A “70mm J.A. Mauer” camera, equipped with 80mm, F2.8 Xenotar lens, built for the Gemini missions. 28 April 1965. 

Photo: NASA

The 187th Fighter Wing unveiled the new Alabama Air National Guard’s F-35 Lightning II fighter jet during an event at Montgomery, Ala., February 9, 2024. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Enrique Barcelo)

F/A-18F Super Hornets, assigned to the “Black Knights” of Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 154, fly above the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71), March 27, 2024. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist Seaman Apprentice Aaron Haro Gonzalez)

On May 28, 1995, Neftegorsk, a small village in the north of Sakhalin, was wiped off the face of the earth in just 17 seconds. Tremors with a magnitude of 7.6 killed more than 2,000 people, but this event was virtually forgotten behind a series of terrorist attacks and other tragedies of the 90s. And still, few people outside Sakhalin know about it.

We met with survivors of the Neftegorsk earthquake to find out how they survived that tragedy, whether people could have been saved and why many graves in the city cemetery still do not have nameplates.

english subtitles

Two C-17's hard on the deck avoiding SAM radar, below the ridgeline.

Flight operations on the flight deck of aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71), March 2024. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class John A. Miller)

new EDC