The failed attempt alerted the East German authorities to the plot, but the police were unable to identify the escapees before their second, successful flight two months later.

East German border troops were instructed to prevent defection to West Germany by all means, including lethal force (Schießbefehl; "order to fire").

[2] Peter Strelzyk (1942–2017), an electrician and former East German Air Force mechanic, and Günter Wetzel (born 1955), a bricklayer by trade,[3] were colleagues at a local plastics factory.

Subsequent calculations determined a balloon capable of lifting this weight would need to hold 2,000 cubic metres (71,000 cu ft) of air heated to 100 °C (212 °F).

[6] The pair lived in Pößneck, a small town of about 20,000 where large quantities of cloth could not be obtained without raising attention.

The gondola was made from an iron frame, sheet metal floor, and clothesline run around the perimeter every 150 millimetres (5.9 in) for the sides.

After weeks of additional searching, they found a 25-metre (82 ft) cliff at a rock quarry where they could suspend the balloon vertically before inflation, but that also proved unsuccessful.

They constructed a blower with a 14 hp (10 kW) 250 cc (15 cu in) motorcycle engine taken from Wetzel's old MZ, started with a Trabant automobile starter powered by jumper cables from Strelzyk's Moskvitch sedan.

The quantity they needed had to be ordered, and although they feared the purchase might be reported to East Germany's State Security Service (Stasi), they returned the next day and picked up the material without incident.

Disappointed with the result, Wetzel decided to abandon the project and instead started to pursue the idea of building a small gasoline engine-powered light aeroplane[6] or a glider.

He modified the gondola to mount the propane tanks upside down, and returned to the test site where he found the new configuration produced a 12-metre (39 ft) long flame.

Unsure of where they were, Strelzyk explored until he found a piece of litter – a bread bag from a bakery in Wernigerode, an East German town.

The group spent nine hours carefully extricating themselves from the 500-metre (1,600 ft) wide border zone to avoid detection.

[6] On 14 August, the Stasi launched an appeal to find the "perpetrator of a serious offence", listing in detail all the items recovered at the landing site.

They needed 1,250 square metres (13,500 sq ft) of taffeta, and purchased the material, in various colours and patterns, all over the country in order to escape suspicion.

Confident in their calculations, they found the weather conditions right on 15 September, when a violent thunderstorm created the correct winds.

[6] Lifting off just after 2:00 am, the group failed to cut the tethers holding the gondola to the ground at the same time, tilting the balloon and sending the flame towards the fabric, which caught fire.

After putting out the fire with an extinguisher brought along for just such an emergency, they climbed to 2,000 metres (6,600 ft) in nine minutes, drifting towards West Germany at 30 kilometres per hour (19 mph).

[6] They had also been detected on the East German side by a night watchman at the district culture house in Bad Lobenstein.

When the propane ran out, they descended quickly, landing near the town of Naila, in the West German state of Bavaria and only 10 km (6 mi) from the border.

[6] Propane gas tanks became registered products, and large quantities of fabric suitable for balloon construction could no longer be purchased.

[12] Erich Strelzyk learned of his brother's escape on the ZDF news and was arrested in his Potsdam apartment three hours after the landing.

The former, also called With the Wind to the West – the English translation of the German title – was an English-language film produced by Disney.

[12] The latter was a German-language production which "both families welcomed [Director] Herbig’s desire to, as he put it, 'make a German film for an international audience.'"