Looking back this was one of my favourite sites of the trip, despite it terrifying me whilst I was there. One of the reason's for this is that it resembles one of the old US "Texas Towers".
Teufelsberg is an artificial hill in Berlin's Grunewald Forest in the Former British Sector, the hill was created out of the rubble of the heavily damaged West Berlin by the Allies. Originally there was a Nazi era, Albert Speer designed, Technical School at the site. This Technical School proved to much hassle to the British trying to demolish it, so they buried it and made a hill instead. Teufelsberg means 'Devils Mountain' in German.
The listening station was built when a Mobile Allied Listening Unit drove up the hill and found that reception, and therefore interception, of Soviet and DDR military communications markedly better. The US NSA(National Security Agency) eventually took over the running of the Allied built facility, with the exception of building 1455 which was operated by the British Army. It remained in use until the reunification of Germany in 1990, with the British Antenna being removed in 1992.
I'd really like to revisit this place as I didn't take many photographs, but I did shoot some Super-8, which I need to get sorted.
Anyway, images:
Teufelsberg is an artificial hill in Berlin's Grunewald Forest in the Former British Sector, the hill was created out of the rubble of the heavily damaged West Berlin by the Allies. Originally there was a Nazi era, Albert Speer designed, Technical School at the site. This Technical School proved to much hassle to the British trying to demolish it, so they buried it and made a hill instead. Teufelsberg means 'Devils Mountain' in German.
The listening station was built when a Mobile Allied Listening Unit drove up the hill and found that reception, and therefore interception, of Soviet and DDR military communications markedly better. The US NSA(National Security Agency) eventually took over the running of the Allied built facility, with the exception of building 1455 which was operated by the British Army. It remained in use until the reunification of Germany in 1990, with the British Antenna being removed in 1992.
I'd really like to revisit this place as I didn't take many photographs, but I did shoot some Super-8, which I need to get sorted.
Anyway, images: