Born into a peasant family. Soon the family of S.I. Safronov moved to the Saratov region. After graduating from a seven-year school and a secondary school, he worked at the Gorky Machine Tool Plant as a planer, and at the same time studied at the local flying club. In 1937, being an accountant, he performed one of his first flights with V.P. Chkalov. In 1938 he was drafted into the Red Army and sent to the Engels Military Aviation School. After graduating from college in February 1939, he served in the Far East.
Since October 1942 - at the front. His first air battle took place near Stalingrad. Defending Stalingrad, he shot down seven enemy planes. He took part in the liberation of Kuban, the Novgorod region, Pskov, Latvia, in the Battle of Kursk, and fought on the North Caucasus Front as part of the 4th Air Army. He met victory in East Prussia.
The title of Hero of the Soviet Union with the award of the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal was awarded by Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on August 24, 1943 for 65 combat missions, during which S. I. Safronov personally shot down 11 enemy aircraft and 2 in group battles. By May 1945, he had 160 combat missions, 24 personally shot down enemy aircraft and 4 in group battles. S.I. Safronov was wounded twice and shell-shocked twice. For the courage and heroism shown in the fight against the German invaders, he was awarded orders and medals (see “Awards”).
The squadron commander, Major S.I. Safronov, retired for health reasons in 1945. From 1947 to 1975 he worked at the Saratov Aero Club and was a mentor to the first cosmonaut Yu. A. Gagarin. In 1975, Sergei Ivanovich moved permanently to the city of Gorky. Safronov died on September 29, 1983, and was buried in Nizhny Novgorod on the Alley of Heroes of the Red Etna cemetery.
Awards
- medal "Gold Star" (No. 1140; 1943)
- Order of Lenin (1943)
- two Orders of the Red Banner (1943, 1945),
- two Orders of the Patriotic War, 1st degree (1944),
- Order of Alexander Nevsky (1943),
- medals “For the Defense of Stalingrad” (1942), “For the Victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945.” (1945), “For military merits”, “For the defense of the Caucasus” (1944).
Memory
One of the streets of the Leninsky district of Nizhny Novgorod is named after the Hero of the Soviet Union Sergei Ivanovich Safronov.
The “little-known” pilot Boris Safonov is the first twice hero!
Moscow, April 3 - Our Power. The short but glorious history of this heroic man certainly deserves special attention. The most talented naval aviation fighter pilot Boris Safonov died in the first year of the war, but his merits are so great that they would have matched many famous aces who fought over Berlin.
Boris Feoktistovich Safonov was born in the Tula province in August 1915, into a peasant family. The origins of this brilliant pilot left an imprint on his character. One of the British pilots, who happened to see Safonov in action, later noted: “Safonov was a typical Russian, stocky, respectable, methodical and leisurely.”
Safonov's talent made him atypical. Seven classes, a factory school - everything is like people’s. But since 1931, a flying club was added. Also not God knows what an achievement, in the interwar period the country was raving about the sky, the boys wanted to become pilots just like their peers from the 1960s later wanted to become astronauts. The only thing worth noting: Safonov’s instructor at the flying club was not just anyone, but Valentina Grizodubova, the future idol of those same youth of the late 1930s.
In 1933, Safonov was drafted into the army, sent to a flight school in the Crimean Kach, from where he ended up in Belarus, where he served until 1940. This year, according to a personal report, Safonov was transferred to the Kola Peninsula, as a squadron commander in the 72nd mixed air regiment of the Northern Fleet. There he met the war - at the age of 25.
He flew an I-16, the first time he took off to intercept immediately on June 22, 1941, he was attacked by a German He 111 bomber. It was not possible to shoot down the plane - only damaging it and forcing it to leave. Safonov will win his first victory on June 24. And by August 28, he already had 130 sorties, 32 air battles and 11 officially shot down. Why the “official” amendment is so important in the case of Safonov will be explained below.
On September 16, commander Boris Safonov received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. At that time, his squadron had already blown 50 enemy aircraft out of the sky, 16 of them by the commander personally. In the same September, allies appeared in the Northern Fleet - the British on their Hurricane fighters. Safonov became the first pilot to master this machine. His conclusions about the necessary changes in the composition of the on-board weapons were taken into account when organizing the supply of Hurricanes under Lend-Lease.
In October 1941, Major Safonov became commander of the 78th Fighter Aviation Regiment flying those same Hurricanes. By the end of January 1942, two Orders of the Red Banner were added to his chest.
In March 1942, Lieutenant Colonel Safonov returned to the 72nd Regiment, which had already become the 2nd Guards, and switched to another Lend-Lease vehicle - the American P-40E Kittyhawk. At the same time, he received the Distinguished Flying Cross, the highest award for British aviators. During the entire war, only four Soviet pilots were awarded this order. “Safonov is the most popular fighter pilot among the British pilots in the Northern Fleet. His courage, bravery, and heroism set an example for the entire flight personnel of the Northern Fleet Air Force, as well as the British. If the issue of nomination for English awards is resolved, Safonov is the most suitable and popular candidate,” said the text of the nomination for this award.
Safonov was a competent fighter aircraft tactician, careful and thoughtful. The Red Army Air Force met the war with a statutory formation of flights of three aircraft, and in battle this scheme was inconvenient to control and use. There is evidence that Safonov, even before the war, argued that it was time to switch to a more flexible and integral scheme with the formation of “master-slave” pairs. This is exactly how Luftwaffe fighters fought, and Soviet aviation was retrained for this scheme already during the war.
Boris Safonov’s principle was to chalk up no more than one downed aircraft in one battle. The ace's formal score - 22 enemy vehicles shot down - did not even closely reflect his combat effectiveness.
Colleagues recalled that it was normal for Safonov to independently shoot down 2-3 vehicles in a group battle, keep one for himself, and assign the rest to his subordinates at his own will.
According to some estimates, his real account for less than a year of war could reach up to 40 aircraft.
It’s hard to guess how Boris Safonov’s military career would have turned out. On May 30, 1942, four Kittyhawks of the 2nd Guards flew out to cover the escort of the allied convoy PQ-16. Safonov's wingman returned from the road due to a malfunction, and the lieutenant colonel took three vehicles into battle.
The circumstances of Safonov’s last fight are scant. Three North Sea Kittyhawks attacked six Ju 88 bombers rushing towards the convoy order. In the dump, Safonov hit two cars and disappeared. Radio communications retained only Safonov’s brief reports: “he shot down one,” “he shot down the second,” and then “an engine.” Sailors from the caravan saw one of the Soviet Kittyhawks enter a steep dive and crash into the water.
One of the versions of Safonov’s death is engine failure, which at that time was the real scourge of these fighters.
On June 14, 1942, Boris Safonov was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union for the second time. It is noteworthy that the submission was signed just three days before his death, on May 27. Safonov became the first in the USSR to receive a gold star twice during the war.
Who knows, Safonov would not have become the number one Soviet ace in the Great Patriotic War if his military fate had not ended so early. He was respected immensely in naval aviation after the war.
For example, the 2nd Guards Regiment, which he commanded, in 1948 became the 174th Guards Pechenga Fighter Aviation Regiment named after B.F. Safonov. One of the MiG-31 interceptors, which until recently was in service with this regiment, bore its own name “Boris Safonov”. Since 2006, the aircraft has been in the Northern Fleet Air Force Museum in the village of Safonovo on the Kola Peninsula.
On May 8, 1960, the Pravda newspaper published a Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on awarding medals and orders to 21 people for the successful completion of the Soviet government’s combat mission to protect the integrity of the Soviet Union and the destruction of an aircraft that entered the territory of the USSR on May 1 with enemy targets. The first on the list to receive the “Order of the Red Banner” was Senior Lieutenant Sergei Ivanovich Safronov, a native of the city of Gus-Khrustalny, Vladimir Region.
Photo from the site permnecropol.ucoz.ru
We are talking about the famous operation on May 1, 1960 to eliminate the U-2 aircraft flown by American intelligence officer Francis Gary Powers. Of the military personnel listed in the Decree, only one Safronov was awarded posthumously. But this detail was not indicated in the document. And for almost 30 years the state preferred to remain silent about the death of the Soviet pilot.
Photo from the group "Gus-Khrustalny" In contact with
Sergei Safronov was born in March 1930 in the Vladimir region in the city of Gus-Khrustalny, lived on Tkatskaya Street, and in 1948 graduated from school No. 1 (later No. 12) - the former Maltsovsky gymnasium. He did not become a glassblower - he chose a military career, entered the Borisoglebsk Aviation School, completed retraining in Central Asia, and from the mid-1950s served in the 764th Air Defense Fighter Regiment of the 87th Fighter Division in Perm, flying MiG-19 fighters. He was married to Anna Panfilova, also a native of Gus-Khrustalny, with whom he studied at the same school.
SOVIETDETSVO
In the early morning of May 1, 1960, a U-2 piloted by Powers took off from the Peshawar air force base on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border and crossed the state border into the USSR near Kirovabad in Tajikistan. At about 5 am, Sergei Safronova and other pilots of the regiment were alerted and received orders to fly to the airport in Sverdlovsk.
“I got on the plane, Sergei came running a little later. We were given the task in the air after takeoff. The tragedy of the situation was that the engine of his plane did not start immediately (five attempts were allowed). I sit in the cockpit and count down: one - no, two, three, four. Already other pilots are beginning to approach and take place in the cockpits of their aircraft. I think to myself: “Now it won’t start, I’ll give the command to it to get out of the cab.” For the fifth time, the plane's engine started. He took off and received the command in the air: “Landing on the Donets (this is the call sign of the Koltsovo airfield in the city of Sverdlovsk),” recalled Safronova’s fellow soldier N.V. Gorlov.
Powers at that time was flying over Uzbekistan, the Aral Sea, and heading for Chelyabinsk and Sverdlovsk. The Su-9 was the first to intercept the American from the Sverdlovsk airfield. After the command was given to the jet interceptor to land, the MiGs took to the skies. The leader in the pair was the deputy squadron commander, Captain Boris Ayvazyan, and the wingman was Sergei Safronov.
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After some time, the Americans began to be attacked h anti-aircraft missile forces located around Sverdlovsk. An S-75 air defense missile was fired at the U-2, which hit the rear of the aircraft.
Powers recalled: “Suddenly I heard a dull explosion and saw an orange glow. The plane suddenly tilted forward with its nose, and it seemed that its wings and tail had broken off - Lord, I was hit.” The American threw back the canopy and fell out of the cockpit, the parachute opened and the pilot landed safely near the village of Kosulino, Sverdlovsk Region.
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Soviet air defenses fired several more missiles from the ground. One of them accidentally hit Sergei Safronov’s MiG, which was pursuing an American reconnaissance plane. The leader of the pair, Boris Ayvazyan, dived sharply down and saved his life. Boris Ayvazyan recalls:
“We were brought close to the area where the spy plane fell, and we entered the range of Shugaev’s air defense division. From that time on, we began to be perceived as a target, because the anti-aircraft gunners believed that all our planes were at the airfields at the “Carpet” command. In addition, the “friend or foe” transponder did not work, since the codes were not changed. We were given the command: “Immediate landing, refueling and takeoff.” I gave the command to Sergei: “Pull back, we’ll land in a straight line.” Again the command: “Descend.” I answered that we were descending. The second command was so feverish that I already reacted on an intuitive level: I turned vertically down to 2 degrees. ilometers and with a large overload brought the plane out of the dive only at about three hundred meters. This is what saved me. In general, we should have heard another command: “Wall.” Ethat means- you are entering the kill zone of a missile system. Then you act more energetically. I cannot say whether Safronov saw the missile fired at him, but I heard when he responded to the request: “Descend” - “I am descending.”
The wreckage of Safronov's plane fell near the city of Degtyarsk, 40 kilometers from Sverdlovk. Nikolai Himalaev, a local police officer who was at the crash site, recalled:
“The pilot was sitting in a seat with an unopened parachute and was already dead 30-50 meters from the plane. The pilot was wearing a flight suit and there were no visible injuries. Soon a helicopter arrived. A major general, two colonels and seven soldiers emerged from it. The general approached the pilot, unbuttoned his overalls, took out documents, a photo, and a party card. He told the pilot: “Well done.” You have fulfilled your duty." The soldiers then transferred the pilot’s body onto a stretcher and loaded it into the helicopter.”
Photo from the site permnecropol.ucoz.ru
It was determined that the cause of the pilot’s death was the uncoordinated work of the main air defense command post. The heads of the military branches and services did not report decisions made to the main command post, which in turn did not inform the commanders of units and formations about the situation. The divisions that fired the missiles did not know that the fighters were in the air.
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Sergei Safronov was buried at the Yegoshikha cemetery in the city of Perm. The pilot's parents, who came from Gus-Khrustalny, attended the funeral. Powers, as you know, was sentenced by the Supreme Court of the USSR to 10 years in prison and, until the famous exchange on the Berlin Bridge in 1962, served time in the Vladimir Central.
The first publications about Safronov’s death appeared in Pravda, Red Banner and Trud only 30 years after the tragedy - in May 1990. The newspaper “Prizyv” of the Vladimir region published an article “On the morning of May 1960” by Viktor Nikonov. The pilot was posthumously awarded the title “Honorary Citizen of the City of Degtyarsk”, in this locality there is a street named after him, memorials were erected at the site of the plane crash and in the city park.
Today, July 28, 2006, I visited the grave of Sergei Ivanovich Safronov. They briefly told me the story of his death. The MiG-19 aircraft, piloted by Senior Lieutenant Safronov, was mistakenly shot down by our air defense systems on May 1, 1960 in the Sverdlovsk region while performing a combat mission (intercepting an aircraft violating USSR airspace). The pilot died at the age of 30.
Gift for Nikita Sergeevich
On the territory of the Yegoshikha necropolis, the oldest cemetery in Perm, those who did not fight on the fronts of the Great Patriotic War, but successfully preserved the fighting traditions of the older generation, are also buried. Sometimes - at the cost of your life. On the alley near the All Saints Church there is a monument from the time of another war, called the Cold War, when the confrontation between two world systems almost led to a planetary catastrophe.
The exciting documentary television series “Russian Secrets” showed a film about how an American U-2 plane was shot down in the skies over Sverdlovsk. This event took place on May 1, 1960. A better gift, as they say, could not have been imagined for the then leader of the country, Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev.
The Soviet people could, of course, have every right to be proud of the success of our rocket scientists. Only later did it become clear at what cost everything was given. And we learned that the Soviet pilot Safronov was shot down together with an American, and that the incident with the spy plane led to a sharp cooling in the international situation.
In fact, both pilots became hostages of big politics and fell into a “time trap,” as Harry Powers himself later wrote. Nikita Sergeevich “squeezed” everything he could out of the incident and even more. Powers was tried and given 10 years. His parents and wife were present at the trial. His father later said that Harry did not ask for anything, but they brought him warm clothes, and he was expected to serve his sentence in the Urals or in Siberia, in one of those camps, pictures of which were taken by U-2 equipment. But Powers was quickly exchanged for Colonel Abel. And a few years later, the former violator of the USSR air borders will die under strange circumstances, crashing in a helicopter.
Two wonderful pilots, men in the prime of life and strength - and both turned out to be “cogs”, victims in a frontal attack by two superpowers. Yes, sad as it may be, both senior lieutenants, the American and the Russian, can be called losers. It was just that the Cold War was going on and the directions of the battles crossed at different points.
Our people scolded Powers, but, by and large, there was no hatred towards him. So, they were curious... In his homeland, in the USA, he was no longer liked and even despised for the fact that he repented at the trial, for the fact that even earlier, when he was shot down, he did not resort to “self-destruction”. For being a loser. But, despite this, the American government did everything to get its citizen out.
And the people pitied and continue to regret Sergei Safronov, feeling for the Russian pilot that acute feeling characteristic of Russian people, which can be called compassionate love. He carried out his combat mission and died in the process. It’s ridiculous... but anything can happen with us even in peaceful life.
How it really happened
The drama that took place on May 1, 1960 in the skies over Sverdlovsk and in the underground air defense bunkers still disturbs the souls of its participants. It’s as if everything happened yesterday... One of the popular ORT programs “How it Was,” aired in the summer of 1998, was dedicated to this event. Its merit lies in the fact that the authors focused not only on the success of the rocket scientists, but also on the fact that there was another side to the medal. Nevertheless, there were omissions and inaccuracies in the presentation of the material. Before watching the program, we agreed with the Honored Pilot of the USSR, retired Colonel Anatoly Zheleznov, that we would meet with him after, and he would comment on everything he heard from the screen. You definitely need to listen to this man - after all, he served with Safronov, was a flight commander. According to the flight schedule, Zheleznov went on duty the day after the tragedy. And it was he, Captain Zheleznov, who went for the body of his colleague, sorted out the circumstances of his death without delay and took his body to his homeland, to Perm.
Let's go back to May 1960. What did Senior Lieutenant Safronov experience on that fateful flight?
"... It seemed to me that the explosion occurred somewhere behind, and I saw an orange flash... I could not use the ejection device due to the forces that arose in the falling plane, and I remember when I was flying headlong down and realized that I could not use catapult at such a height. Then I opened the canopy and released the seat belts. I was half pressed against the instrument panel by centrifugal force and half thrown out of the plane. I forgot to disconnect the hoses of the oxygen device and had to fight to leave the plane. The parachute opened automatically immediately after after I left the plane..."
No, this, as you might guess, is not our pilot’s story. This is Powers, who was “a little more fortunate” in that situation. He was shot down at an altitude of 20,000 meters, and the parachute opened at an altitude of 14,000 feet (about 5,000 meters) ...
 Boris Ayvazyan |
And here’s what Boris Ayvazyan, the same pilot who miraculously escaped death, said in a television program: deputy squadron commander, he was the leader of the duty pair of MiGs scrambled to intercept the intruder aircraft.
"... We existed (!) in the sky for about 40 minutes (that is, after the American was already hit). All means were used to shoot us down. And Sergei’s plane was shot down almost in the airfield area. He, Sergei, began to pull back, and at that moment I received the command: “Descend!” But we were already descending. Then the same command was given a second time. At that moment I turned vertically down and began to dive. I dived to two thousand meters, then "he began to take out the plane with a large overload. At about an altitude of 500 m he took out the plane, and at that moment contact with Sergei was lost. He was also given a command to descend - but there was no longer any connection."
Their last joint flight was tracked by ground air defense services first in the direction of Perm, then a turn, flight back... As direct witnesses to the event show, on the way back, Soviet planes entered the zone of Shugaev’s missile division. And then, unfortunately, the equipment in the division fails, asking the plane: “Whose are you?” A chain of fatal inconsistencies stretched out to overwhelm the throat of one of them.
The division commander (he will later write a book about what happened, where he will present everything “from his own perspective”) is confused - he knows that there should be one enemy target in the air, but here there are two. Shugaev asks the command post: “Please clarify the air situation!” And he receives an explanation: “There are no people in the air.” Wrong!
Just at this moment, Ayvazyan sharply dives and leaves the Shugaev locator sector. There is only one plane left on the screen and without the “I’m mine” signal. Carrying out the command, the rocket men fire surface-to-air missiles at Safronov’s plane. As Ayvazyan clarified, Sergei was also descending, but at the usual, customary pace of 30 meters per second.
 MiG-19 |
Colonel Anatoly Zheleznov recalls that difficult day:
Interestingly, there was no feast on the eve of May Day. Then we even racked our brains - how did this happen, why... And at six in the morning there was an alarm - everyone rushed to the airfield.
We sat on our planes, ready for an hour or two. Then lights out and we got out. The regiment commander says to me: “Are you Safronov’s flight commander? Now a plane will come, fly for Safronov, he was killed.”
We were all dumbfounded. Having come to their senses, they began to collect money for the trip. And so I took the LI-2 plane to Sverdlovsk. The atmosphere at headquarters is tense, our chief’s hands are shaking. I was young, arrogant, and immediately began to find out how this could all happen. In response to me: “Just wait with your questions!”
Later it turned out that an attempt was still made to shoot down an American spy by ramming our plane. They lifted into the air a pilot who was ferrying an SU-9 from Novosibirsk from the factory to the airfield. From the ceiling he could easily have reached the Lockheed U-2, but there were no guns or weapons on board. And he was raised for ramming. But the idea turned out to be pointless: at a speed of 2,000 km/h, how can you ram it with such overloads? By the way, they also fired a missile at him.
The air defense system, I must say, was just being created at that time, and our relations between fighters and missilemen were non-contact, to put it mildly. They had no idea what we were doing, we had no idea about them. Interception must be carried out at distant borders - this is our task, and anti-aircraft missile launchers came into action near cities. All! The whole point is that interaction with the units was not established. Shugaev’s division didn’t even know that Powers’ plane had already been shot down by missilemen from a neighboring division. (The country’s new air defense system was really in a fever at that time. Reorganizations followed one after another. This is a fact: of the eleven post-war commanders of the Soviet air defense, seven were removed from their positions, the last in 1987 in connection with the arrival of Rust, and in 1991)
About the fact that Sergei ejected (as reported in the TV show “How It Was”) or they also wrote that he tried to divert the plane from the road along which the festive demonstration was moving - all this is nonsense! There was a direct hit, he was killed immediately and he landed already dead, his body was thrown out of the plane. He lay there flat as he was crushed. I remember in the morgue - I took his hand - like it was made of dough, without bones, as if... he was lying intact in a high-rise suit. There is blood on his face because he fell from a great height, and the catapult was activated when he hit the ground.
I then wandered around to different offices... To bury, the money we collected was also useful, the men were drunk everywhere, you can’t just bury them. They made a zinc coffin only at Uralmash - imagine where I had to go. It’s interesting that people in Sverdlovsk already knew that something had happened. On May 3 we buried him, our Sergei, in Perm...
Most importantly, there was an order from Moscow - to shoot down everyone! Before this there was the command “Carpet”, meaning that all planes must be removed and landed. Powers had been walking over the Soviet Union for what seemed like three hours. I would pass Perm - and that’s it, I can’t get it anymore.
Anatoly Georgievich, has your attitude towards Powers changed over time?
I do not consider Powers to be the culprit in Safronov’s death. Our rocket scientists are to blame, first of all. And of course politicians...
In May 1960, a decree was promulgated on rewarding military personnel who stopped the flight of a spy plane (by the way, this was the first decree signed by Leonid Brezhnev, who then became the chairman of the presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR). 21 people received orders and medals. Order of the Red Banner - Senior Lieutenant Sergei Safronov (the word “posthumously” was omitted) and the commanders of anti-aircraft missile divisions Nikolai Sheludko and Major Mikhail Voronov.
And yet, still, still...
There is only a moment between the past and the future, that’s for sure... The course of our history cannot be understood if we brush away the fate of one pilot like a fly. We need just one MiG to be a creative force in history.
One question remains open: was the accidentally surviving pilot of one of the planes leading the pair to blame for that situation? The question is really sensitive.
The widow of one of Sergei Safronov’s colleagues, Raisa Glazkova, claims that the attempt to blame Boris Ayvazyan for the death of his wingman has no basis.
He remembers Sergei Raisa with a warm feeling - handsome, slender, cheerful. Young flying families lived first in an air camp, then in an air garrison. Somehow they did not pay attention to everyday troubles. Seryozha and Anya Safronov, in order to get to their room, had to go through the Skvortsovs’ room. We lived together and had fun. But their happiness was short-lived.
After the death of Sergei, Ayvazyan had a major conversation with the general, continues Raisa Glazkova. - Yes, and after that there were unpleasant rumors and speculations. Boris worries all his life. But we are all against posing the question in such a way as to suspect him of anything. Maybe the leading pilot’s instinct of self-preservation worked faster... Ayvazyan was an experienced pilot, an ace, and he had much more training flights over objects than Safronov. But Boris Ayvazyan himself, apparently, has not gotten rid of the feeling of guilt and will never get rid of it. Involuntary guilt, which is familiar to front-line soldiers who have lost their fighting friends.
Life is life
Life decreed that 8 years after that flight, Boris Ayvazyan married the widow of a deceased comrade. They have been living for many years, children, grandchildren. Life is unpredictable…
Yes, the flight drama had a romantic ending. On a personal level. The fate of its main participants appeared like an aerobatics maneuver in a clear sky.
At first it seemed that their paths diverged forever. Anna graduated from the pedagogical institute, worked in a kindergarten, where she placed her son Sasha, and then taught at the institute. Boris went to Moscow and entered the Gagarin Air Academy. Without finishing it, he began working at the Tupolev Design Bureau and completed graduate school. I came to Perm several times, met with friends, with Anya. He proposed to her and persuaded her several times to move to Moscow.
A friend of her bitter and happy youth, Raisa Andreevna Glazkova, recalls: “For two years, Anya thought about Boris’s proposal. Her parents persuaded her, and Boris is a good person. And Anya graduated from another institute in Moscow, became a speech therapist. They had a daughter. Sergei’s son, Alexander Safronov graduated from the Civil Aviation School.
We don’t talk about happiness, I don’t know...I judge by myself, the main thing is to escape from bitter thoughts. My second husband was also a pilot, we lived with him for 10 years. At first, too, she refused marriage... They, our husbands, never informed us that someone died or crashed. We found out about this later. They said: Well, this won’t happen to me! And they mastered new jet aircraft, flew, and fulfilled their duty."
...Every year, friends and relatives of Sergei Safronov meet at his grave, in the old cemetery in Razgulyai. Collection day is May 9. For both military pilots and their families, this is, of course, not an accidental day. Sverdlovsk residents and Muscovites come from all over, in general. This tradition has not been broken in recent years, although fewer people already gather there. Young pensioners, military pilots, die most often from heart attacks. Colonel Zheleznov also recently passed away.
But many people who did not know him also come to honor the memory of Sergei Safronov.
In the famous Motovilikha, in the Perm Museum of Weapons, a new exhibit recently appeared - an anti-aircraft launcher. The planes of Powers and Safronov were shot down from this one in May 1960.
In the Museum of the Armed Forces in Moscow (Sovetskaya Armii St., 2, Novoslobodskaya metro station or Tsvetnoy Boulevard) you can see the wreckage of the Lockheed U-2 aircraft and briefly get acquainted with the history of that disaster.
The article was typed and sent by Anastasia Isaeva with the personal permission of the author
25.08.1918 - 29.09.1983
Hero of the Soviet Union
WITH Afronov Sergei Ivanovich - squadron commander of the 293rd Fighter Aviation Regiment of the 287th Fighter Aviation Division of the 4th Air Army of the North Caucasus Front, captain.
Born on August 25, 1918 in the village of Pelekshevo, Pianoperevozsky district, Nizhny Novgorod region. Russian. Graduated from high school. After graduating from a one-year vocational school at a machine-tool plant in the city of Gorky, he worked there as a planer and at the same time studied at the flying club.
In 1938 he entered the Engels Military Pilot School, from which he graduated in February 1939. He served in aviation units in the Far East.
From August 1942 until the victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War, he fought as part of the 8th, 4th and 15th Air Armies on the Stalingrad, Southern, North Caucasus, Bryansk and 2nd Baltic fronts, holding the position of flight commander, squadron and navigator of a fighter aviation regiment. He took part in the Battle of Stalingrad, battles in the Caucasus, the Battle of Kursk, the liberation of the Novgorod, Pskov regions and Latvia. Wounded twice.
Z ceremony of the Hero of the Soviet Union with the presentation of the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal (No. 1140) to the captain Safronov Sergei Ivanovich awarded on August 24, 1943 for 65 combat missions, during which he personally shot down 11 and 2 enemy aircraft in a group, and demonstrated valor and courage.
IN 1945 S.I. Safronov was dismissed from the Soviet Army for health reasons. Retired major. Disabled person of the 2nd group. Lived in the city of Saratov. He worked at the Saratov flying club, where he had to be a mentor to the first cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin. Later he moved to his homeland in the city of Gorky (now Nizhny Novgorod). Died September 29, 1983. He was buried in Nizhny Novgorod on the Alley of Heroes of the Red Etna cemetery.
Awarded the Order of Lenin (08/24/43), 2 Orders of the Red Banner (01/26/43; 01/05/45), the Order of Alexander Nevsky (No. 119 from 05/28/43), the Patriotic War 1st degree (09/08/44), medals "For defense of Stalingrad", "For the defense of the Caucasus" and three other medals.
During the Great Patriotic War, Safronov entered into mortal battles with the enemy dozens of times and always emerged victorious. Eight red star Yak-1 fighters, led by Safronov, flew out on April 28, 1943 to cover the ground forces. Over the village of Krymskaya, the pilots met 20 German Me-109 fighters and boldly entered into battle with a superior enemy. With swift attacks, Soviet pilots shot down five Messers, putting the rest to flight. Personally, Safronov, in his car with tail number 13, destroyed one vulture in this battle. Observing the progress of the air battle, the commander of the Red Army Air Force, Air Marshal A.A. Novikov expressed gratitude to all the pilots of Safronov’s group.
The air battle over the village of Neberdzhaevskaya, which took place on May 6, 1943, will forever remain in the memory of Sergei Ivanovich. Safronov's eight then met with 16 enemy fighters. Among the Nazi pilots there were many experienced aces from the 3rd Udet fighter squadron. Safronov knew the habits of the pilots of this squadron from the battles in the Stalingrad area and contrasted them with his own tactics. Having gained altitude, Safronov discovered two hidden aces behind the clouds, waiting for an opportunity for a surprise attack. In a short duel, the Soviet pilot knocked down one of them, the other, and his wingman immediately finished him off. Having shot down five Messers, Safronov’s group returned to their airfield without losses.
In intense air battles in the Kuban, Safronov’s squadron destroyed 24 enemy aircraft in the air from April 23 to May 20 alone, including five aircraft destroyed personally by its commander.
In total, during the war years S.I. Safronov carried out 147 combat sorties and shot down 27 enemy aircraft personally and as part of a group of 4.