Just one of the many shots from Lana Sator’s exploration of a Russian Rocket factory. /via
bits
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2012-01-15
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2011-06-09
It’s believed that sinking into cold water for three times helps wash away your sins and become closer to God. In Russia it’s a very popular ritual and sometimes even people who don’t really believe in God take part in it. It doesn’t matter what the temperature is outside. People sink even if it’s -30C outside or colder. Those who have tried it say they feel lighter and better and their problems disappear.
Photo by Alexander Aksakov by way of Verve Photo.
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2011-03-25
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2009-07-16
This Photo is by Jonas Bendiksen from his book Satellites: Photographs from the Fringes of the Former Soviet Union. The Fortean Times gives some background behind the shot:
The most strikingly otherworldly piece in Satellites captures two men stood atop a used rocket carcass in a field in the Altai Mountains smothered in butterflies. They live in the flight path of Baikonur Cosmodrome, in the Kazakh steppes, built by the USSR in the 1950s and now the largest operational launch facility in the world, popular among Western corporations as a cheap alternative to launching from the US. As the spent rocket stages fall flaming out of the sky, scrap metal dealers roar across the grasslands like Mad Max extras, racing to strip them of their titanium and high-grade aluminium. For many of the region’s former collective farmers, this space junk seems an answer to desperate prayers, yet it’s not all valuable metals; highly toxic rocket fuel seeps into the soil and water, and villagers complain of diseases and cancers; Bendikson finds dead cows in a lush, verdant field.
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2009-04-08
The Dyatlov Pass Incident:
The story sounds like something out of a low-budget horror movie: nine young students go on a skiing holiday in Russia’s Ural Mountains but never return. Eventually, their bodies are discovered – five of them frozen to death near their tent, four more bearing mysterious injuries – a smashed head, a missing tongue – buried in the snow some distance away. All, it seems, had fled in sudden terror from their camp in the middle of the night. Casting aside skis, food and warm coats, they dashed headlong down a snowy slope toward a thick forest, where they stood no chance of surviving bitter temperatures of around –30º C (–22º F). At the time, seemingly baffled investigators offered the non-explanation that the group had died as a result of “a compelling unknown force” – and then simply closed the case and filed it as ‘Top Secret’.
The compelling unknown force has been theorized to be anything from a yeti, UFOs, angry tribesman, an avalanche, and military experiments gone awry. Forty years later the case is still unsolved and investigated by many. A very interesting read from Fortean Times.
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2008-12-02
russian art museum guards
When I read the title for this series of photos by Andy Freeberg I figured the guards would look something like this. I was suprised to see little old ladies, but I still think they would be able to kick my ass if I tried any shenanigans with the art. From Coudal.
