Steponas Darius

Bellanca CH-300 Pacemaker

Both Lithuanian Aviators Steponas Darius and Stasys Girenas were performing a non stop transatlantic flight from New York (Floyd Bennett Field) to Kaunas, Lithuania. After crossing the Atlantic and Germany, the aircraft named 'Lituanica' arrived over Pomerania and encountered poor weather conditions. It went out of control and crashed in Soldin, Germany (this city was renamed Myslibórz and became Polish after WWII). Both crew were killed. The planned route had to cover a total of 7,186 km. When the aircraft went down, Darius and Girenas were only 630 km from the destination.