On December 12, 1986, an Aeroflot plane crashed near Berlin. 72 people are killed, including 20 students from Schwerin. They were on their way back from a class trip to Minsk.
This Friday in December 1986 is a foggy day. Dense clouds are moving low over the south-east of Berlin. Around 5 p.m., the calm in a small piece of forest near Bohnsdorf, near Berlin Schönefeld Airport, is broken by a thunderous explosion. A plane just crashed. The Tupolev 134 of the Soviet airline Aeroflot had first touched the treetops. After the crash, it immediately bursts into flames. 72 of the 82 occupants die in one of the worst German air disasters.
Only seven students survive
Among the victims is a school class from the Schwerin Ernst Schneller High School, now called the Nils Holgersson School. They were returning from a final trip to the Belarusian capital, Minsk. Only seven students survived. 20 students, one teacher and two supervisors died.
Pilot didn't understand English
The cause of the crash is believed to be pilot error. It was said that the Russian pilot did not understand English and headed for the wrong runway. But there are also rumors that a technical defect caused the crash. Out of consideration for the "big brother" Soviet Union, a great deal of secrecy was pursued about the cause of the accident after the catastrophe. The sometimes unworthy treatment of the victims' families by government agencies also caused resentment. Only handpicked guests were allowed to attend the central funeral service. The parents of the surviving youths were only allowed to attend after they complained.
If the son doesn't come back
Among the victims was 16-year-old Torsten Kadzioch. On the 30th anniversary of the accident, his father Bernhard from Schwerin spoke to the NDR - and at the time he still had the day of the accident clearly in mind:together with his wife, he and his wife went to the train station on December 12, a Friday, to pick up his son . It should have landed in Berlin a few hours earlier. But it was a time without cellphones, without internet. A time when not every message spread worldwide in a matter of minutes.
"We went to the train station and wanted to pick up the boy. When we were standing at the station, a teacher was already there. When she noticed that we were standing there so completely helpless and were searching and noticed, nothing happened, no Torsten came again, none of the boys are coming back, so the teacher came up to us. She said the plane had crashed, the children probably won't come." Bernhard Kadzioch speaks the last words of the sentence very softly, almost silently.
Plaque at the scene of the accident
Since 2012, a memorial stone at the Schwerin Forest Cemetery has commemorated the children and their companions who died in the crash in December 1986. A central place of mourning is located in the forest near Bohnsdorf. In the years after the disaster, nature gradually reclaimed the site of the accident. Until the commemorative plaque was erected, only the different ages of the pines provided a subtle clue to the scene of the accident.