Mathias Rust Mathias Rust Mathias Rust (born 1 June 1968) is a German aviator known for his illegal landing near Red Square in Moscow on 28 May 1987. An amateur pilot, the teenager flew from Helsinki, Finland, to Moscow, being tracked several times by Soviet air defence and interceptors. The Soviet fighters never received permission to shoot him down, and several times his aeroplane was mistaken for a friendly aircraft. He landed on Vasilevsky Descent next to Red Square near the Kremlin in the capital of the Soviet Union. Rust said he wanted to create an "imaginary bridge" to the East, and
Mathias Rust but was denied. The fighters lost contact with Rust soon after this. While they were being directed back to him he disappeared from radar near Staraya Russa. West German magazine "Bunte" speculated that he might have landed there for some time, noting that he changed his clothes during his flight and that he took too much time to fly to Moscow considering his plane's speed and the weather conditions. Air defence re-established contact with Rust's plane several times but confusion followed all of these events. The PVO system had shortly before been divided into several districts, which simplified management but