"U2 Gary Powers" jacket

At the beginning of 1960, the Russian ground-air defense is on alert, for months it has been trying to intercept a mysterious plane flying over its territory at very high altitude.

On May 1, a new target was spotted above an isolated region of the Urals. It was impossible for the Russian air force to intercept this intruder flying at more than 70.000ft.

On the orders of the high command, a salvo of 14 SA-2 "GUIDELINE" surface-to-air missiles is fired. The SA-2 is a real monster of 10m height and more than 2 tons able to reach 100.000ft at mach 3.

In his U2 the pilot is concentrated on his objective, a nuclear enrichment center, but also on his piloting. Indeed, to fly a plane at the limit of space is a miracle, the domain of flight at high altitude of the U-2 is very narrow, the difference between the maximum speed and the stall speed being only 10 knots, that is to say less than 19 km/h. 

He then has no idea of the drama which is playing 28.000 meters lower, a true deluge of fire is going up towards him.

In spite of the performances of the SA-2 none manages to reach directly the spy plane, only the shock wave produced by the explosion of the 2nd missile causes the tearing off of a wing.

It is 07h47 the History began...