Günther PLÜSCHOW, a German naval pilot, was the first human who, flying a small plane, had the courage to fly over the "feared Cape Horn".

He actively participated in the German Navy during the First World War and, once the conflict ended, he directed his efforts to fulfilling his greatest wish: to know the ends of the earth, which is Patagonia and the island of Tierra del Fuego.

He sailed around Cape Horn in 1926 on board the 4 masted sailing ship PARMA and later, with the backing of the Ullstein Editorial, he was able to finance the acquisition of a 16 meter cutter, which was named FEUERLAND (Tierra del Fuego). Meanwhile the HEINKEL aeronautic industry built him a single motor, two seater, BMW hydroplane equipped with a motor of scarcely 250 HP, which was given the name TSINGTAU, and nicknamed the SILVER CONDOR.

The cutter set sail from Büsum, Germany in November 1927, sighting land in Punta Arenas at the end of October the following year. On the other hand the plane was sent dismantled in the merchant ship PLANET, of the "Flying P-LINE", and was disembarked in Punta Arenas awaiting PLÜSCHOW and his crew, made up of five people, to undertake the great adventure: flying over Cape Horn.

After a prolonged process of route reconnaissance, which extended from Punta Arenas to the Beagle Channel, PLÜSCHOW moved to USHUAIA, Argentina with the cutter and plane where he waited until weather conditions were favourable to attempt a successful flight to Cape Horn.

The cutter FEUERLAND was previously dispatched to the area, while the SILVER CONDOR made ready to carry out the most difficult stage of the expedition.

The awaited day arrived in mid February 1929 when PLÜSCHOW decided to take off, accompanied by his mechanic Ernst DREBLOW. In his book, "The Silver Condor over Tierra del Fuego", PLÜSCHOW relates in detail his personal experiences of this extraordinary flight. The flight began in bright sunshine and culminated in rain and reduced visibility, with fog and storms declared in Cape Horn where the FEUERLAND waited, anchored in a small cove of isla Hornos.

Having finished the flyover PLÜSCHOW returned to USHUAIA and later to Punta Arenas. The cutter was sold on and PLÜSCHOW travelled to Germany over several months, returning to Punta Arenas at the end of 1930. He restarted his reconnaissance flights over Chilean and Argentinean Patagonia, and died - together with DREBLOW his loyal mechanic - on the 28th of January 1931 when, due to a damaged wing of the plane which had been provisionally repaired, the plane lost height, crashing in a branch of Lake Argentino.

The exploit of Günther PLÜSCHOW deserves the recognition of the nautical community and especially of Cap-Horniers. If mastering the Cape in a surface ship is and always will be an adventure, then flying over - with the precarious elements of the age - obliges us to admit that the German naval aviator Günther PLÜSCHOW deserves a seat of honour in history for being the first human that flew over one of the most inaccessible and feared geographic accidents in the whole world.