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Air and space museum opens in Germany

FRIEDRICHSHAFEN, Germany — One of Claude Dornier’s planes — the 1925 Dornier Merkur — set seven world records in its first year. Another that could land on water was used by polar explorer Roald Amundsen over the Arctic in 1926.

Now a museum focused on the life and work of the German-born aeronautics pioneer opened July 24 in the southern German town of Friedrichshafen, where Dornier started his first factory.

The 30 million euro privately funded museum brings together vintage aircraft, replicas and interactive displays on a site near Friedrichshafen Airport.

The focus is on the aircraft, but it also integrates an exhibit on the dark side of the company: its use of slave laborers under the Nazis. Visitors learn about the era through firsthand audio and video displays featuring laborers’ own recollections.

Dornier, an engineer, started his career in the aviation industry in 1910 working for the Luftschiffbau Zeppelin company, which made airships. He worked there through World War I, distinguishing himself and was promoted to the head of his own department.

After the war, in 1922, he started work for the spinoff company Dornier-Metallbauten GmbH, and became the sole shareholder in 1932.

Dornier won international acclaim for his revolutionary designs — bringing to fruition a number of different aircraft projects made completely out of metal.

According to the museum, his Dornier Merkur, a single-engine, strut-braced monoplane, set seven world records in its first year. A replica is on display.

His Dornier Wal, a so-called “flying boat,” was used by Amundsen for his flights over the Arctic in 1926. Another flying boat, the Dornier X, came out in 1929 and was the largest such aircraft of its time.

“Can we allow everything that the Dornier company has achieved over nearly a century and all the projects on which so many people have worked so hard to simply vanish?” said Silvius Dornier, one of Claude Dornier’s six sons and initiator of the museum.

The museum houses several original planes including: A Dornier 31, a transport jet capable of vertical take-off and landing; a Dornier 27, the first mass-produced aircraft in Germany after World War II; and the Dornier 228, a twin turboprop light transport aircraft with short takeoff and landing capability.

Some of the aircraft are still air worthy. Spokeswoman Susi Peschke said plans are underway to regularly show some in flight.