Nina Ulyanenko

Nina Zaharovna Ulyanenko (Russian: Нина Захаровна Ульяненко; 17 December 1923 – 31 August 2005) was a navigator and pilot in the 46th Taman Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment, 325th Night Bomber Aviation Division, 4th Air Army, 2nd Belorussian Front during World War II. She was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union on 18 August 1945.[1]

Nina Zakharovna Ulyanenko
Native name	Нина Захаровна Ульяненко
Born	(1923-12-17)17 December 1923 Sarapul, Soviet Union
Died	31 August 2005(2005-08-31) (aged 81) Izhevsk, Udmurtia, Russia
Allegiance	Soviet Union
Service/branch	Soviet Air Force
Years of service	1942–1945
Rank	Lieutenant
Unit	46th "Taman" Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment
Battles/wars	Great Patriotic War
Awards	Hero of the Soviet Union
Other work	Supreme Soviet deputy, Teacher

Early life

Ulyanenko was born in Sarapul on 17 December 1923 to a working Russian family. After secondary school she studied at the Saratov Aviation Technical School before entering the DOSAAF aeroclub in 1939 where she made her first flight on 11 April 1940.[2]

World War II career

After the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, she studied navigation at the Engels Military Aviation school. She was sent to the Southern Front in May 1942 as part of the 588th Night Bomber Regiment, later renamed the 46th Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment. In 1944 she became a flight commander in the regiment. She took part in the Battle of Stalingrad and flew missions in Crimea, the Caucasus, Poland, East Prussia and eventually in the Battle of Berlin. She became a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1944.[3] By mid February 1945, she had flown 388 sorties as navigator and an additional 530 sorties as pilot in command of a Polikarpov Po-2; by the end of the war she had flown 905 sorties, dropping 120 tonnes of bombs, damaging ten vehicles, four ferries, and forcing four artillery batteries to retreat. For her service in the war, she was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union on 18 August 1945.[2][3][4]

Later life

After leaving the military at the end of the war Ulyanenko entered the Military Institute of Foreign Languages of Moscow in November 1945. In 1946 she moved to the city of Kursk with her husband Nikolai Minakov, where she worked for two years as a writer for the newspaper Kurskaya Pravda. In 1948 she moved to the city of Izhevsk in Udmurtia where she worked as an editor for the newspaper Udmurt Pravda. Between 1947 and 1951 she was a deputy of the Supreme Soviet. From 1957 on she worked as a teacher and as an instructor at a local DOSAAF flying club after graduating from Udmurt State University in 1955. She died on 31 August 2005.[5]

Awards and honors

• Hero of the Soviet Union (18 August 1945)
• Order of Lenin (18 August 1945)
• Two Orders of the Red Banner (17 June 1943 and 15 June 1945)
• Order of the Patriotic War 1st class and 2nd class (11 March 1985 and 29 February 1944 respectively)
• Order of the Red Star (29 December 1942)
• campaign and jubilee medals

[6]

See also

• List of female Heroes of the Soviet Union

References

1. Sakaida, Henry (2012-04-20). Heroines of the Soviet Union 1941–45. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 55. ISBN 9781780966922.
2. Ufarkin, Nikolai. "Ульяненко Нина Захаровна". warheroes.ru (in Russian). Retrieved 2018-01-19.
3. Shkadov, Ivan (1988). Герои Советского Союза: краткий биографический словарь II, Любовь - Яшчук [Heroes of the Soviet Union: A Brief Biographical Dictionary, Lyubov – Yashchuk]. Moscow: Voenizdat. p. 623. ISBN 5203005362. OCLC 247400113.
4. "Ульяненко Нина Захаровна". airaces.narod.ru. Retrieved 2018-01-19.
5. Simonov & Chudinova 2017, p. 245-246.
6. Simonov & Chudinova 2017, p. 246.

Bibliography

• Simonov, Andrey; Chudinova, Svetlana (2017). Женщины - Герои Советского Союза и России [Women – Heroes of the Soviet Union and Russia]. Moscow: Russian Knights Foundation and Museum of Technology Vadim Zadorozhny. ISBN 9785990960701. OCLC 1019634607.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)