Yevgeniya Zhigulenko

Yevgeniya Zhigulenko studied at Moscow State Aviation Technological University, Lomonosov Moscow State University and Gerasimov Institute of Cinematography. The recorded working language is Russian. Distinctions recorded are Medal "For the Victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945", Order of Lenin, Hero of the Soviet Union and Order of the Patriotic War, 1st class.

Zhigulenko was born on 1 December 1920 in Krasnodar to a working family. After graduating from secondary school in Tikhoretsk in 1939 she studied at the Moscow Aviation Technology Institute and then graduated from flight school at Moscow Aeroclub. She became a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1942.

In October 1941 she joined the Soviet military and participated in battles on the Eastern Front starting in May 1942 after graduating from her military navigation courses. She initially served as a navigator but went on to become a pilot, after which she was promoted to the position of flight commander. Her regiment was officially designated the 588th Night Bomber Regiment until it was renamed in 1943 to the 46th Taman Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment. During the war she participated in bombing campaigns on the Southern, Caucasian, and Belorussian fronts as well as in Berlin, Crimea, Kerch, Kolberg, Kuban, Mlavsko-Elbing, Mogilev, and Osowiec. In addition to bombing enemy targets she flew missions to resupply the Red Army. By November 1944 she had dropped 89 tons of bombs on targets, destroyed three crossing points, a searchlight, three artillery batteries, and started 177 fires. Upon the end of the war she flew 968 missions, during which she had encountered many close-calls with death. For completing her first 773 sorties she was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union on 23 February 1945.

Zhigulenko remained in the air force on active duty until 1955 when she graduated the Lenin Military-Political Academy in 1955; she was the second woman to graduate from the school. In 1976 she graduated from the All-Union State Institute of Cinematography after which she worked as a film director, and created two major films: "In the Sky of the Night Witches" (1981) and "Without the Right to Fail" (1984). She died at the age of 73 on 27 February 1994 and was buried in the Troyekurovskoye Cemetery.