Famous 1908 Impact Crater Found?

richardsud 01:52:00 PM Aug 14 2007

BUSH DID IT. JUST ANOTHER AMERICAN CONSPIRACY. TOO MANY "TERRORISTS" HERE ON EARTH. THE TRUTH HAS BEEN POINTED OUT. - RICHARD

AmberPro 02:27:49 PM Jul 05 2007

[previous comment concludes]
...It is just an incidental mention, also at second-hand, but the repetition rules out a mistake in transmission, and the context strongly implies that Lake Cheko was a well-known waypoint among the hunters and trappers who traveled that forest road prior to the Event. (After the Event, such landmarks would have been of no use, since the area had become, to all intents and purposes, closed to traffic.)

For more detail, see the blog at http://www.myspace.com/billdesmedt

AmberPro 02:27:02 PM Jul 05 2007

[previous comment continues]
...Three mentions of the ?mouth? of the Cheko (i.e., the point at which the lake flows out into a stream) makes it pretty definite that the younger Dzhenkoul has not misremembered his hand-me-down tale. And the context makes clear that the second storehouse must have been located at the mouth of the Cheko before the Event, since the blast itself swept the structure away. Which, in turn, means the Cheko itself was there too.

Finally, we have the testimony of Vasilii Nikolaevich Dmitriev taken in 1960 by G. B. Kolobkova (VINITI, page 104/61):

The road from Strelka to Vanavara passed through Lake Cheko, From Ilimpei you could go to Strelka. There was no trading post there at that time, but the road went through. Further on toward Vanavara, the road went through [across?] Lake Cheko.

It is just an incidental mention, also at second-hand, but the repetition rules out a mistake in transmission, and the context strongly implies that Lake Cheko was a well-known

AmberPro 02:24:58 PM Jul 05 2007

[previous comment continues]
...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).

Three mentions of the ?mouth? of the Cheko (i.e., the point at which the lake flows out in

AmberPro 02:23:52 PM Jul 05 2007

Lyuchetkan seems to be about as close to an unimpeachable witness as we?re likely to find in these annals: He lived close to the impact site (his brother, who lived even closer, had his hut blown into the air ?like a bird? from the blast and became so afraid he was struck mute for several years thereafter). As a herder and hunter, Lyuchetkan could be expected to know the surrounding area as well as anyone. And his veracity is independently attested by one N. N. Kartashov, who stated to geologist A. N. Sobolev that ?it is impossible not to believe Ilya Potapovich?s story? (VINITI, page 13/8).

But was the lake Lyuchetkan spoke of the one we?re looking for? There are two other accounts in the catalogue that strongly suggest it was.

The first, by Lavrentii Vasil?yevich Dzhenkoul, was collected in 1960. Dzhenkoul was only four years old at the time of the 1908 blast, but he recounted the stories passed down to him by his father and uncle (VINITI, page 95/56):

In that place the seven rich

AmberPro 02:23:13 PM Jul 05 2007

[previous comment continued]
...(though I?ve translated a few of the more interesting bits for the ?Vurdalak Conjecture? website ? see http://www.vurdalak.com/tunguska/witness/witnesses.htm).

So, does this document have anything at all to say about Lake Cheko? More particularly, about whether it was there before the impact or not?

Let?s start with what seems to be the earliest recorded account making mention of a lake: the report of Ilya Potapovich Popov (more commonly referred to by his Evenki name Lyuchetkan), taken in 1924 by geologist S. V. Obruchev (VINITI, p. 23/14). There we find Lyuchetkan saying, ?In that place where the stone fell, there is a pit, and from it some creeks [running] into the Chambu. There is a lake nearby, but it existed before the fall of the meteorite.?

Lyuchetkan seems to be about as close to an unimpeachable witness as we?re likely to find in these annals: He lived close to the impact site (his brother, who lived even closer, had his hut blown into the a

AmberPro 02:19:15 PM Jul 05 2007

Of course, the whole Bologna "solution" falls apart if it can be convincingly shown that Lake Cheko antedates the Tunguska Event.

On that score, it is instructive to review the catalogue of Tunguska eyewitness accounts available on the Internet at http://olkhov.narod.ru/tungwitn1.htm. (The catalogue, entitled ?Testimony of the Eyewitnesses to the Tunguska Impact,? was compiled back in 1981 for the archives of the All-Union (now All-Russian) Institute for Scientific and Technical Information (VINITI) by the grand old man of Soviet/Russian Tunguska studies Academician Nikolai Vladimirovich Vasil?ev himself. It gathers into one document both contemporary newspaper reports and the testimony of witnesses to the Event recorded by a variety of researchers from 1921 through the 1970s. The sole drawback is that, to date, the bulk of its materials are available only in Russian (though I?ve translated a few of the more interesting bits for the ?Vurdalak Conjecture? website ? see http://www.vurda