U-2 pilot shot down and captured by China has passed away

One of the two Nationalist pilots who were shot down while flying the Lockheed U-2 spy plane over China has passed away.

U2China
By Ben Wong (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Yeh Ch’ang Ti was 84 years-old. He suffered a heart attack on the morning of Nov. 16.

He was on his third U-2 mission over China on Nov. 1, 1963. He spent 19 years in captive before being repatriated to Hong Kong in 1982. The government in Taiwan at that time refused to allow him to return home, his wife had also remarried during his absence.

Yeh migrated to United States with help from Washington and he was only allowed to return to Taiwan in 1990.