Leipzig-Mockau Airport
| Leipzig-Mockau Airport | |
|---|---|
|
|
| Characteristics | |
| ICAO code |
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| Coordinates | |
| Height above MSL | 131 m (430 ft ) |
| Transport links | |
| Distance from the city center | 6.5 km northeast of Leipzig |
| Street | B 2 |
| Basic data | |
| opening | June 22, 1913 |
| closure | May 31, 1991 |
| operator | most recently Interflug |
| surface | 210 ha |
| Runways | |
| 07/25 | 1560 m × 45 m concrete |
| 07R | 1000 m × 50 m grass (emergency runway) |
| 25R | 1000 m × 50 m grass (emergency runway) |
The Leipzig-Mockau Airport (former ICAO code : ETLM ) was the first civil airport of Leipzig . It was commissioned in 1913 as an airship port and pilot station. During the First and Second World Wars, production facilities for the aircraft defense industry existed on the site, and the area served as a works airfield . Mockau Airport was used for civilian purposes until it was closed in 1991.
planning
After Saxony's first civil airfield opened in Lindenthal near Leipzig in 1911 , plans for an airport were also started in the city itself.
Citizens of Leipzig founded a company with the aim of establishing an airship port company . Shares for 937,000 marks could be subscribed and on March 15, 1913 the Leipziger Luftschiffhafen- und Flugplatz-Aktiengesellschaft (LEFAG) was founded with a share capital of 1.2 million marks.
After the city of Leipzig, after the death of Adolph Andreas Friedrich Gontard (1834-1909), owner of the Mockau manor , from whose widow the manor had acquired in 1912, they made 112 hectares of the area available to the stock corporation free of charge for 30 years. The city took over the development costs for the airfield area located on the corridor of the Mockau incorporated in 1915 and granted an annual grant of 20,000 marks.
opening
On January 1, 1913, the Seibert company from Saarbrücken began building an airship hangar based on the plans of the Leipzig civil engineer Paul Ranft (1854–1938). The steel structure in the middle of the square had a footprint of 193 × 77 meters, the clear height was 25 meters with a ridge height of 32 meters. The hall with a usable area of 17,765 m² offered space for two Zeppelin airships . The construction costs of what was then the largest airship hangar in the world amounted to 850,000 marks.
The inauguration of the airship hangar took place on June 22, 1913. The elderly Graf Zeppelin arrived on board the Zeppelin Zeppelin LZ 17 Sachsen and its escort ship LZ 11 Viktoria Luise at around 3:30 p.m. The Saxon King Friedrich August III. inaugurated the hall and opened the airship port and airfield in Leipzig .
The two zeppelins LZ 13 Hansa and LZ 17 Sachsen were housed in the airship hangar . As a result of excessive snow and ice loads, the hall collapsed on February 8, 1917 in a storm. It burned down completely in the subsequent explosion.
Also in 1913, Germany's first airport hotel was built on Dübener Landstrasse according to the plans of city planner Otto Wilhelm Scharenberg . A restaurant with a large hall was located on the ground floor of the building. A pilot's home with bedrooms, bathrooms and an officers' mess was on the first floor. There was also an open terrace facing the airfield. The building, which is now vacant, is one of the few remaining massive structures from the early days of aviation.
In the first World War
In the year up to the First World War , several hundred zeppelins and airplanes took off from Mockau. With the beginning of the war, the airport was only used for military purposes.
In 1914, the Bavarian Airship Squad No. 1 and III, subordinate to the Naval Airship Department Nordholz, were at the airship port in Leipzig. Naval Airship Detachment stationed. Military airships such as the Z VI and Z III Army Zeppelins were also in port in Mockau. The airship port served the Imperial Navy until 1915.
During the First World War, some aircraft manufacturers set up factories for the production of armaments at Mockau Airport for the first time. These were Deutsche Flugzeug-Werke GmbH (DFW), Germania-Flugzeugwerke GmbH and Automobil und Aviatik AG .
After the war, the gates of the hangars were walled up so that they could no longer be used for aircraft storage under the terms of the Versailles Treaty .
In the 1920s
On May 21, 1922, the Leipzig city council decided to provide several million marks for the expansion of the airport. In the spring of 1923, Reich President Friedrich Ebert reopened Mockau Airport as a “world airport”. The airport now extended north to Seehausen territory, the border between Leipzig and Seehausen ran roughly in the middle of the square. In 1926 night air traffic and a trade fair flight service began. By 1929 it was equipped with all the structural and technical systems required for a commercial airport. A few years after the founding of Deutsche Luft Hansa in 1926, Mockau airport stepped back from the new airport in Schkeuditz , which was in the then Prussian province of Saxony .
In 1928/1929 the Leipzig architect Georg Wünschmann built the new LEFAG administration building, a two-story reinforced concrete low-rise with a clinker brick facade in the modern style . This building was to be followed by four more identical blocks, but they were not executed. On the ground floor of the administration building there was a check-in hall for passengers, airline offices, the airport administration and the air police . There was a three-tier terrace on the roof. At the two corners of the building facing the airfield there was a glazed stair tower. From 1928 to 1932 the Junkers aerial photo center was located in the airport administration building.
The Junkers aircraft factory AG Dessau (Jfa) established a central repair yard. For this purpose, construction of the large aircraft hangar III began in spring 1928 based on a joint design by LEFAG and Jfa, which was opened on November 16, 1928. The workshops were connected to the 100 × 30 meter hall, which was equipped with two electrically movable sliding folding doors, each 45 meters long and 7 meters high, so that a floor area of 1200 m² resulted. In 1929 the shipyard was inaugurated in the presence of Hugo Junkers . The global economic crisis that broke out almost at the same time, however, severely restricted operations from the start. After Jfa had stopped paying subsidies in March 1932, the Junkers shipyard in Leipzig had to be closed on June 30th.
Before and during World War II
Since 1933, Mockau Airport was the venue for the NS “Volksflugtage”. In March 1933, the Junkers aircraft yard was reopened with the support of the Nazi government. The newly created Luftwaffe began using the site on November 7, 1935 and founded an Air Force School in 1938, which lasted until 1944.
Since 1936, as part of the armament of the Wehrmacht, air armament companies have been established: on the northern edge of the square (Seehausener Strasse, Seehausen district), Plant 3 of the Allgemeine Transportanlagen-Gesellschaft (ATG), in the southeast (Vierzehn-Trees-Weg, Mockau district) Plant II of the Erla machine works and a branch of the Mitteldeutsche Motorenwerke (MiMo), which manufactured aircraft engines in their main plant located between Portitz and Taucha . The Junkers extended 1936-1938 their yard Leipzig Mockau. On the southwestern border of the square on the extended Ostmarkenweg (northwest of today's Walter-Albrecht-Weg, Mockau district), a new repair yard was built for 2,000 to 3,000 employees with two assembly and arming halls; the topping-out ceremony for the administration building took place on September 4, 1937. The land remained in the possession of LEFAG, which had concluded usage agreements with the armaments companies.
In September 1939, with the beginning of the Second World War, an aircraft pilot's school (FFS C 7) moved from the Celle-Wietzenbruch air base to Mockau, but stayed only a few weeks and moved to Finsterwalde before Christmas 1939 .
During the air raids on Leipzig , Mockau Airport and its armaments factories were the target. For the first time on the night of August 25-26, 1940, the British Royal Air Force (RAF) bombers took off with the aim of Erla-Werke and Mockau Airport, but they lost their way and did not find their targets. Also on October 20, 1943, the air armament operations remained unscathed during a major attack on Leipzig due to poor weather conditions. In the heaviest air raid on December 4, 1943 , in which around 2000 people were killed, the aircraft industry was also affected for the first time. A large number of fuselages and aircraft were destroyed or damaged at ATG, Junkers and Erla, but overall the economic failures were not serious. It was not until the attack on February 20, 1944 at the beginning of “ Big Week ” that the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) carried out a major attack on the Mockau airport complex. Bombs fell on almost all Leipzig aircraft factories, causing the most serious damage at Mockau Airport. The USAAF flew further attacks on the airport and factory facilities on May 29 and July 20, 1944. Nevertheless, the Allies were unable to completely shut down the Leipzig aviation industry.
In April 1945 the Luftwaffe ordered the blasting of the runway, which had largely been spared. The concrete surfaces were already mined, but the blasting was no longer carried out. Since April 14, the USAAF flew space attacks on the airport; Only at this point in time did Erla finally cease production, ATG and Junkers had already ended it a few days earlier. The airport was captured by American troops on April 19, 1945 and was officially under American occupation from May 1, 1945. The site was restored by the 818th EAB (Flugplatz-Baubataillon) and only used to a very limited extent until June 15.
At the beginning of July 1945 the airfield was handed over to the Red Army . The SMAD initially had the mines removed from the runway and began in 1946 with the dismantling of all industrial plants from Erla, ATG and Junkers. By the end of 1948, all the halls and factory facilities had disappeared, the steel recovered was taken to the Soviet Union as a reparation payment and the rolling and parking areas had been blown up.
As early as autumn 1945, the Red Army began operating again in Mockau . A-20 bombers of the 8th Guard Bombing Regiment were stationed . There was no permanent stationing of the Soviet military at Mockau Airport.
After 1945
The airfield site was initially largely unused. In 1946/1947, LEFAG had to sell and lease land to grow vegetables, potatoes and tobacco. The land could only be used for agricultural purposes for a short time, because in 1949 the authorities ordered the land to be cleared, as the space was to be used again for trade fair flights. The trade fair office submitted an application to SMAD in order to be able to receive "aircraft with foreign buyers". This was followed by the immediate order to complete the preparations for the start of a special trade fair service by August 20, 1949. On August 29, 1949, when a Douglas DC-3 of the ČSA landed at the Leipzig Autumn Fair, civil aviation in the post-war period began at Leipzig-Mockau Airport. The handling in the former airport hotel was carried out by Soviet personnel. Before that, Aeroflot , LOT and ČSA flights to and from Berlin-Schönefeld were handled exclusively by Soviet personnel.
For the spring fair in 1950, the space could then be used under the direction of German experts, but landings were only permitted during the day, and night flights had to switch to Berlin-Schönefeld.
After the founding of the GDR , on February 3, 1950, the Soviet Control Commission (SKK) ordered the site to be handed over to the GDR authorities. In 1951, the trade fair air traffic was officially resumed and the terminal building was provisionally repaired. Until 1955, the facilities in Mockau were only used twice a year as a trade fair airfield, as the sovereignty of the air was not transferred to the GDR until January 7, 1957, albeit strictly limited.
The first aviation activities took place in Mockau in 1952. The FDJ built a glider pilot station , which was later followed by a glider hangar. The first flight days of the glider pilots, which Wilhelm Pieck visited on June 1, 1952, took place in Mockau .
For an expansion of the airport, plans were drawn up in 1954 for the extension of the runway with a 400-meter-long motorway underpass, a second runway at an angle of 45 ° to the existing, and even a third, runway. None of these projects was carried out. In 1955, however, the administration building from 1929 was converted into a modern passenger handling building with a counter hall, transit room, customs and baggage handling. An additional floor with rooms for air traffic control and an all-round glazed control tower was built on the roof terrace . The former Fliegerheim in the Dübener Landstrasse 100 was in the 1950s to HO -Gaststätte and 1961 Mitropa OPERATION airport restaurant Leipzig Mockau with 70 seats in the dining room and 250 seats in the hall.
At the spring trade fair in 1956, the GDR's Deutsche Lufthansa took up special trade fair traffic on the Leipzig – Berlin-Schönefeld route. After completion of the expansion measures, Mockau Airport was included in the route network as a permanent Leipzig airport on June 16, 1957 and domestic air traffic was officially opened on seven routes between Berlin-Schönefeld, Leipzig, Dresden , Erfurt and Barth .
_1962,_MiNr_0915.jpg)
In the summer of 1958, Lufthansa’s “Economic Flight Group” began the preparatory work for the construction of a hangar for the repair of agricultural aircraft north of the commercial flight facilities. The shipyard was inaugurated on June 29, 1963. In the following years, a social building, a customs warehouse, a heating system, a hangar for agricultural flights, the approach and main entry signs for the instrument landing system and runway lighting were built. In addition, from April to June 1960, the runway was extended to 1,300 meters. Another extension to 1560 meters took place from October 1963 to May 1964. The new sections were 45 meters wide. However , the runway was still too short for modern jet aircraft . Therefore, in March 1963, today's repaired Leipzig / Halle Airport in Schkeuditz became the Leipzig Exhibition Center . On September 10, 1962 was the start of a 340 CV Convair of KLM instead of the last mass flight Mockau. Mockau Airport thus lost its approval as a commercial airport.
From July 24th to August 6th, 1966, the 8th World Championship in parachuting took place in Mockau, organized by the GDR Aeroclub . On July 20, 1969, on the occasion of the 5th German Gymnastics and Sports Festival, a major GST air show took place.
On January 1, 1969, the GDR's fifth agricultural air base was put into operation in Mockau , operating section 4 South with the Leipzig and Dresden squadrons (seat: Kesselsdorf ) of the forest squadron (seat: Erfurt) and the central Leipzig shipyard . The company academy, which was inaugurated on June 12, 1977, provided training for agricultural engineers as well as aircraft pilots and station mechanics for agricultural flights.
Before Leipzig Airport in Schkeuditz began operating all year round as a commercial airport on May 19, 1972 , the last scheduled aircraft took off from Mockau on March 6, 1972. The airport was henceforth called Interflug - Betrieb Agrarflug Leipzig, part of the site on Friedrichshafner Strasse used by GST as a sports airfield.
During the Leipzig Trade Fair, the reception building served as the “Leipzig-Mockau Registration Point” for the registration of West German trade fair guests who had arrived by motor vehicle.
Cessation of flight operations and development
On August 18, 1990, approval was granted to the airport Leipzig-Mockau as International airfield with a focus on handling and maintenance of commercial and private aircraft, and aircraft with up to 40 passengers. However, on May 31, 1991, the airport was closed for take-offs and landings. Aircraft movements with special permits continued until late autumn 1991.
The city of Leipzig made the land it owned available for industrial and commercial settlements. On June 18, 1991, the foundation stone was laid for the dispatch center of the Quelle mail-order company on the airport grounds . With the opening of the new Leipziger Messe on the Seehausen side, the rebuilding of the former airport was completed.
Only the former airfield from 1913 and the handling building with tower from 1929/1955 are currently preserved. Since they are not in use, the two buildings in Graf-Zeppelin-Ring 10 and 12 are currently falling into disrepair.
In 2013, plans were announced that would convert the historic airport building into a hotel. The plant was originally scheduled to open at the end of 2014. After the initial clean-up work, which took place from mid-2013 to the beginning of 2014 on the 30,000 m² area, the dilapidated airfield was to be included in the Zeppelin Park project . The wooden floor in the ballroom of the Fliegerheim cannot be preserved. The former tower of the airport was to offer rooms for conferences. The renovation of the facades and windows of the former terminal building and the airfield should start in spring 2014 and originally be completed in 2017. A hotel with around 300 rooms including boarding house apartments was planned between the two buildings . So far, these plans have not been carried out.
Traffic figures
| Year of operation | Passenger volume | Air freight [ t ] | Flight movements |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1925 | 16,399 | ||
| 1926 | 4,957 | ||
| 1929 | 18,658 | ||
| 1930 | 21,891 | ||
| 1931 | 28,496 | ||
| 1937 | 68.117 | ||
| 1940 | 25,527 | ||
| 1943 | 45,559 | ||
| * 1950 | 784 | 14.6 | 57 |
| * 1951 | 600 | 18.2 | 96 |
| * 1952 | 554 | 9.6 | 49 |
| * 1953 | 1,988 | 20.0 | 62 |
| * 1954 | 2,553 | 12.7 | 79 |
| * 1955 | 99 | ||
| * 1956 | 5,576 | 232 | |
| 1961 | 48,407 | ||
| 1962 | 47,381 | 3,336 | |
| 1963 | 41,803 | 2,313 | |
| 1964 | 52,925 | 2,598 | |
| 1965 | 66.005 | 285.0 | 2,663 |
| 1966 | 57,369 | 220.0 | 2,063 |
| 1967 | 61,423 | 166.5 | 1.993 |
| 1968 | 78,833 | 418.6 | 2,618 |
| 1969 | 80,594 | 249.6 | 2,603 |
| 1970 | 62.120 | 235.2 | 2,192 |
| 1971 | 55.092 | 238.0 | 2,280 |
missing information is not available
literature
- Klaus Breiler: About flying and landing. On the history of East German aviation. Passage-Verlag, Leipzig 2012, ISBN 978-3-938543-89-4 .
- Wolfram Sturm: Leipzig goes up in the air. Leipzig aviation from its beginnings to the present. Self publication . Engelsdorfer Verlag, Leipzig 2011, ISBN 978-3-86268-524-0 .
- Peter Kühne, Karsten Stölzel: Sachsenflug and fair charter. From the history of aviation in Leipzig and aircraft construction in Saxony. Connewitzer Verlagbuchhandlung, Leipzig 1999, ISBN 3-928833-41-3 .
- Lothar Brehmer, Günther Naumann, Eberhard Blobel: Aviation in Saxony. A historical outline. UniMedia, Baalsdorf 1998, ISBN 3-932019-32-6 .
- Wolfgang Hesse, Peter Kirchberg, Henry Lohr: 70 years of Leipzig-Halle Airport. Airport Leipzig / Halle GmbH, Leipzig u. Halle 1997, ISBN 3-00-001923-5 .
Web links
- Leipzig-Mockau Airport. In: Structurae
- Leipzig / Halle Airport: History of the Airport - Leipzig-Mockau Airport ( Memento from May 9, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
- Military Airfield Directory - Cold War airfields : Airfield / Leipzig-Mockau Airport
Individual evidence
- ^ Ulrich Bücholdt: Historical Register of Architects, Ranck – Ravoth ; accessed on December 2, 2015.
- ^ Kühne, Stölzel: Sachsenflug and fair charter. P. 15 f.
- ^ Karl Clausberg: Zeppelin. The story of an unlikely success. Weltbild Verlag, Augsburg 1990, ISBN 3-89350-030-8 , p. 171.
- ↑ Frank Zöllner (Ed.): Georg Wünschmann (1868–1937). A Leipzig architect and the plurality of styles. Passage-Verlag, Leipzig 2006, ISBN 3-938543-23-X , pp. 94-96.
- ↑ Peter Achs: Junkers in Leipzig, part 1. In: JET & PROP , H. 6/2012, p. 41.
- ↑ a b Kühne, Stölzel: Sachsenflug and fair charter. P. 57.
- ^ Lutz Freundt (ed.), Stefan Büttner: Red places. Russian military airfields, Germany 1945–1994. Air bases - aerodromes - military fallow. AeroLit-Verlag, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-935525-11-4 , p. 194.
- ↑ a b c Kühne, Stölzel: Sachsenflug and fair charter. P. 59.
- ↑ a b Hesse et al .: 70 years of Leipzig-Halle Airport. P. 79 f.
- ↑ Breiler: About flying and landing. P. 184
- ^ Kühne, Stölzel: Sachsenflug and fair charter. P. 61.
- ^ Helmut-Henning Schimpfermann : Wirtliches on the Pleiße. A gastronomic compendium of Leipzig. Verlag Die Quetsche, Hanau 1991, ISBN 3-9802743-0-6 , p. 46.
- ^ Kühne, Stölzel: Sachsenflug and fair charter. P. 64.
- ^ Hesse et al .: 70 years of Leipzig-Halle Airport. P. 86.
- ↑ a b Kühne, Stölzel: Sachsenflug and fair charter. P. 65.
- ↑ Breiler: About flying and landing. P. 136.
- ↑ Breiler: About flying and landing. P. 186 f.
- ^ Kühne, Stölzel: Sachsenflug and fair charter. P. 67 f.
- ↑ Breiler: About flying and landing. Pp. 125, 179.
- ↑ Breiler: About flying and landing. P. 126.
- ↑ Evelyn ter Vehn: Four-star hotel to kiss Mockau airport awake. In: Leipziger Volkszeitung from 13./14. July 2013, p. 5.
- ↑ Evelyn ter Vehn: Mockau Airport becomes a hotel complex. In: Leipziger Volkszeitung from 18./19. January 2014, p. 4.
- ↑ northgate enterprises group: Messeblick Leipzig GmbH ( Memento of the original dated October 2, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. ; accessed on May 8, 2018.
- ↑ Data for the years 1925–1931 from Kühne, Stölzel: Sachsenflug and Messecharter. P. 31.
- ↑ Data for the years 1937–1943 according to Kühne, Stölzel: Sachsenflug and Messecharter. P. 42.
- ↑ Data for the years 1950–1971 according to Hesse et al .: 70 years of Leipzig-Halle Airport. P. 162
