Urlaub am Todesstreifen: Feriengäste in Lebensgefahr!

A misaligned East German self-firing device threatens a Hessian holiday farm directly on the inner-German border. The killing machine is positioned so that one of its craters points directly at the farm – at guests, children, and the residents themselves. What to do? Before Ralph Giordano documents this dramatic incident, his journey along the border first takes him near the Thuringian town of Großtöpfer in the idyllic Friedatal valley. There, his team films so-called light barriers, which provide an additional surveillance element for the East German border guards at night. During filming, East German border guards observe, photograph, and film the team – a constant game of cat and mouse. At night, an eerie scene unfolds: A visual and acoustic alarm is suddenly triggered at the protective fence – it remains unclear whether it is caused by a bird, an animal, or a person. Within minutes, East German border guards arrive on motorcycles, followed by a special vehicle with a searchlight. The search operation lasts over an hour. A gruesome parallel: The night before, two SM-70 bombs exploded near Veltheim in the Wolfenbüttel district. Eyewitnesses reported that East German soldiers carried an injured person in a tracksuit away from the barrier – a horrifying sight! The "Border '78" film crew traveled on to Philippsthal on the Werra River, where Reichsstraße 84 once connected Frankfurt and Leipzig. In 1978, however, the road abruptly ended at the Wall and barriers – these have been continually perfected for decades. Particularly impressive is a modern barrier that blocks the Werra River across its entire width and right down to its bottom – even swimmers, boats, and divers have no chance of crossing the border. A curious symbol of the division also stands here: a house through which the old border runs – one half is West German, the other is in East Germany and is dilapidated. Opposite the Wall lies Vacha, where the bridge over the Werra River was once an important crossing point for trade and citizens. In 1978, the bridge was heavily guarded by the GDR – it was now merely a memorial to the past. A change of scene, a good 20 kilometers further south: For the Faulstich family in Nüsttal near Fulda, everyday life became a real ordeal! Fear and insomnia dominated their lives, while their life's work – the holiday business at Lörnhof – threatened to collapse. Located just a few meters from the border, the situation ultimately escalated dramatically. It wasn't until the beginning of August 1978 that the GDR replaced the old barbed wire with a modern expanded metal fence equipped with an SM-70 automatic firing device. Shocking: One of the craters pointed directly at the Faulstich family's farm – it had been incorrectly adjusted and now threatened to injure people in the West. Just a few days before filming, early in the morning, an SM-70 had exploded. A loud bang roused the family and their holiday guests from their sleep. The fear is boundless: "I can't live here anymore," farmer Oskar Faulstich declares in despair. His vacationers feel like they're living "on the front lines." Guests are leaving, and the vacation business is facing closure. For the family, which had invested heavily in modernizing their house, barn, and machinery, it's an existential blow. Giordano's film vividly shows how closely West and East, life and death, touch on the border. The fate of the Lörnhof farm in the Rhön region of Hesse, in particular, clearly demonstrates the great dangers posed by the GDR's border security – not only for refugees from the East, but also for people who simply want to live in peace in the West... 🎥 Source: Sender Freies Berlin (SFB) 📼 VHS recording, digitized and posted online for the preservation of contemporary historical documents. #GDR #Border #Self-Firing Device #SM70 #RalphGiordano #History #GDREscape #Philippsthal #Vacha #Nüsttal #BorderArea #VHS#Rewound