Winfried Freudenberg's fatal gas balloon flight

Winfried Freudenberg, born in 1956, and his wife Sabine began building a balloon out of polyethylene sheeting in their flat in January 1989. The envelope was about 13 metres high and 11 metres across, held by a net of packing string. To get access to natural gas, Freudenberg took a job in the gas supply department of an energy combine.

On the night of 7–8 March 1989 the couple began filling the balloon at a gas regulator station in Blankenburg in the north of East Berlin. Around 1:30 a.m. a passer-by noticed it and alerted the police. With a police car arriving, the couple decided in haste that Winfried should take off alone; Sabine stayed behind and was arrested.

The balloon drifted over Berlin for about five hours, far longer than planned. At around 7:30 a.m. it came down in the West Berlin district of Zehlendorf. According to the Chronik der Mauer, the balloon dropped quickly, was then pushed upward again by the wind, and the sudden jolt threw Freudenberg out; he fell to the ground and suffered fatal injuries.

Sabine Freudenberg was charged with attempting to cross the border illegally and given a three-year suspended sentence, and was amnestied on 27 October 1989. A memorial stele now marks the site in Zehlendorf where her husband died, eight months before the Wall opened.