Gulag prisoners arrived on foot, provided only with hand tools, one horse and a single motorized cart.

When work started more reminders were found, including frozen corpses and a candlestick holder made from a skull.

The commission concluded that the political education of the soldiers was poor and that it was inappropriate to house them in former prisoners' barracks.

In just ten days, the entire camp was leveled, including the cemetery, and all signs of the previous workers were destroyed.

The tunnel was cleared by 1974, but was not officially opened until November 1982 when the first train traveled from Novy Urgal to Komsomolsk-on-Amur.