Smaranda Brăescu

She was the first female Romanian pilot, the European skydiving champion in October 2, 1931, skydiving from a record height of 6,000 m, landing in the Bărăgan!

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

Patriot anti-communist and a promotor of Romanian National folk costumes.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

A street in Bucharest was named after her.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

After World War II, she signed a document condemning the November 1946 election, and was sent to prison for two years.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

She was in the medical wing during battles on the Eastern Front in World War II, remaining active until May 12, 1945.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

From then on she becomes a heroine, being escorted by 30 other planes to an air show in Canada where she is invited.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

Sacramento, Braescu establishes an absolute world record,previously held by an American at 21,733 ft, by jumping successfully from 24,000 ft

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

In 1932, in her Miles Hawk, she established the record crossing the Mediterranean Sea between Rome and Tripoli(1100 km in 6 hours and 10 min

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

She owned two biplanes.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

On August 17, 1930, she was seriously injured and remained bedridden for six months.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

She got her parachuting license in Germany.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

1928 while in Germany,she bought a parachute,jumped for the first time from a 6000 m height, becoming the first female Romanian parachutist.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

In 1918, she flew for the first time in a Farman plane piloted by Captain Dumitru Naidinescu.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

She was born in the village of Hânţeşti, Buciumeni.After World War I she worked as a substitute teacher in her native village.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

The people who helped her were hounded out and given long prison sentences, including the doctors who looked after her in hospital.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

She operated under an assumed name, first from a convent and then as an anti-communist resistance fighter.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

Thereafter Smaranda Bràescu became a pariah and had to join the underground resistance in order to escape imprisonment and certain death.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

Her letter of protest to the Allied Command in Romania fell into the hands of a Russian general.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

She protested to the United Nations about the legality of the 1946 elections.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

Although a war hero Smaranda Bràescu soon fell foul of the communist puppet régime which was installed in Romania by Stalin’s armies.

[Smaranda Brăescu @SmarandaBraescu]

After 1944, Bràescu joined the 13th squadron, which was fighting the Germans on the Western front, first in Transylvania, then in Hungary.