Cuba: Nonstop to Moscow

The flight is the world's longest nonstop passenger run in the world's largest transport. Once a week, an immense Russian turboprop TU-114 transport lifts from the runway of Havana's José Marti airport and points north on the 6,800-mile run to Moscow. Among the passengers aboard last week's flight was TIME'S Correspondent Edmund Stevens, the first Westerner ever to make the trip. His report:

One struggles up a ramp that is like a staircase leading to the fourth floor of a building—the TU-114 is around 40 ft. high when standing on the ground. Inside...