Alexei Ivanovich Pietsuj (Russian: Алексей Иванович Пьецух) was born in 1918 in Vínnitsa, Ukraine. At age 16, he built a small glider, called PAI-1, in which he learned to fly and demonstrated at Aviation Day parties in Kiev. For this device he would receive the award for the youngest constructor in the national competition for light aircraft.

Later, working in the Osoaviajim Glider Factory and under the direction of Oleg Konstantínovich Antonov and BN Sheremetiev he would build his second model, called PAI-2 “Pavel Golovin” in 1937, followed by PAI-3in 1937 itself. Pietsuj worked as a teacher at the glider school, developing the PAI-4 tailless glider in that period.

From 1939 on he was called up to serve in the ranks of the Red Army.

During the Great Patriotic War he served as a tug pilot in the glider section of the air landing troops. He was tasked with piloting an Ilyushin Il-4 to tow gliders towards the front line, but Pietsuj requested a fight. After his request was denied three times, in reply he made a dead link between Nesterov and the Il-4. His performance was branded as “dangerous vandalism”, for which he was handed over to a court, demoted to the ranks and sent to a punishment battalion. On his first night he made seven combat sorties in a Polikarpov Po-2 bomber. After two months the accusation was withdrawn in court.

As a pilot of the 44th Guards Bombardment Aviation Regiment and the Don Red Flag belonging to the 9th Guards Bombardment Division, he carried out 91 combat sorties. He participated in the fighting for Warsaw.

In the spring of 1945 in Germany and with the help of several soldiers, he managed to assemble a flight-capable Messerschmitt Me-410 using components from three aircraft. At the controls of the Me-410 he airlifted it to Moscow. In June this aircraft was tested on the NII VVS.

After the victory he began working as a test pilot in the GK NII VVS, serving in the V. Ye squad. Golofastov. At this stage he built the PAI-5 (1947) and PAI-6 (1949) gliders with aerobatic capacity, which participated in several aerial demonstrations for the Air Fleet Day in Túshino. He was the test pilot PAI-5 (02- 1948) towed gliders Antonov A-7 from Ilyushin Il-4. As a test pilot he flew in more than 60 types of aircraft and gliders.

In the early 1950s Pietsuj organized a student construction bureau among the students of the Moscow Aviation Institute. In this institution he developed the glider models PAI-6M (1952), MAI-56 (1956), MAI-63 (1964), MAI-68 “Pushinka” (1970) and the MAI-58 (1958) and MAI- 62 (1962), as well as the MAI-63M motor glider. He personally tested the MAI-53 models in 1954, MAI-56 in 1958, MAI-62 in 1965, MAI-63 in 1964 and MAI-63M in 1965.

He lived in the village “Liotchik Ispitatiel” (Test Pilot) of the city Iksha, in the Moscow suburbs. He built a house made of bottles there. He died in 1994.

Military grade
Captain

Awards and distinctions
Order of the Great Patriotic War Second Class (5-02- 1988)
Twice Order of the Red Banner (04- 1945, 1948)
Medals

Pietsuj was the author of several articles published in the pre-war period in the magazine “Samoliot”.

He wrote the book “Krylya Molodiozhi” (Youth Wings), published by the Moscow publishing house “Oborongiz” in 1954.