Simo Hayha: The White Death and Deadliest Sniper

On March 13, 1940, a soldier woke from a week-long coma, his face shattered, and read his own obituary in the newspaper. This episode explores how Simo Hayha, a quiet five-foot-three Finnish farmer, became the deadliest sniper in human history, known as the White Death during the Winter War.Forged by a life of hunting and skiing in rural Finland, Hayha honed instinctive marksmanship long before formal sniper training in 1938. During the Soviet invasion he exploited the frozen landscape with analog discipline, erasing every trace of his presence while a legend and a propaganda persona grew around him.He could estimate distances up to 150 meters with an error of barely a meter, purely by eyeHe used iron sights instead of a scope to avoid glare, fogging, and raising his profile, and packed snow to muffle his muzzle blastHe is credited with over 500 kills in under 100 days, verified by a strict comrade witness systemHis rediscovered 1940 memoir shows he called his record a sin list rather than a point of prideStruck by an explosive bullet in March 1940, he survived a pile of corpses, lost his family farm to ceded territory, and lived to 96