Since I don't have anyone to talk about it, I'm just going to leave it there.
IMO they got terrified by UFO. Not the kind that belongs to or has aliens inside - object, cause I believe it was real, flyng, cause I believe it was flying, and unidentified cause soviet government had no interest in ever disclosing anything.
I used to be very suspicious about the presence of the older guy that seemingly had no reason to join them, but since I learned that he was living a life that should be impossible in USSR for years, not getting any trouble from officials while constantly moving and hanging around their secret areas of cold war related, top notch guarded secrets I'd put my bet on the simplest explanation.
And for me the simplest explanation is that he joined them, cause such trips are great occasions to befriend people... and that he aimed at gaining trust of the group, especially those two who had acces to some secrets in order to test if they can keep their mouth shut. As an inside spy, not outside spy.
Soviets were doing that and I don't think it was even close to unusual considering the time, location and their area of work.
Avalanche theory is just bizarre for me. They were on the flat surface. Hill wasn't even close to high or steep. Significant distance from the top of that hill.
None of which excludes risk of avalanche completely but lack of trace of an avalanche is pretty convincing to me.
On the other hand I'm not convinced by the vision of eight experienced hikers trying to flee from avalanche, on foot, leaving their shoes and clothes behind cause nobody is going to flee from an avalanche on foot, shoeless, running/walking down almost a mile down to the tree line. Their tracks indicate that they stopped running frantically after first 40ish yards and then slowed down into walking. About the time to get back to the tent and start setting and fixing it back if they weren't hit by an avalanche yet. They didn't so the danger must still be there. And possibly-another-avalanche is less deadly than Siberian winter without winter clothes.
Burned ends of top branches on the trees at the tree line leads me to believe that something burning got pretty close. Likely same thing melted top layer of snow enough that it turned their footprints into ice and cause them to be still visible weeks later.
No signs of explosion cause nothing exploded there, it hit somewhere else - even if that place was located, no way it would be disclosed to the public.
I don't believe that soviet government had any direct involvement in their deaths, cause it couldn't be farther from their ways of killing/disposing of people.
And if they were aware of some "unfortunate event" with soldiers accidentally killing the group, they would start covering it up straight away and we would never know about it. After all rocket science is rocket science and staging a site of tragic, yet mondain tragic accident is not a rocket science, especially if you have full control over everyone who can even touch the case.
I'm torn on the part where they may be tracked, beaten and kept in cold in order to make sure that everyone dies. Some injuries seem to be more consistent with a beating, and even torture than with accidental hits and falls while running from something scary but since their autopsies weren't as detailed as they should be, we will never know.
Missing diary could point at someone possibly being there, but since bunch of people trashed their tent, ramaged their stuff, took some with them, drank their alcohol, returned some items and empty bottle to the tent after messing it in all possible ways BEFORE the pics were taken and before any actual investigator showed up, the list of people that may stole it afterwards is too long to put much weight on a chance that someone may took it on the 1st/2nd of February.
I fail to see a reason why someone else would even be there, not to mention find themselves with a reason to murder those people - all or most of which were in a tent before something scared them.
Cause they saw something weird in the sky? So what even if they spoke about it?
Cause they took a picture of something they shouldn't see? Plenty of easy, effective and not_deadly or deadly_but_not_as_suspicious ways of dealing with that used by soviets on almost daily basics.
So my bet is on consequences of not supernatural UFO exposition.
I tend to assume that they weren't acting irracional or stupid but did the best they could to try to survive something they couldn't predict, wasn't expecting and had no idea what to do.
Vague descriptions of conditions of the bodies are leaving a lot of space for theories that make sense with such vague descriptions pictured in a way that could fit such theories, not so much with more detailed descriptions.
If there were some individuals who showed up to beat them up and force to stay in the frost long enough to make sure they'll die, with an unknovn motive, then I don't see any way anyone could be ever able to prove it more effectively now, after decades of coverups. I'm not completely excluding that possibility, but even if so, the heatwave surely was there (IMO) cause of the burned branches and the way their footprints got preserved... as well as lack of any significant animal predation. Basically none with all five bodies that were barely covered by snow or hidden under not very deep layer of snow. Nothing ate them afterwards cause IMO nothing was there, cause even predators got so scared by same thing that scared hikers that they haven't came back to the area.
I don't want to sound disrespectful, it's just the matter of my limitations and lack of knowledge about other examples, but their inuries sound kinda familiar to injuries of dogs and cats who got so terrified of New Year's fireworks explosions that they ran for their life in panic and before they realised got all sorts of horrible injuries by hitting and falling while trying to escape.
On the other hand that shouldn't happen to all or almost all of them after slowing down and walking in somewhat reasonable speed so...
