Mathias Rust, a German pilot, flew his Cessna from Helsinki to Moscow as a teenager and landed in central Moscow in 1987. He wasn’t shot down as the plane was mistaken for a Soviet one several times
https://i.redd.it/4feeq3ytn5cg1.jpeg
Posted by Random_Introvert_42
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Mister Rust was sentenced to 4 years of labor (freed after 14 months) while his casual flight through the “impenetrable” Russian air defenses led to the dismissal of several Soviet officers including the Minister of Defence and the Commander of the Soviet Air Defence Forces.
As a side-note, Rust was a very inexperienced pilot and the plane was rented. Finnish air traffic controllers assumed he had crashed when he stopped responding to radio calls after departing from Helsinki and launched a search-effort near Espoo when an oil slick was spotted.
The plane spent some time in Japan before ending up in a Museum at Berlin, Germany.
Teenager casually flying into Moscow like it’s a school field trip Cold War side quest unlocked.
Right in the city centre. Ryanair didn’t get the memo.
He was at times classified as a possible friendly or civilian aircraft, and no one took responsibility for ordering a shoot-down.
Long time ago…. He was not mistaken for a “Soviet one”… As I recall one Soviet radar station was inoperational due to maintenance, and operators of the other radar station went for a lunch break or a smoke.. so Herr Rust had a nice flight.
I remember this. Fucking legend.
Apparently some brave/foolish jokesters later stood by Red Square and, when asked, said they were waiting for the ‘next flight to Helsinki’.
Not so legendary for stabbing a co-worker for rejecting his advances. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-04-20-mn-225-story.html
At the time Moscow had two Airports, Sheremetyevo 1 and Sheremetyevo 2. After this incident Moscow residents started referring to Red Square as Sheremetyevo 3.
And wasn’t that day also some kind of Soviet anti-aircraft defense day?
This was the first post I ever saw on Reddit 6 years ago. Thanks for sharing.
Is nobody commenting on the fact that a teenager had a cessna?
I remember the newspaper headlines from back then. They also depicted the Soviet Air Generals that were fired after this his flight and I wondered how many medals they all had.Â
The real reason he wasn’t shot down was because Soviet air defense commanders were scared of the consequences if they did shoot down another civilian aircraft after the KAL007 shoot down incident after which several high ranking officers and a lot of others had been sacked and some sent to prison.
Lots of bullshit explanation in here.
Reality is he tracked way before he entered Soviet airspace. First after he entered USSR airspace, they send 2 MIG-23MLD aircraft to check intruder from air defense forces, MIGs check him but because of its flying very low and very slow fighter pilots reported him as civilian aircraft with transponder error, meanwhile rust landed on halfway to some agricultural field middle of nowhere and MIGs returned to base. After he take off again, again air defence radar operators saw him near training field for friendly soviet forces and student pilots forget to turn on and adjust transponder many times and then didnt even investigate this time. After all he landed to red square. He was very lucky at the end.
IIRC he wasn’t shot down because no one in the air defense forces took responsibility. The whole ordeal was a massive fuckup of the army, which cost many people there their posts. I may remember it wrong though.
Still better outcome than the air balloon incident in Belarus in ‘95, where the balloon with two people onboard was shot by a border guard helicopter, killing both of them.
Rust was inspired by the now obscure German book series “Perry Rhodan” in the beginning of which the titular protagonist prevents a nuclear war and unites the world.
In a way Perry Rhodan did that to the real world too, since the Rust incident allowed Gorbachew to relieve many high ranking military officers from their posts. Had he not done that it would have been likely there would have been a military coup before he could enact his famous glasnost and perestroika policies that would eventually lead to the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the end of the cold war.