Three young men swim the Teltow Canal
Shortly after 2 a.m. three young men used a wooden ladder to scale the barriers in Teltow and swam the 40-metre-wide Teltow Canal to Zehlendorf, helped by a guard's lost magazine.
Shortly after 2 a.m. on 24 September 1986 three young men in Teltow used a wooden ladder to climb the three-metre rear wall, the signal fence and a final three-metre wire-mesh fence.
They then swam across the roughly 40-metre-wide Teltow Canal to Berlin-Zehlendorf and arrived unhurt.
Border soldiers had in fact spotted them, but one guard slipped in the dark interior of a watchtower while climbing down and lost the magazine of his submachine gun. By the time it had been found, the three had disappeared.
Sources
- Gelungene Flucht über den Teltowkanal nach Berlin-Zehlendorf, 24. September 1986Chronik der Mauer
- Flucht aus der DDR: Durchs WasserDemokratiegeschichten
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