse and reports that he also saw some sort of fiery body, saw how in that place where it fell there appeared at first a fire, and then, when the crash resounded, instead of the fire there appeared smoke.

My father and two brothers were about 6 versts[6] away from Nizhne-Ilimsk on a fishing trip and distinctly heard how before the powerful crash there were two thunderclaps, not as strong, while after the crash there were heard very many less strong crashes — up to 100 and in different places in three directions. One of [my] brothers, having been to war, compares what happened to that moment when the enemy opens fire and the big military weapons roar ...

A muzhik who rode up to us from a village 7 versts away also saw the fiery body. The body rushed from the south to the northwest, and everyone who saw it unanimously confirms that, indicating the direction exactly.

M. R. Romanov, peasant, Nizhne-Ilimsk

Note appended to an undated questionnaire:

At the beginning of the ninth hour of the morning, local time, there appeared a fiery sphere which flew in a direction from the southeast to the northwest. This sphere, as it neared the earth, took on the form above and below of a flattened sphere (as was visible to the naked eye); approaching even nearer to the earth, this sphere had the look of two fiery colums. As that enormous mass fell to earth, there occurred two strong crashes, like thunder, but the fact that the sky was completely cloudless may serve as proof that it was not thunder, then later there was heard a noise as if from a strong wind; the duration of this phenomenon was around 15 minutes.

interviewed by D. F. Landsberg in Kansk, 11 October 1921:

I was a master tanner. In the summer (it was closer to spring) around eight o’clock (in the morning), I and my workers were washing wool on the shore of the Kana river when suddenly I heard at first a noise, as from the wings of a frightened bird, coming from the south toward the east, toward the village of Antsyr’, and a wave like a ripple went up the river in the direction of the current. After that there followed one sharp crash, and after it, hollow, seemingly subterranean rumbles. The crash was so strong that one of the workers, Yegor Stepanovich Vlasov (he is now dead) fell into the water. With the noise, there appeared in the air a radiance, circular in form, with nearly half the dimensions of the moon, with a bluish hue, flying quickly in the direction from Filimonov toward Irkutsk. After the radiance there remained behind a trace, in the form of a blue-gray streak, stretching along almost the whole way and then gradually disappearing from its end. The radiance, without breaking up, vanished behind the mountain. I didn’t notice the duration of the phenomenon, but it was very brief. The weather was completely clear and it was calm.

Semyon Borisovich Semyonov, Vanavara Trading Post

Correspondence with L. A. Kulik, 1927:

This was in 1908 in the month of June at about eight in the morning. At the time, I was living on the Stony Tunguska River, at the Vanavara trading station, and was working out of my own hut.

I was sitting on my porch facing north and then in an instant a fiery flare took shape in the northwest from which there came so much heat that it was impossible to remain sitting — my shirt nearly burst into flame while still on me. And what a glowing marvel it was! I saw that it covered a space no less than two versts. But then that flare existed only very briefly; I barely managed to cast my eyes at it and see what size it was, then it shut down in an instant.

After that shutdown, it got dark and at the same time there was an explosion that threw me from the porch, about a sazhen’ or more, but I didn’t remain unconscious for very long and when I came to there was such a noise that all the houses shook as if they were moving off their foundations. The glass in the houses shattered and in the middle of the square near the huts a strip of ground tore apart and at the same time the so-called iron hasp of the barn door also broke, although the lock remained intact.[1]

Interviewed by E. L. Krinov, 1930:

I don’t remember the year exactly, but more than twenty years ago, when the fallow land was being plowed up, at breakfast time I was sitting on the porch of the house at the Vanavara trading station and facing towards the north.

I had just raised my axe to hoop a cask when suddenly I noticed how in the north above Vasily Il’ich Onkoul’s Tunguska Road, the sky split in two, and in it, high and wide above the forest, a fire appeared. The heavens moved apart a great distance; the whole northern part of the sky was covered with fire.

At that moment I got so hot I couldn’t endure it, as if my shirt had burst into flame while still on me, and from out of the north, from where the fire was, there came an intense heat. I wanted to rip off my shirt and throw it away, but at that moment the sky slammed shut, and a mighty crash resounded and I was thrown about three sazhen’s to the ground. For a moment I lost consciousness, but my wife, running out, brought me back into the hut.

After the crash there came such a noise as if stones were falling, or a cannon was firing. The earth trembled, and while I lay on the ground I covered my head fearing that the stones might smash it.

At the moment when the sky opened, a hot wind, as if from a cannon, blew past the huts from the north. It left traces on the ground in the form of little paths, and damaged the growing onion plants.

Later, it turned out that many panes in the windows had been broken out, and the iron hasp in the door of the barn had been broken. At the moment when the fire appeared, I saw P. P. Kosolapov, who was working near the window of the hut, sit down on the ground, seize his head with both hands, and run into the hut. [2]

Bushkov, Evenk from the Khatangsk region

Interviewed by G. P. Kolobkova[1], November 1959.

The eyewitness [i.e., Bushkov] saw in the sky a big ball of white flame, “the size of a house,” out of which there flew sparks. In the Khatangsk region, where he lived at the time, the thunder whas such that it seemed that it had fallen somewhere within 1.5 km. There was intense heat, and then smoke. There was good weather that day. The thunder was terrifying, the people all became frightened, they thought that the end of the world had begun.

Right after that some old men went there: his [Bushkov’s] father, Zakhar Ivanovich Salatkin, and Il’ya Semyonovich (or Pavlovich) Cheronchin. They all died long ago. [Bushkov’s father?] recounted that they found nothing, other than felled forest and swamps. The Evenki got very sick after that, blisters broke out on their body, they suffered intensely, then died.

Stepan Ivanovich Chuchana, Shanyagir Clan, Strelka-Chunya Trading Post

Interviewed, together with his brother Chekaren, by I. M. Suslov, 1926.

Our choum[1] stood on the banks of the Avarkitta. Before sunrise Chekaren and I arrived from the Dilyushmo creek, where we had stayed with Ivan and Akulina [Lyuchetkan]. We fell into a deep sleep. Suddenly we both woke up at once: someone had jogged us awake. We heard a whistle and felt a strong wind. Chekaren yelled to me “Do you hear how many golden-eyes[2] or mergansers are flying by?” We were both still in the choum, you know, and we couldn’t see what was going on in the forest. Suddenly someone shoved me again, so hard that I hit the choum’s pole and then fell on the hot coals in the hearth. I got scared. Chekaren also got scared, caught hold of the pole. We began to yell father, mother, brother, but no one answered. Beyond the choum there was some sort of noise, we could hear how the tree-trunks were falling. Chekaren and I crawled out of our sleeping bags and already wanted to leap out of the choum, but suddenly the thunder struck very strongly. That was the first thunderclap.

The ground began to twitch and pitch, a strong wind slammed into our choum and knocked it over. I was squeezed hard by the poles, but my head was not covered because the ellyun[3] had split. There I caught sight of a terrifying marvel: The tree-trunks are falling, their needles are burning, the dried ones on the ground are burning, the reindeer moss is burning. There’s smoke all around, my eyes hurt, it’s very hot, I could burn up.

Suddenly, above the mountain, where the forest had already fallen, something started to shine intensely, and, I tell you, it was as if a second sun had appeared; the Russians would have said “something suddenly flashed unexpectedly”; it hurt my eyes, and I even closed them. It resembled that which the Russians call lightning. And immediately there were agdyllyan[4], loud thunder. That was the second thunderclap. The morning was sunny, there were no thunderclouds; our sun shone brightly, as always, and here there appeared a second sun!

With difficulty Chekaren and I crawled out from under the poles and the ellyun. After that we saw something flash above us, but already in a different place, and there was loud thunder. That was the third thunderclap. A wind flew at us, knocked us off our feet, struck against the fallen tree-trunks.

We looked at the falling trees, we saw how their tops were broken, we looked at the fire. Suddenly, Chekaren yelled “Look up!” and pointed. I looked there and there was lightning again, it flashed and struck again, made agdyllyan. But the thump was a little less than before. That was the fourth thunderclap, like normal thunder.

Now I remember well that there was one more thunderclap, the fifth, but it was small and somewhere far away — there where the sun sleeps at night.

L[avrentii] V[asil’yevich] Dzhenkoul, Strelka-Chunya Trading Post

Interviewed by G. P. Kolobkova, 1960.[1]

L. V. Dzhenkoul was born in 1904, so his personal memories of the 1908 Tunguska Event are minimal. Here he is recounting what he was told by his father V[asilii?] I[l’ich] Dzhenkoul and uncle I[van] I[l’ich] Dzhenkoul (both long dead by the time of Kolobkova’s 1960 interview.

In that place the seven rich Dzhenkoul brothers in those days pastured a reindeer herd of 600-700 head. The brothers were rich. On that day, [my] father went to meet the reindeer on the Ilimpo [river] (in the north). The herd was pastured between the Kimchu river and the Polnoty (Churgim) river. On the upper reaches of the Polnoty river there was a storehouse. There was a second storehouse at the mouth of the Cheko. There, where the first storehouse was (on the Polnoty-Churgim), there everything was burnt up. Of that storehouse there remained only ashes. The storehouse at the mouth of the Cheko was thrown over (carried away) by a whirlwind. At the headwaters of the Khushmo [river] their herd was burned, the reindeer were burnt up, only ashes remained. At the mouth of the Cheko, the reindeer lay curled up, but they didn’t burn (they had been stunned and they died).

My uncle said: Ogdy[2] came down to earth. There was strong thunder. The weather was completely clear, there wasn’t even any rain. Early in the morning it thundered, there were two thunderclaps: one short and strong, the second, long. Sparks flew. A whirlwind rushed in a NW to SE direction. Such a strong whirlwind that it blew down the forest. The earth shook. From the headwaters of the Polnoty river the forest was strewn in all directions. The choums[3] flew into the air, people fell without memory, then consciousness returned.

That year the shaman Chanchyu frightened everyone: do not go there for a whole year. Anyone who goes could die. But people went anyway. My uncle went looking for reindeer [there] the same summer. Pieces of iron (of silvery metal) and unusual stones he did not find, did not see — I cannot say that.

My uncle, Ivan Il’ich Dzhenkoul, worked as a guide for [L. A.] Kulik. He said that they needed to dig on the south side, and not there where Kulik [dug]. In the southern part of the swamp there was a pit with cave-ins and the trees were stuck into it by their tops. The pit was located in a pine forest, to the south of where Kulik was working, there where the sun sets. Afonya Doonov and Ivan Maksimovich Dzhenkoul were there after the war[4] and saw that pit. I myself was not there. It was they who recounted that they saw that pit at the very end of the swamp.

Nastya Dzhenkoul, Khushmo River

The widow of Ivan Maksimovich Dzhenkoul, interviewed by G. P. Kolobkova, November 1959.[1]

Her [i.e., Dzhenkoul’s] father and grandfather were living at that time (in 1908) on the Khushmo River. The weather was good. Suddenly it began to rain, a strong wind arose, blew away the birchbark choum[2]. A big stone fell, as big as a choum, skipped two or three times, then sank in the swamp. The stone was brightly shining, black, it fell with a terrible sound oo-oo-oo-oo. It threw down trees, tore them out by the roots. Everyone lay like dead men for three days. The swamp had been there all the time, only it had been drier, [as you can tell] by the fact that they used to pasture reindeer on it. The next year after the catastrophe, everyone became sick. They were sick the whole winter, their bodies covered with spots, they itched. Many died.

When [s]he (N[astya] Dzhenkoul) went hunting on the Chavidokona, she saw two pits. One was small, the other, as big as a choum, about 6 meters in diameter; it got narrow down below, and on the edges the earth was rusty. They brought the rusty earth to Vanavara, it shone in the dark like snow at night, with sparkles. There [in the location of the pits] fallen trees are rare. The pits are located on the left shore of the Chavidokona, about 2 km from its mouth and about 0.5 km from the shore.

Shaman Vasilii Dzhenkoul, Shanyagir Clan

Night Chant[1]

The god comes, the god comes.
The earth trembles in fear at the coming of Ogdy.
The earth rises and falls beneath my feet, like waves of water.
My place of purification is overthrown, my lodgepoles topple.
The god comes.

The god calls out.
Blinding-bright, his tongue lashes the sky.
His roar booms off the hills, the heavens ring with it.
Ogdy is calling his avatar from the Lower World.
The earth at my feet tears open at the touch of his fiery tongue.
The god calls out.

Heeding the god’s call, the avatar arises.
Night-walker, Spawn of Darkness, Beast of Evil Heart,
From the Lower World he arises.
Insatiable, All-devouring,
As wild dogs tearing at entrails of their kill,
Heeding the god’s call, the avatar arises.

Akulina Lyuchetkana, Dilyushmo River

The widow of Ivan Potapovich Lyuchetkan, interviewed by I. M. Suslov, March 1926.

There were three of us in the choum[1] — my husband Ivan, me, and old man Vasilii, the son of Okhchen. Suddenly someone gave our choum a powerful shove. I got frightened, cried out, woke up Ivan, we started to crawl out of the sleeping bag. We saw that Vasilii was crawling out too. Ivan and I hadn’t even managed to crawl out all the way and stand on our feet, when once again someone gave our choum a powerful shove, and we fell on the ground. Old man Vasilii fell on top of us, as if someone had thrown him. All around a noise was heard, someone was making a noise and banging on the ellyun[2]. Suddenly it got very bright, a bright sun shone on us, a strong wind blew. Then someone fired a powerful shot, as if the ice were cracking on the Katanga [river] in winter, and right away a dancing whirlwind swooped down, grabbed hold of the ellyun, whirled it around, twirled it, and dragged it off somewhere. Only the dyukcha[3] was left. I got completely terrified and lost consciousness, I saw a whirlwind dancing. I cried out and immediately came to life again.

The whirlwind knocked the dyukcha down on me and a pole injured my leg. I crawled out from under the poles and wept: the trunk with the dishes had been thrown out of the choum, and it was dragged far and opened, and many cups were broken. I look upon our forest and don’t see it. Many of the trees are standing there without branches, without leaves. Many, many trees are lying on the ground. On the ground the dry tree-trunks, the twigs, the reindeer moss are all burning. I see some sort of clothes burning, I come closer and see our rabbit-fur blanket and our fur bag, in which Ivan and I were sleeping.

I went to look for Ivan and the old man. I see something hanging on the naked branch of a larch. I came closer, reached out with a stick and took it down. It was our fur, which used to hang tied to the poles of the choum. The fox skin was scorched, the ermine had become yellowish and dirty in the ashes. Many rolls of skins had wrinkled up and dried out.

I took the fur, wept and went to look for my men. And on the ground the dried pine needles are burning and burning, the reindeer moss is burning, smoke is all around.

Suddenly, I hear someone quietly moaning. I ran toward the voice and caught sight of Ivan. He was lying on the ground between the branches of a big tree. He had broken his arm on a log, the bone had torn his shirt and was sticking out, blood had dried on it. Here I fell down and again lost consciousness. But I soon came to life again. Ivan had “slept it off, ” began to moan louder and weep.

The whirlwind threw Ivan nearby. If you stood ten choums in a row, then where he fell would have been beyond to last choum, very near the place where I took down the furs from the branch.[4]

Ivan clasped me around the neck with his good arm, I lifted him, and we went toward the Dilyushmo [river] toward our choum, where in the storehouse there were two skins, a sack of flour and some nets. The choum had stood on the shore of the Dilyushmo, the storehouse was close to the choum to the west [literally, “toward the sunset ”]. All of a sudden it sounded as if someone were yelling. And there we saw our Vasilii. He lay beneath the root of an old fallen larch and had hidden himself there. Vasilii crawled out of his “den ” and went with us toward our choum. I got tired, gave Ivan to the old man, and myself carried only the scorched skins.

It got harder to walk, there were very many fallen trees. Suddenly we saw logs on the ground, and skins lying under them. The hair on the skins was scorched, the hide was wrinkled and singed. Instead of the nets we saw a pile of pebbles — the plummets. The horsehair nets had burned up. The logs had burned up, become embers. Instead of the flour sack, a black stone. I jabbed it with a finger and the coal-stone broke into pieces. In the middle of it I found a little flour and wrapped it up in Vasilii’s shirt. So perished our storehouse. We rested a bit and went to look for our choum.

Here’s the place where our choum had been. The poles lie on the ground, a big tree fell on them, it was intensely scorched. I chopped it to pieces with an axe and dragged it to one side. Underneath it we found our copper pot, in which there was a lot of meat from the day before.

A bright summer night fell, the fire began to diminish. In place of the heat, it grew cold. We decided to move toward the Katanga [river]. By the time we got to the Chambe river, we were already totally weak, all around we saw marvels, terrible marvels. It wasn’t our forest [any more]. I never saw a forest like that. It was strange somehow. Where we lived there had been dense forest, an old forest. But now in many places there was no forest at all. On the mountains all the trees lay flat, and it was bright, and everything was visible for a far distance. And below the mountains in the swamps it was impossible to go at all: some trees were standing, some were lying, some were leaning, some had fallen on one another. Many trees were scorched, the needles and moss were still burning and smoking. Reaching the Katanga, we met [Ivan’s brother, Ilya] Lyuchetkan.

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