Life and Career
Sigizmund Levanevsky was born to a Polish family in St. Petersburg. His brother Józef Lewoniewski (1899-1933) was a Polish military and sports pilot. Sigizmund took part in the October Revolution on the Bolshevik side, later took part in the civil war in Russia, serving in the Red Army since 1918. In 1925 he graduated from the Sevastopol Naval Aviation School and became a military pilot. In 1930 he was withdrawn to reserve.
Since 1933 he had been a pilot with the Glavsevmorput' (Main Northern Maritime Route's Administration) and had accomplished several long distance flights. On July 20, 1933 he brought from Anadyr to Nome the American pilot James Mattern, who had been forced to land near Anadyr during his attempt of a flight around the world and then been eventually rescued by the local Eskimos. In April 1934 Levanevsky piloted from an improvised airfield on the Arctic ice of the Chukchi Sea, taking part in the successful aerial rescue operation saving people from the sunken steamship Cheliuskin. He was awarded the title of the Hero of the Soviet Union for this deed, though he actually didn't even reach their "ice-camp" because of his crash near Vankarem, so he didn't rescue anyone.
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