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Pobezhimov
Grigoriy Trofimovich
Born in the village of Usmanka, Samara Province. In aviation since 1915. After graduating from the Samara Naval School of Aviation Specialists, Pobezhimov served as an assistant flight mechanic at a naval aviation station on Degerby island in the Aland skerries in the Baltic. Here he met with V.S. Molokov, a friendship that lasted more than a dozen years. In 1918 he joined the Red Army and already in May 1918, he participated in the battles against the White Czechs near Samara. Then he was transferred to Nizhny Novgorod, where the aviation hydro squad of the Volga military flotilla was created.After the war, he worked at the school of aerobatics in the Red Selo. Pobezhimov's work in the Arctic began in 1927, when he was on the expedition of G.D. Krasinsky flew on Wrangel Island. All the pilots of this expedition, including Pobezhimov, received the following certificate: “Dear Comrade! You have done a tremendous and difficult task, having made a flight from “Kolyma” to Wrangel Island in extremely harsh conditions, as well as a flight over the great Lena River, which was not studied in air. You have proved once again with your flight that Soviet aviation stands at the height of the latest achievements of human genius. Your flight is of paramount importance on an all-Union scale, but for YASSR it is of exceptional importance. By your flight, you have established what conditions are necessary for the implementation of a close air connection for centuries separated from the cultural centers of our Union of Yakutia. You were the pioneer of this matter of great importance to us. To commemorate this, the Presidium of the YATSIK and the Presidium of the OSOAVIAHIMA of the JASSR favor you with the skin of a polar bear, white fox, a real diploma and petition the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and RVS of the Union to award you the Order of the Red Banner”. In the 1930s Pobezhimov worked as a flight mechanic at the Polar Aviation Administration of Glavsevmorput, considered one of the best flight mechanics of polar aviation. He was called the "polar Lefsha". A bright, sociable, tireless person, he often visited the factory and helped the workers master new professions. In 1935–1937 Pobezhimov flew in the crew of the Hero of the Soviet Union Molokov. In 1936, they flew over the territory of the Far North in a Dornier-Val "USSR H-2" flying boat, breaking 31,000 km along a circular route. For participation in the Arctic flights Pobezhibov was awarded the Order of Lenin and the Red Banner. His last flight took place in August 1937 as part of the S.A.Levanevskiy crew. They were supposed to make a long-cherished Levanevsky flight from Moscow across the North Pole to America. The pilot chose a four-engine aircraft designed by V.F. Bolkhovitinova, although the designer himself did not consider his aircraft suitable for such flights. The earlier flights to America across the pole were carried out on the aircraft of system A.N. Tupolev, however Levanevsky, who at one time was negative about Tupolev’s planes, did not want to turn to him. Many people had bad feelings. Levanevsky skillfully lifted the overloaded car into the air, and the mourners relaxed from the heart. However, after a day's flight, one engine had already failed at the pole.The icy plane began to lose altitude, then the connection was broken forever. Searches continued for many months. They were conducted from the west, from the archipelago of Franz Josef Land, and from the east, from Chukotka and Alaska, and Soviet and American pilots participated in them. The crew of the Hero of the Soviet Union, M.S.Babushkin's was died. Everything turned out to be unsuccessful. Until now, there is no reliable information about the place and details of the death of the Levanevsky aircraft. Cape in the north of the island of Ziegler in the archipelago of Franz Josef Land. The name was given by cartographers in the 1950s. |
