ABOUT FACTS NET

 

Cuban Missile Crisis Pictures 3

October 27, 1962: The Soviet ship Grozny crosses the quarantine line, but stops after U.S. Navy ships fire star shells across her bow.

October 27, 1962: Cuban anti-aircraft gunners open fire on low-level reconnaissance planes over San Cristobal site no. 1 (a Soviet SA-2 missile shoots down Maj. Rudolf Anderson’s U-2 on this day).

October 28, 1962: The U.S. Navy shadows the second Soviet F-class submarine to surface, after repeated rounds of signaling depth charges on 27 October (the sub features no conning tower number, but is Soviet fleet number B-59, commanded by Stavitsky).

October 29, 1962: Low-level photography reveals Soviet removal of missile erectors and transporters at San Cristobal.

October 29, 1962: Low-level photography reveals Soviet removal of missiles and tents at San Cristobal.

November 5, 1962: Low-level photography documents loading of Soviet missiles at the main Mariel port facility for return to the USSR. On the dock are vehicles later identified by NPIC as nuclear warhead vans.

Early November 1962: Low-level photography captures convoy of Soviet trucks driving onto dock at north Mariel port to begin loading process.

Early November 1962: Low-level photography reveals 17 missile erectors at north Mariel port awaiting return to the USSR.

November 6, 1962: Soviet personnel and six missile transporters loading onto ship transport at Casilda port. (Note shadow at lower right of RF-101 reconnaissance jet taking the photograph.)

NPIC diagrams and photograph of Soviet nuclear warhead vans, determined afterwards to have been present at San Cristobal MRBM site no. 1 as early as October 23.

October 23, 1962: Low-level photograph of Komar guided-missile patrol boats at Mariel port. Post-crisis review by NPIC revealed the Soviet nuclear warhead processing base at the end of the runway to the left.

Close-up of the Soviet nuclear warhead processing base at the Mariel runway, onto which the 101st Airborne was scheduled to parachute if a U.S. invasion took place.

Graphic from Military History Quarterly of the U.S. invasion plan, 1962.

 

November 9, 1962: Low-level photograph of 6 Frog (Luna) missile transporters under a tree at a military camp near Remedios. U.S. photo analysts first spotted these tactical nuclear-capable missiles on October 25, but only in 1992 did U.S. policymakers learn that nuclear warheads for the Lunas were already in Cuba in October 1962.

Photograph of Soviet submarine B-59 taken by U.S. Navy photographers, circa 28-29 October, 1962
Source: U.S. National Archives, Still Pictures Branch, Record Group 428, Item 428-N-711201

Photograph of Soviet submarine B-130 (conning tower number 945), taken by U.S. Navy photographers, circa 30 October-8 November 1962
Source: Dino Brugioni collection