2024-12-16 19:41:00
Oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree. The file bears the stamp “strictly confidential!” and the words “Ministry for State Security”. At the request of the BILD, the document was released by the Federal Archives.
“SU. On January 7, 1986, between 1.20 pm and 4.04 pm, a failure of block A 10 (500 megawatts) occurred at the GDR lignite power plant in Jänschwalde. In the course of a secret operation the investigators of the Stasi investigated the causes of the blackout and came to a surprising conclusion.
Read also
“This was caused by an earth fault which occurred because the wires from the Christmas tree ended up on the transformer bar of the block,” the Stasi agents recorded in bureaucratic language. But how did the trappings of the GDR end up on the transformer rail and paralyze state electricity production?
Before there were more tinsel: a GDR tinsel box from 1967 with a viewing window from the PGH Steinheid Thuringia production.
The Stasi learned that a Christmas tree had been set up on the upper floor of the power plant’s workshop building, apparently heavily decorated with decorations. The tree should be disposed of after New Year. An employee of a power plant received instructions from his boss “not to remove the Christmas tree from the stairs, but from the window of the workshop building”.
A fatal mistake, as you can see from the Stasi documents. When the Christmas tree was thrown out of the window, the tinsel broke off from the needles and, “due to the influence of the wind, ended up about 35 meters away” on a bus bar to which all the lines are connected incoming and outgoing. The tinsel burned out and triggered the short circuit.
Stasi Tinsel file: In January 1986 the GDR state security investigated the blackout at the Jänschwalde power plant which, according to the findings of the secret police, was caused by Tinsel
“A power plant failure caused by tinsel seems at first glance to be a joke. Since it concerned energy supply, it was of great importance for the security of the GDR,” explains Professor Daniela Münkel, responsible for research in the Stasi document archive. The BILD expert: “The Cottbus district administration of state security immediately drew up a detailed report on the ‘Tinse Gate’ and forwarded it to the XVIII main department responsible for the economy and the central evaluation and evaluation group in Berlin. information from the Stasi.”
According to the documents, the blackout led to a “complicated situation for electricity supply”, because at the same time a second one occurred Blockade of the power plant pipe damage, resulting in a total loss of 1,000 megawatts, enough to power several hundred thousand households.
#Stasi #file #revealed #Christmas #tree #trappings #shut #GDR #power #plant #Life #knowledge