Vladimir Petlyakov Vladimir Mikhailovich Petlyakov ( ) ( 15 June 1891 – 12 January 1942 ) was a Soviet aeronautical engineer . Petlyakov was born in Sambek ( Don Voisko Oblast , Russian Empire ) in 1891 ( currently part of the county of Novoshakhtinsk , Rostov Oblast ) , where his father was a local official . After he and graduated from the Technical College in Taganrog ( today the " Taganrog Petlyakov Aviation College " , ) in 1910 . he travelled to Moscow , where he was accepted into the Moscow State Technical University ; however , due to financial difficulties he was unable to complete his studies . After the Russian Revolution , he was hired to work as a technician in the aerodynamics laboratory at Moscow State Technical University under the guidance of Nikolai Zhukovsky , while resuming his studies . He gained experience as a laboratory assistant on wind tunnels and calculations for aircraft design . In 1922 , he graduated from the same university . In 1921 – 1936 , Petlyakov worked at the Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute under the guidance of Andrei Tupolev , where he was involved in wing design and the development of glider s . In 1936 , he became a chief aircraft designer at an aviation plant . Petlyakov was directly involved in organization and development of Soviet metal aircraft construction . In particular , Petlyakov ( together with an engineer Nikolai Belyaev ) elaborated methods of calculating durability of materials and theory on designing metal wings with multiple spars . Petlyakov assisted in designing the first Soviet heavy bomber s TB - 1 , TB - 3 ( 1930 – 1935 ) , and a long - range high - altitude four - engine bomber , the Pe - 8 ( 1935 – 1937 ) . However , on October 21 , 1937 , Petlyakov was arrested together with Tupolev and the entire directorate of the TsAGI on trumped up charges of sabotage , espionage and of aiding the Russian Fascist Party . Many of his colleagues were executed . In 1939 , he was moved from a prison to an NKVD " sharashka " for aircraft designers near Moscow , where many ex - TsAGI people had already been sent to work . Petlyakov was tasked with designing a high - altitude fighter , which he successfully accomplished . However , operational experience in the Soviet - Finnish War showed that this was not what the Soviet Air Force needed , and Lavrentiy Beria , head of the NKVD and of the " sharashka " told that the fighter was to be redesigned as a dive bomber , with the promise that he and his colleagues would be released on its successful completion . The resulting aircraft , the Pe - 2 , which went into serial production at the Kazan Aviation Plant , proved to be one of the most successful designs of World War II . Petlyakov was released in 1940 , and was awarded the Stalin Prize in 1941 . However , at Kazan , Petlyyakov faced increasing difficulties , with so many of his trained technicians and machinists conscripted into the Soviet military and sent to the front lines , which adversely affected the quality of production aircraft . He protested to Soviet senior leadership , and was on his way to Moscow in January 1942 ( flying in a Pe - 2 ) , when he died in an air crash near Arzamas . His grave is at the Arskoe Cemetery in Kazan . Vladimir Petlyakov received the State Award of the USSR ( 1941 ) and was awarded two Orders of Lenin and an Order of the Red Star .