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→Francis Gary Powers' U2 shot down near the Ural Mountains in May 1960
====Francis Gary Powers' U2 shot down near the Ural Mountains in May 1960====
[[ File:Hrs_powers_61512.jpg|thumbnail|left|275px| Francis Gary Powers, right, is shown with U-2 designer Kelly Johnson in 1966. ]]
On May 1, 1960, the situation changed. On the eve of the Paris Summit and during the May Day holiday, CIA pilot Francis Gary Powers took off from a base in Pakistan bound for another base in Norway, with his planned flight path transgressing 2,900 miles of Soviet airspace. Near the city of Sverdlovsk Oblast in the Ural Mountains, Powers' plane was shot down by a Soviet surface-to-air missile. Powers ejected and parachuted safely to the ground, where he was captured by the KGB, and held for interrogation. The plane crashed, but parts of it were recovered and placed on public display in Moscow as evidence of American deceit.
