200,000 Dead in 3 Weeks: What Killed the Saiga of Kazakhstan

2026-11-05 · True Mysteries Editorial Desk · Nature Defying Explanation · 7 min read

In May 2015, a team of scientists was camped on the open steppe of central Kazakhstan, the huge country in Central Asia south of Russia. They were there to watch one of the strangest-looking animals on Earth give birth.

The animal is the saiga antelope. It is about the size of a goat, sandy brown, with a large, soft nose that hangs over its mouth like a short trunk. The nose filters dust in the summer and warms the freezing air in the winter. Saiga have lived on the grasslands of Central Asia since the Ice Age, when they grazed alongside mammoths.

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