U-2 pilot to posthumously receive Silver Star
Thursday - 6/7/2012, 4:03pm ET
BRISTOL, Va. - The pilot whose spy plane was shot down in 1960 over the Soviet Union is set to receive a Silver Star posthumously.
A ceremony to award the third-highest combat military decoration for valor to Francis Gary Powers is scheduled for June 15 at the Pentagon.
An Air Force report last year said that the U-2 pilot distinguished himself with his gallantry during harsh interrogation in Soviet prisons.
Powers was swapped for a Soviet spy in February 1962 in Berlin. He died in a 1977 helicopter crash.
Powers posthumously was awarded a military POW medal and a CIA medal in 2000, after incident records were unsealed.
His son, Francis Gary Powers Jr. told the Bristol Herald Courier ( http://bit.ly/KRPrsw) that the award is a wonderful honor and that the family is humbled.
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Information from: Bristol Herald Courier, http://www.bristolnews.com
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