THE U-2 AFFAIR

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00001R000400080059-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: November 17, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 8, 1999
• Sequence Number: 59
• Publication Date: June 3, 1962
• Content Type: NSPR

:.tti, a~..( 1ON SLAY` JUN 3 19b2
Approved For Release 2000/08/03 : CIA-RI
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Begins Fateful Flight:. '
Powers, 27-Mission Veteran;
THE 112 AFF,
By DAVID WISE and THOMAS B. ROSS
He was thirty years old and he had flown more than
500 hours in the U-2. He had completed 27 missions in
It since reporting to the Middle East four years before.
Each had been a grueling and lonely ride ariong the edges
of space. ' But 'the worst ride for any U-2 pilot wAs the
notations: 1 May 1960. Sortie
Number 4154. Takeoff 0126 GMT (6:26 tt.m. local time),
delayed one-half hour.
Headed For Russia's "Canaveral"
On his map, a red and blue line traced w 3,788-mile
. .
,
y
o
In his logbook were the
pistol.
On his hip was a noise-
less 22-caliber semitutomatlc
silent flight over the.Soviet
Union.
Francis Gary Powers was
flying there that day for the
Central Intelligence Agency.
flight from Peshawar, Pakistan. to Bodo, Norway. It would
take him P,019 miles over the Soviet Union, past Staltnabad,'
Aralsk, Chelyabinsk, Sverdlovsk, Kirov, Archangel, and'
6,'soviet Cae.Ca-aeveral, eighty mils to the east of the ,Aral ' k
southeast of $t;'alingrad, were th ,gn1y intercontinental tfai-
listtc missile I tes that?Americat~~ftel1lgenee had located in
the Soviet UZ~.,n.
The prtinsj 'urpose of t h e 0 1 fit~'ht roams 40 photo-
rluns that 'the lets werb built{ S their first operatidnal
y digl;ingsvalai the route Pow 'was to follow that day.
Local-agents oelectrdnic e.T opping deepened cusp!-
the north rjf t Uafov,M' summer months.
flag' the sle'. ' ver of tl4hl ck fog wh1Ctli blankets
This Is the first of 14 ertkti
coedeesed from the book, THE
U-2 AFFAIR, whit` tells 1141.11"
behind the most expbaive elfl*,"II
,case of the loth leatury, Gpy-
right 1962, by David Wise drA
Inc.
Rondom Move.
Y
rk b
tt bolos in the belly OVUM"
*. t tIng 944.7 millimeter. )Ana
sal dent. He was carrying 'a.
25X1A '