Plane lands in Red Square

During the the cold war era the Soviet Union was thought of as being a military super power with near impregnable air defences. The thought of a plane landing in Moscow’s Red Square was laughable. No enemy would dare try.

But a teenager with a Cessna dared to try. Not only did he try, he succeeded.

Mathias Rust

An idealistic teenager from West Germany who believed that with his stunt he could unite the East and West. At the time an unthinkable notion. Division between the two different ideologies had been building since the Second World War ended. Mathias had only clocked up 50 hours of flight but decided to “build a bridge” to show Europe that relations could be improved.

So began his epic journey.

Setting off on May the 13th, 1987, he prepared for the off to “tour northern Europe”, or so his parents thought.

First he travelled to Shetland, then to the Faroe Islands, stopping over for a night at each. He then travelled to Iceland, then Norway before arriving in Helsinki, Finland. It was now the 25th of May.

While in Helsinki Mathias spent a few days mulling his idea over in his head. Nerves threatened to get the better of him. As they should. In front of him lay the full weight of the Soviet Unions Air Defence systems. From Helsinki, its a journey of over 500 miles, most of it through the USSR’s air space. Not a journey for the faint hearted. Suicidal in fact. Just 4 years before his attempt, a Korean airliner had accidently strayed into USSR airspace and been blown out of the sky. 269 people lost their lives, with no survivors.

A Dangerous Journey

On the 28th of May, still conflicted, Mathias set out. Air traffic believed he would be heading towards Stockholm in Sweden. Which at first, he did. Half an hour into the flight he made his decision and changed course for Moscow. Air traffic controllers in Helsinki saw that he was heading the wrong way before Mathias disappeared from their screens. The Finnish coast guard launched a frantic hunt for him, believing him to have perished at sea.

As they were hunting for him, Mathias, soaring high above their heads crossed over into Soviet airspace.

Quickly he was picked up by radar and within an hour a MIG fighter jet passed by him. Mathias, terrified, pushed on as the jet vanished into the clouds. Somehow, he had been mistaken for a friendly aircraft and allowed to continue. A huge stroke of luck.

Time to Land

The rest of his journey was relatively quiet. In no time at all he could see the Spires of Red Square. He had made it. Not quite. Looking down he saw nowhere to land. Too many people. Spotting a four lane wide bridge next to St Basil’s Cathedral, Mathias headed for it.

You can see a small clip of the incident at the start of this YouTube segment on the flight:

At around 7pm, with the sun starting to set behind him, Mathias Rust landed and taxied his little Cessna into Red Square. The people there were shocked and delighted to see him at first, especially when he said he was from Germany, they thought he meant East Germany!

Once over their shock, the authorities arrested and charged Mathias with hooliganism, breaching the Soviet border and disregard of aviation laws.

Aftermath

Mathias Rust was sentenced to spend 4 years in a labour camp. Primarily for embarrassing the Soviet Union with his stunt. Luckily for him, he was never transferred to the labour camp and instead served his time at a facility in Moscow. In August of 1988 he was released as a sign of goodwill between the East and West.

Once back in Germany, Mathias refused to speak to the press. Why? Because he had signed an exclusivity deal with German magazine Stern to the tune of 100,000 deutsche marks. The journalists there describe him as “probably mentally unstable and dangerously unworldly“. A chilling foreshadowing of what Mathias would do in 1989. We will cover that below. Back to the story.

As for his aim of helping bring East and West together? Well, he sort of did. But not in the way he, or indeed anybody thought he would.

Mathias and his stunt damaged the reputation of the Soviet military. Some thought beyond repair. Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet leader, used this as a way to clean house of his strongest opponents. It was the biggest overhaul of the Soviet military since Stalin purged the forces 50 years before.

Because of Gorbachev’s actions, he set in place a series of events that would lead to the fall of the Soviet Union within a matter of years. The events are too detailed to go into here, but Wikipedia has a great write up for those who would like to delve deeper into the subject.

Where are they now?

As for Mathias Rust and his rented Cessna? The Cessna is now on display at the German Museum of Technology in Berlin.

To put it mildly, Mathias himself has lived a chequered life. In 1989 Mathias stabbed a female co-worker who had rejected his advances. She barely survived. It was recommended he spend 8 years in jail but he was only sentenced to 2 and a half years. He served just 15 months. The LA Times report in 1991 reads thus:

Enraged by his mild sentence for attempted manslaughter, spectators booed in the Hamburg courtroom as Rust, 23, smiled.

LA Times – 1991 Article

Rust himself said that something inside him “just snapped” before the incident. Rust’s lawyer conceded that if the student nurse had not been in a hospital when stabbed, it is very unlikely she would have survived.

In 2001 he was back in court. Thankfully this time merely for stealing a cashmere pullover. And again in 2005 when he was convicted of fraud.

Apparently, as of the latest reports, he now works as a Yoga instructor and financial analyst.

According to most reports, Mathias Rust is an extremely strange person. In an interview with The Guardian in 2012 he described himself as “a bit of an oddball”. Looking back at his life, that seems a bit of an understatement.