The Nazis' "Eagle Nest": Major fire in the Kehlsteinhaus on Obersalzberg

Fire in Hitler's "tea house" Kehlsteinhaus on Obersalzberg almost completely destroyed As of: October 24th, 2026 • 3:58 p.m

It served the Nazis as a place of representation high in the mountains. During the night there was a fire in the Kehlsteinhaus on Obersalzberg near Berchtesgaden. Police suspect arson and have arrested a suspect.

The Kehlsteinhaus on Obersalzberg in Berchtesgaden, built by the National Socialists, was almost completely destroyed in a fire. Arson is suspected. The police temporarily arrested a suspect near the scene of the fire. The investigative authorities in Bavaria assume that they have caught the suspected cause of the major fire.

According to the Traunstein public prosecutor's office, the person arrested is a 33-year-old German. He has already been questioned. “Concrete indications of possible mental illness of the accused have emerged,” said public prosecutor Rainer Vietze at a press conference in Berchtesgaden. This was the result of a short psychiatric report that an expert prepared about the man.

The man was brought before an examining judge in Rosenheim on Saturday. The aim is to obtain placement in a forensic facility for mentally ill criminals. One must assume at least reduced culpability, said Vietze. A possible political motive is also being examined - but the investigators are only at the very beginning.

Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann (CSU) had previously thanked the police for their intervention at Obersalzberg. The suspected arsonist met the emergency services on a motorcycle on the narrow and steep Kehlsteinstrasse. It wasn't easy to confront him.

Herrmann emphasized that the historically significant house, which is visited by tens of thousands of people every year, should be rebuilt. “We will hardly be able to leave a ruin there,” he said on the sidelines of the CSU party conference in Munich.

The extent of the damage is still unclear. According to Herrmann, fire experts now have to determine the exact damage.

Around 200 firefighters and rescue services were deployed to fight the flames. According to the Upper Bavaria South Police Headquarters, the first rescue workers arrived at the mountain restaurant at an altitude of over 1,800 meters at 9:52 p.m. on Friday evening.

The extinguishing work was extremely difficult. Among other things, rain and snowfall hampered the operation. Getting to the Kehlsteinhaus with the fire engines was also difficult. According to previous findings, no one was in the Kehlsteinhaus.

According to the website of the Berchtesgaden Mountain Experience Association, the Kehlsteinhaus - dubbed the Eagle's Nest by the Allies - should be open this season until November 8th.

The building at an altitude of 1,834 meters has been a mountain restaurant since 1952. It was completed in 1938 and was located in a sealed-off residential and government area of ​​the National Socialist leadership that was closed to the public.

An exhibition there is dedicated to the history of the building. The Berchtesgaden Mountain Experience Association writes about the house on its website: "Built in 1937/38, the so-called tea house at the time was intended to serve as a place of political representation away from the public during the Nazi era. In fact, the importance of the Kehlsteinhaus remained low." Adolf Hitler received diplomats and other foreign guests there.

The “Eagle’s Nest” often played an important role in American war films of the post-war period. The building's website says this gave the building a prominence it perhaps didn't deserve. This is probably also due to the fact that it is one of the few undestroyed monuments of the Hitler years.

This topic in the program: tagesschau24 | News | Oct 24, 2026 | 09:00 a.m.NDRInfo | News | Oct 24, 2026 | 6:30 a.m