A year after the test of the first Soviet atomic bomb Beria spoke at the secret meeting with unexpected proposal: to organize an expedition to the area of the fall in 1908 Tunguska meteorite! Of course, the meteorite Lavrenty Pavlovich not interested. However, he managed to get quite detailed information about the event of the year in the area of Podkamennaya Tunguska.

The main argument of the need of the expedition was the following: some experts believe that over the taiga happened atomic explosion. Surname writer Alexander Kazantsev Beria did not mention, but it Kazantsev, who led one of the defense enterprises, in 1946, came up with the idea that over the taiga there was an explosion of a Martian spaceship with nuclear engine.

"We are not going to search for the meteorite! said Beria audience. - But there is a scientifically established fact in 1908 over the Siberian taiga was an explosion of enormous power. Your task is to estimate the parameters of this explosion, and other physics. Scientists draw will not - this is not their problem, but we need competent ballistics and experts dealing with nuclear tests. I repeat that we are interested in pure and applied questions of this phenomenon.

Before sending expeditions Beria demanded to collect all information about geophysical effects that accompanied the explosion over the Siberian taiga. We have thoroughly analyzed recording devices June 30, 1908 at the Russian and German meteorological stations. It is confirmed that the air wave from the explosion several times around the globe! At the same time seismic vibrations were confident recorded only Siberian seismic stations. It is obvious conclusion: the energy of the explosion amounted to several tens of megatons took place, but he is at a height of 20 kilometers.

Especially interesting were the data of Irkutsk geophysical Observatory, fixing an intense magnetic field perturbation of the Earth in a few minutes after the incident over Tunguska. It turns out that such effects are caused by sharp increase of ionization in the epicenter and accompany powerful nuclear explosions in the atmosphere. This is confirmed by the results of experiments in the Irkutsk laboratory on distant reception of radio waves for some time after the mysterious events managed to take a number of signals from Europe (on the detector receiver!), that had never been observed.

Before military expedition went in a taiga, reconnaissance aircraft with photographic equipment twice flew over the alleged place of the meteorite fall at different heights, having filmed the configuration fall forest. In addition, each participant of the expedition familiarized with the reports Kulik, who visited the area in the late 20-ies, and made photos.

In the summer of 1949 States "Beria" expedition under the guise of geologists were flown in the village of Vanavara, and then several flights of double seaplane thrown on Cheko lake. From there to the mountain Farrington, where Zaimka kulika, straight was less than ten kilometers. A part of equipment and products were dropped from a plane in the area of the squatting. "Geologists" categorically forbidden to ask local people about the events in 1908, but not everyone is allowed to listen, if the initiative of the story came from a local.

Scientific results of expedition and conclusions was never published in the open press. They differed from the results obtained subsequent expeditions under the auspices of the Academy of Sciences and the Committee on meteorites. Military experts have established that the fall forest in the taiga caused by the shock wave of the explosion, the internal energy of the Tunguska object, not the ballistic wave Bystrytsia body, which was moving at a height of 10-20 kilometers at a speed not exceeding 1 - 2 km per second. The trees bore visible marks of weak radiation burn. So, really explosion occurred at high altitude, either over the forest at that moment there was a thunderstorm. According to the most modest calculations, the power of the explosion exceeded one megaton, that does not exclude its nuclear nature.

However, the radioactivity in the area of the Tunguska event seats only slightly exceeded the background, and after the atomic explosion should occur radioactive contamination of the area. Well, if the explosion was "pure", we could go on thermonuclear its nature.

Having returned to Moscow, every team leader, responsible for some direction (ballistics, radioactivity, light exposure), prepared by the order of Beria report on the results and conclusions in a single copy. Sergei Petrovich Potapov recalls that for this purpose he was locked in his office alone with a typewriter and a small stack of numbered and stamped sheets of paper. The incident was that typing Potapov not know how. So I had him all day beating on the keyboard with one finger, afraid to make mistakes. Of course, the report turned out to be brief. No discussion, no collective discussion of the results of the expedition was not followed. All reports disappeared in offices Beria's officials.