The German Spaceflight Exhibition ("Deutsche Raumfahrtausstellung") in Morgenröthe-Rautenkranz

Old and (go visit the) New Exhibition

To commemorate the spaceflight of the first (East-) German cosmonaut Sigmund Jähn in August 1978 this exhibition was founded in 1979 at his birthplace, the small village Morgenröthe-Rautenkranz situated in a mountainous region in southern east Germany. Even though the village is way off the main traffic routes and the exhibition space was very limited from the beginning (about 100 sqm, later extended to about 200 sqm), this "Permanent Exhibition - First Joint Spaceflight USSR-GDR" ("Ständige Ausstellung erster gemeinsamer Kosmosflug UdSSR-DDR") attracted nearly 700 000 visitors in the 10 years until the reunification of Germany.

Following some very difficult transition years and only due to the determination and spirit of a number of space enthusiasts the now renamed "German Spaceflight Exhibition" ("Deutsche Raumfahrtausstellung") managed to stay alive and came back to greet some 50 000 visitors a year in the early 2000s.

Over the decades the number of available exhibits grew and the small station building was no longer adequate. In 2006 construction of a large new exhibition complex started at a nearby site of the village. On March 27 2007 the new exhibition site was opened to the public.

The modern new site with an exhibition area of nearly a thousand sqm features a lot of exiting exhibits, including for example the full-scale Russian made MIR station basic block training replica or a space docking simulator. The exhibition is really worth a visit, I made the trip two more times already.

So every spaceflight enthusiast out there:
Go and visit the NEW German Spaceflight Exhibition in Morgenröthe-Rautenkranz!

Contact

web: www.deutsche-raumfahrtausstellung.de

Deutsche Raumfahrtausstellung Morgenröthe-Rautenkranz e.V.
Bahnhofstraße 4
D-08262 Muldenhammer
Germany

I visited the old exhibition once in 2005 and was very much charmed by the crowded but very interesting displays, some emanating a nice touch of space nostalgia. Since I took some pictures then (of course not enough, there are never enough pictures for 3D modelling) I decided to include the old exhibition in my 3D reconstruction practise and try to recreate the special atmosphere of the Space Age crammed into an old village station ...

Next: The 3D Project