Aerospace

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  Die Bücker Bü 131 ist eines der ersten und weltweit bekanntesten Kunstflugzeuge. – Ein großes gelbes Flugzeug hängt senkrecht im offenen Treppenhaus des Neubaus. Im Hintergrund hängen weitere Flugzeuge und Flugapparate.

• Einmal Pilot sein? Kinder können zu bestimmten Zeiten ins Cockpit der Focke Wulf A 16 klettern. In dem kleinen Verkehrsflugzeug aus den 1920er Jahren konnten nur drei Passagiere mitfliegen. – Ein kleiner Junge sitzt im Cockpit eines historischen Flugzeugs. Auf Augenhöhe mit dem Jungen kniet ein Mann auf einer Leiter.

• Die Erfolgsgeschichte des Fliegens begann mit Otto Lilienthals ersten Flugversuchen und seinen selbstgebauten Segelapparaten. – Im offenen Treppenhaus des Neubaus schwebt ein Segelapparat mit Holzgestell und aufgespannten, weißen Tragflächen.

Pioneering achievements, adventurous air journeys, but also air war and forced labor: the exhibition "From Balloon to Airlift" uses more than 40 aircraft to illuminate the highs and lows of German aviation and combines them with the personal experiences of contemporary witnesses.

The exhibition begins with a model of a balloon. It is based on a satirical drawing from 1790 and shows how the first balloon ascents fired people's imagination. One hundred years later, the steerable airship and the successful gliding flights of Otto Lilienthal ushered in a rapid further development of aviation technology.

During the First World War, the aeroplane was further developed, produced in large numbers and used for reconnaissance and combat flights. The exhibition shows how aerial cameras, radio technology and weapons found their way into the aircraft and how the fighter pilots were glorified as "knights of the air". The exhibition contrasts this heroic image with the "invisible" work of ground personnel and female workers in the aircraft factories.

During the Second World War, air warfare reached a new dimension. The widespread dropping of bombs destroyed European cities and cost the lives of hundreds of thousands of civilians. The wreckage of a Ju 87 dive bomber symbolises the horror of the bombing war, and the exhibition uses the example of V2 production to show how forced labourers and concentration camp prisoners were forced to build German aircraft and rockets under inhumane conditions. Survivors have their say in interviews with contemporary witnesses.

The Douglas C-47 visible from afar on the building of the German Museum of Technology is a reminder of the Airlift of 1948/49, when "raisin bombers" supplied the western sectors of the city with the necessities of life during the blockade of Berlin by the Soviet military. The exhibition uses individual examples to show how differently aviation developed in divided Germany. And the German Museum of Technology is venturing into space: the expansion of the exhibition on space travel is under construction.

Runtime: from January 2001

Price info: Admission is free for those under 18 and up to the completion of regular schooling.

Price: €8.00

Reduced price: €4.00

Reduced price info: Discounts are available to the following, with appropriate proof:

Students

Unemployed persons

Severely disabled persons (from 50%)

Recipients of social welfare

Recipients of benefits under the Asylum Seekers' Benefits Act (Asylbewerberleistungsgesetz)

Federal volunteers and those doing voluntary military service

Berliners with the berlinpass and berlinpass-BuT

Groups from institutions for the disabled

Takes place here:

• Deutsches Technikmuseum Berlin