37 Flight navigators

Aleksandra Akimova was a squadron navigator in the 46th Taman Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment during the Second World War. In 1994 she became one of the few women awarded the title Hero of the Russian Federation.

Raisa Yermolayevna Aronova was a Soviet Polikarpov Po-2 navigator and pilot of the 588th Night Bomber Regiment, later renamed 46th Guards Night Bomber Regiment during World War II. She received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union on 15 May 1946 for completing 914 night bombing missions against Axis forces.

Vera Lukianovna Belik was a flight navigator and lieutenant in the 46th Taman Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment who frequently flew with pilot Tatyana Makarova. They died when their Po-2 was shot down by a German fighter after completing a bombing mission; both were posthumously awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union on 23 February 1945.

Alexander Vasilyevich Belyakov was a Soviet flight navigator who, together with command pilot Valery Chkalov and co-pilot Georgy Baydukov, set a record for the longest uninterrupted flight in 1936 and made the first non-stop flight across the North Pole, flying from Moscow to Vancouver, Washington.

Air Vice Marshal Donald Clifford Tyndall Bennett, was an Australian aviation pioneer and bomber pilot who rose to be the youngest air vice marshal in the Royal Air Force. He led the "Pathfinder Force" from 1942 to the end of the Second World War in 1945. He has been described as "one of the most brilliant technical airmen of his generation: an outstanding pilot, a superb navigator who was also capable of stripping a wireless set or overhauling an engine".

Lieutenant-Colonel Sir Arthur Whitten Brown, was the navigator of the first successful non-stop transatlantic flight.

Dominic Bruce, was a British Royal Air Force officer, known as the "Medium Sized Man." He has been described as "the most ingenious escaper" of the Second World War. He made seventeen attempts at escaping from POW camps, including several attempts to escape from Colditz Castle, a castle that housed prisoners of war "deemed incorrigible".

Duane R. Bushey is a retired senior sailor of the United States Navy who served as the seventh Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy.

Rear Admiral Richard Evelyn Byrd Jr. was an American naval officer and explorer. He was a recipient of the Medal of Honor, the highest honor for valor given by the United States, and was a pioneering American aviator, polar explorer, and organizer of polar logistics. Aircraft flights in which he served as a navigator and expedition leader crossed the Atlantic Ocean, a segment of the Arctic Ocean, and a segment of the Antarctic Plateau. Byrd claimed that his expeditions had been the first to reach both the North Pole and the South Pole by air. His claim to have reached the North Pole is disputed. He is also known for discovering Mount Sidley, the largest dormant volcano in Antarctica.

François Coli was a French pilot and navigator best known as the one-eyed flying partner of Charles Nungesser in their doomed, fatal attempt to achieve the first transatlantic flight.

Khiuaz Qayrkyzy Dospanova was a Kazakh pilot and navigator who served during World War II in the 588th Night Bomber Regiment, nicknamed the "Night Witches." In addition to being the first Kazakh woman officer in the Soviet Air Force, she was the only Kazakh woman to serve in the "Night Witches". Despite sustaining multiple fractures in her legs in a ground collision in 1943, she returned to active duty and continued to participate in sorties against doctor's recommendations; she was eventually awarded the title Hero of Kazakhstan in 2004 for her perseverance.

Galina Ivanovna Markova née Dzhunkovskaya was a squadron navigator in 125th Guards Dive Bomber Regiment during the Second World War who was honored with the title Hero of the Soviet Union on 18 August 1945.

Robert James Flynn was a Commander and Naval Flight Officer bombardier/navigator in the United States Navy. As a Lieutenant, he was captured by the Chinese in August 1967 after the A-6 Intruder he was flying in on a mission over North Vietnam was shot down. Flynn and his pilot, along with another A-6 Intruder crew, were evading North Vietnamese jets following their mission over Hanoi when they strayed over the border into Chinese air space. Downed just over the Chinese border, Flynn was apprehended by the Chinese and held in China as a Prisoner of War where he was tortured and held almost exclusively in solitary confinement for five and a half years.

Rufina Sergeyevna Gasheva was a Soviet Polikarpov Po-2 navigator during World War II who served with the all-female 588th Night Bomber Regiment and recipient of the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Postwar, she continued to serve and was a lecturer in foreign languages at the Malinovsky Military Armored Forces Academy before her retirement. After retiring, Gasheva worked in the Bureau of Foreign Military Literature at Voenizdat.

Harold Charles Gatty was an Australian navigator and aviation pioneer. Charles Lindbergh called Gatty the "Prince of Navigators." In 1931, Gatty served as navigator, along with pilot Wiley Post, on the flight which set the record for aerial circumnavigation of the world, flying a distance of 15,747 miles (24,903 km) in a Lockheed Vega named the Winnie Mae, in 8 days, 15 hours and 51 minutes.

Polina Vladimirovna Gelman was a flight navigator in the all-female 46th Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment who was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union in 1946 for having totaled 857 sorties during World War II.

Albert Francis Hegenberger was a major general in the United States Air Force and a pioneering aviator who set a flight distance record with Lester J. Maitland, completing the first transpacific flight to Hawaii in 1927 as navigator of the Bird of Paradise. Hegenberger was an aeronautical engineer of note, earning both the Mackay Trophy (1927) and Collier Trophy (1934) for achievement.

Julius Waweru Karangi is a retired military officer from Kenya who was Chief of the General Staff of the Kenya Defence Forces from 2011 until 2015.

Glafira Alekseevna Kashirina was a mechanic and navigator in the 588th Night Bomber Regiment of the Soviet Airforce during World War II, commonly referred to as the Great Patriotic War in the former Soviet Union. After she was shot down on 1 August 1943 she was posthumously awarded the Order of the Patriotic War 2nd Class.

Valentina Flegontovna Savitskaya née Kravchenko was a Russian pilot and squadron navigator in the 125th Guards Dive Bomber Regiment during World War II. She was awarded the title Hero of the Russian Federation on 10 April 1995.

Joseph Le Brix was a French aviator and a capitaine de corvette in the French Navy. He is best known for an around-the-world flight he made as copilot and navigator in 1927-1928 which included history's first flight across the South Atlantic Ocean, and for record-setting nonstop long-distance flights he made or attempted between 1929 and 1931.

American Harry Lyon (1885?–1963?), was the navigator for the first flight across the Pacific in 1928 with Charles Kingsford Smith, Charles Ulm and fellow-American James Warner as the in the Southern Cross.

Frederick Joseph "Fred" Noonan was an American flight navigator, sea captain and aviation pioneer, who first charted many commercial airline routes across the Pacific Ocean during the 1930s. Navigator for Amelia Earhart, he was last seen in Lae, New Guinea, on July 2, 1937, on the last land stop before they disappeared somewhere over the Central Pacific Ocean, during one of the last legs of their attempted pioneering round-the-world flight.

Yevdokiya Borisovna Pasko was a squadron navigator in the Soviet all-female 46th Taman Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment during World War II. For her successes in the war, she was honored with the title of Hero of the Soviet Union on 26 October 1944.

Flight Lieutenant John Alan Quinton, GC, DFC was a British navigator and pilot who was posthumously awarded the George Cross for an act of outstanding bravery where he unselfishly saved a young air cadet whilst losing his own life after the aircraft he was in was involved in a mid-air collision over Yorkshire.

Yevdokiya Yakovlevna Rachkevich was the deputy regimental commander and commissar of the 46th Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment during the Second World War, known in the Soviet Union as the Great Patriotic War. After the end of the war, Rachkevich traced the regiment's path throughout the war and managed to locate the remains of women in the regiment that were listed as missing in action so that they could receive a proper burial. Soldiers that went missing in action were considered potential traitors until their remains were found because they could have been captured, and Soviet prisoners of war were considered "guilty until proven innocent" of collaboration with the Axis, especially after Order No. 270 forbid surrender or retreat.

Marina Mikhaylovna Raskova was the first woman in the Soviet Union to achieve the diploma of professional air navigator. Raskova went from a young woman with aspirations of becoming an opera singer to a military instructor to the Soviet first female navigator. She was the navigator to many record-setting as well as record-breaking flights and the founding and commanding officer of the 587th Bomber Aviation Regiment, which was renamed the 125th M.M. Raskova Borisov Guards Dive Bomber Regiment in her honor. Raskova became one of over 800,000 women in the military service, founding three female air regiments, one of which eventually flew over 30,000 sorties in World War II and produced at least 30 Heroes of the Soviet Union.

Larisa Nikolayevna Rozanova was a pilot and later the senior navigator of the 46th Taman Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment, nicknamed the "Night Witches" during World War II. For successfully completing 793 sorties she was declared a Hero of the Soviet Union on 23 February 1948.

Yevgeniya Maksimovna Rudneva was the head navigator of the 46th Guards Night Bomber Regiment posthumously awarded Hero of the Soviet Union. Prior to World War II she was an astronomer, the head of the Solar Department of the Moscow branch of the Astronomical-Geodesical Society of the USSR.

Yekaterina Vasilevna Ryabova was a Soviet World War II navigator awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union on 23 February 1945 for her World War II bombing missions. She attained the rank of senior lieutenant as a member of the 46th Guards Night Bomber Regiment, flying 890 night missions in a Polikarpov Po-2.

Wing Commander Rex Southern Sanders was a Royal Air Force navigator who won a DFC for his service during the Second World War and an AFC for his part in secret photographic and radar reconnaissance missions behind Soviet lines in the 1950s during the Cold War.

Valentina Sergeevna Stupina was a pilot, flight navigator, and the head of communications of the 588th Night Bomber Regiment during World War II until her death in 1943, after which her role was taken over by Khiuaz Dospanova.

Tatyana Nikolaevna Sumarokova was a Soviet navigator and Guard Lieutenant in the 46th Taman Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment during the Second World War. Rejected for the title Hero of the Soviet Union in 1945 after completing 725 sorties, she was eventually awarded the title Hero of the Russian Federation in 1995.

Kenneth Tempest, was a Royal Air Force navigator with No. 139 Squadron RAF during the Second World War flying Mosquitos. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for his service. After the war he trained as a pilot and flew with BOAC in the Bristol Britannia and the VC10.

Nina Zaharovna Ulyanenko was a navigator and pilot in the 46th Taman Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment, 325th Night Bomber Aviation Division, 4th Air Army, 2nd Belorussian Front during World War II. She was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union on 18 August 1945.

Theodore "Dutch" Van Kirk was a navigator in the United States Army Air Forces, best known as the navigator of the Enola Gay when it dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Upon the death of fellow crewman Morris Jeppson on March 30, 2010, Van Kirk became the last surviving member of the Enola Gay crew.

Yevgeniya Andreyevna Zhigulenko was a pilot and navigator in the 46th Taman Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment of the Soviet Air Forces during World War II who was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union.