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Video: How 3 of the best Soviet female pilots nearly died on the border with China: What saved the crew from certain death
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
In September 1938, the Rodina twin-engine aircraft took off from the Shchelkovskaya takeoff station. The crew consisted of famous Soviet pilots Grizodubova, Raskova and Osipenko. At stake was a daring world record among women for a non-stop flight from the capital to the Far East. But for unforeseen reasons, the fuel ran out, and the plane began to lose altitude, and even at the Manchu border.
Women's nonstop record
In the 1930s, world aviation took off, and with it the competition between countries and designers. The clash of systems spawned a race for records. In the Land of the Soviets, aviation and everything associated with it were listed under separate government control. The names of the first pilots were well known. Stalin personally supervised all the events taking place in the airspace. Against the background of the all-encompassing political purges of that period, the first world records were set in several areas of the national economy. High achievements were designed to demonstrate the superiority of the socialist system over capitalist society.
Preparations for world-class records and the selection of candidates for the title of national hero were carried out in the most careful manner. Therefore, it is surprising that the crew of an experienced pilot suffered a series of tenacious failures. Is it possible to assume that there was not enough fuel due to incorrect calculations? And the tragic troubles did not stop even during the search work, when two planes with servicemen crashed.
Unexplained malfunctions
The plane entered into battle with nature from the very first minutes of the flight. Barely taking off, the aircraft fell into heavy clouds. I had to climb sharply, and as we approached Novosibirsk, icing began on the hull. At an elevation of 6,500 meters, a strong roll forced the commander Grizodubova to raise the plane a kilometer higher, and the crew was forced to work in severe frost in oxygen masks. With a long climb, the motors worked in a tense mode, which was the reason for the increased fuel consumption.
Trying to clear frost from the cockpit windows, Raskova opened the side window. A gust of wind blew out all the cards from the cockpit, and then they had to go blindly. The pilots kept the course by instinct, mainly fearing the violation of the state border. The next trouble was the silenced radio station "Rodina", which could not stand the frost. So, on September 25, the crew stopped transmitting their coordinates to the ground. According to the approved flight schedule on Lake Baikal, it was necessary to change the course, going to the Trans-Siberian Railway. But not having a visual view of the terrain due to the continued cloudiness and not hearing radio beacons, the plane more and more risked to be on the other side of the Chinese border - in Manchuria occupied by the Japanese. At that time, only a few days had passed since the conflict at Lake Khasan.
But Grizdubova decides to move only forward. Fortunately, the clouds began to dissipate over the Sea of Okhotsk. This time the worst thing happened - we ran out of fuel. It was necessary to urgently land, the Rodina began to lose altitude. Below you could see the taiga, and you could only sit on your belly in a swampy area. But in those conditions, the plane threatened to fall on the nose, and there was the navigator's cabin. Raskova received the command to immediately jump with a parachute and found herself in the middle of the rugged taiga with two chocolates, a pistol, a knife, a compass and only one fur boots. The second flew off and got lost when opening the parachute. It had been blown far away by the wind, and there was little hope of salvation.
The plane was successfully landed in a swamp. In 26 hours of flight, the Rodina covered 6450 kilometers, which means that the record has been broken. But after landing, bad weather intervened again. It rained without stopping, and an impenetrable fog enveloped the taiga. Raskova wandered in despair through the pristine forest, drowned in a swamp, ate mushrooms and berries and held out with all her might. The places turned out to be so deaf and untouched that there was no question of independent salvation. Marina spent 10 days under the open taiga sky.
Difficult rescue
Dozens of aircraft, numerous foot detachments, local pathfinders on reindeer and horses, fishermen on watercraft were engaged in the search for the female crew and the Motherland itself. Yakov Sorokin, commander of the air force of a separate army on the Far Eastern Front, flew in search of a TB-3 bomber, accompanied by a group of parachutists-rescuers. At the same time, Aleksandr Bryandinsky, the flag navigator of the Army Air Force, was sent to the scene of events without agreement. Neither one nor the other succeeded in establishing the landing site for the Motherland. But circling in search, the planes collided. In front of the desperate female pilots, 15 people died. The women laid out the SOS signal from the cloths of parachute search engines dropped by them. The location of the record aircraft was established by a U-2 squadron from the Komsomolsk Aviation Plant. The plane landed in a swamp near the "Rodina", but its further takeoff was impossible. Now four of the living and the bodies of the dead had to be saved. The evacuation was carried out only on 12 October.
Bitter glory
Raskova, exhausted, was found 20 kilometers from the emergency landing site. The woman had to be carried on a stretcher. To restore the pilots, they were first taken to Komsomolsk, and from there to Khabarovsk. Then they were taken by train through the whole country with passing stops to participate in solemn rallies praising the pilots and the Soviet country. After 2 months, the pilots Grizodubova, Raskova and Osipenko were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. The delay was due to the disapproval of the aviation community. But on the personal order of Joseph Vissarionovich, the record was recorded, the awards were presented. On September 16, 1943, Rodina was written off due to wear and tear. Osipenko and Raskova did not live up to this day, having died in plane crashes in May 1939 and January 1943, respectively.
It also had its own "Lily of Stalingrad". A the exploits of Lydia Litvyak are not surpassed even now.
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