Tempelhof Airport 11/26/25
We spent our final day in Berlin visiting Tempelhof Airport. We had a guided tour of the some of the hangers and buildings by a very informative local historian. Tempelhof is located in the former West Berlin and is famous for being the site of the Berlin Airlift. During the early days of the Cold War in 1948, the USSR blocked the roads, rivers, and railways that led into West Berlin, so West Berliners had no way of receiving food, goods, or any other supplies. So the Western Allies said, OK, we’ll fly everything in. And they did. In 15 months, they flew over 270,000 flights to bring the city needed supplies, including coal. The USSR finally gave up and decided to make people miserable in other ways. Unfortunately, 101 people lost their lives in aircraft accidents. Apparently, planes crashed a lot back then.
The terminal building at Tempelhof was once one of the largest buildings in the world. The Nazis had big plans to make it even bigger, but well, it’s difficult to build infrastructure when you’re fighting a war on all fronts. It holds over 7000 rooms including a gym, a swimming pool, and the remains of a bowling alley. It’s like a giant maze in there. It was an American Army/Air Force Base for several years after the war, and had a large intelligence operation. The airport officially closed in 2008, and it is currently rented out to corporations, businesses, and universities, and used for making movies. Scenes from the Hunger Games, The Bourne Supremacy, Valkyrie, and Bridge of Spies, among others, were filmed here. The field is a park that is popular with the locals. In Hanger 7, Tempelhof houses the only surviving Focke-Wulf Condor aircraft, recovered from a fjord in Norway. The FW was heavily used by the Nazi’s and flown by Deutsche Luft Hansa, the precursor to the modern Lufthansa Airline. Incidentally, Deutsche Luft Hansa, as well as Siemens, VW, BMW, Benz, Krupp, Hugo Boss, and Bayer, among others, profited very nicely from the use of forced labor via concentration camp prisoners during the war. I suppose it’s easy to act like you don’t know the atrocities are happening right under your nose when you’re profiting from free labor.
Anyway, that wraps up our visit to Berlin. It’s been fun, festive, very cold, and a little sad, and we are looking forward to going home to our puppies and kitties. We are both feeling a little under the weather, so will be happy to sleep in our own bed again.
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