The Eagle’s Nest mountainous retreat built for Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler in the Bavarian Alps has been devastated by a blaze, the German police have said.
The former tea house for the leader of the Third Reich, which was constructed on the peak of the Obersalzberg in southern Germany in 1938, sits at an altitude of 1,834 meters (6,000 feet).
A fire alarm at the Eagle’s Nest went off on Friday evening, and it was completely engulfed in flames by the time emergency services arrived, the police said.
The high elevation complicated the work of some 200 fire fighters, who were only able to extinguish the blaze on Saturday morning, they added.
“It is damaged to a large extent. The house is unlikely to be saved,” a police spokesperson told Bild tabloid.
The police said that a suspect had been arrested in connection with the fire, but revealed no further details.
According to Bild, the detained person was a motorcyclist whom the officers encountered on their way to the burning retreat, but his involvement in the case currently remains unclear. Investigators believe arson caused the fire, the paper’s sources claimed.
Following reports of the blaze, the Bavarian authorities announced plans to rebuild the structure, Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann said.
“We will not allow ruins to remain there,” DPA quoted him as saying.
The Eagle’s Nest was one of the few historic building from Hitler’s era to avoid damage by bombing during the World War II. The retreat hosted a museum and a restaurant since the 1950s, becoming a popular tourist destination. It was preserved as “a cautionary reminder of the abysses of the inhumane Nazi dictatorship,” according to its website.
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