Chkalov's Transpolar Flight: Moscow to Vancouver

At 04:05 on 18 June 1937, the single-engine ANT-25 lifted off from an airfield near Shchyolkovo, outside Moscow. On board were commander Valery Chkalov, co-pilot Georgy Baydukov and navigator Alexander Belyakov. Observers had sealed their barographs and the fuel-tank caps, so nobody could claim a hidden landing or refuelling on the way. The takeoff ran along a sloping concrete runway four kilometres long, built here for exactly this kind of long-range attempt. The base is now Chkalovsky Airport.

Location precision: The sources name the airfield near Shchyolkovo; the pin marks today's Chkalovsky Airport.

The plan was a straight line from Moscow across the top of the world to the American Pacific coast, aiming to break the world record for straight-line flight distance. The crew headed towards the North Pole. Soviet newspapers later celebrated it as the first intercontinental flight across the North Pole. The pin is the geographic pole itself, a symbol of the route rather than a surveyed point on the track.

Location precision: The sources give no position for the crossing; the pin marks the geographic North Pole as a symbol of the route.

Near Eugene the crew found they were short of fuel, turned back and made for the army airbase at Fort Vancouver Barracks. At 19:30 Moscow time on 20 June the ANT-25 landed safely at Pearson Field in Vancouver, Washington. Only 100 kg of the original 6,100 kg of fuel remained. The trip took 63 hours and 25 minutes. The credited record distance was 8,582.96 km, less than the 9,130 km actually flown, and short of the world record.

The Americans gave the crew a warm public welcome. General George C. Marshall, then stationed at Vancouver Barracks, hosted the three aviators at his home. Marshall commanded the post from 1936 to 1938, before he became Army Chief of Staff.

Location precision: The sources do not say which house hosted the crew; the pin marks the Vancouver Barracks area.

From the Pacific coast the aviators went on to Washington, D.C., where President Franklin D. Roosevelt received them in the Oval Office of the White House. They also met the Arctic explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson. Back home, all three crew members were awarded the Order of the Red Banner for the flight.

The monument was dedicated on 20 June 1975, with Baydukov and Belyakov in attendance. Chkalov had been killed in a test flight in 1938. It was the first monument in the United States to commemorate an achievement of the Soviet Union. It originally stood on the south side of the airfield and was moved when State Route 14 was rebuilt.

Visitor guidance: Beside the Pearson Air Museum on East 5th Street, Vancouver, Washington.