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Rudolf Anderson

Rudolf Anderson (15 September 1927-27 October 1962) was a US Air Force major and the only US fatality by enemy fire during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Biography[]

Rudolf Anderson was born in Spartanburg, South Carolina in 1927, and he joined the US Air Force in 1951 during the Korean War and earned two Distinguished Flying Crosses for his service. He later acquired a reputation as the United States' best U-2 pilot, and, at the height of the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962, he was sent to take surveillance photographs of Soviet missile sites in Cuba in preparation for a potential American invasion. However, he was shot down over Banes, Cuba, and he died when his pressure suit was punctured.

Gallery[]

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