Gatow

For the former Royal Air Force station, see RAF Gatow.

Gatow
Quarter of Berlin
Panoramic by the Havel river
Location of Gatow in Spandau district and Berlin
Location of Gatow
Gatow Location within Germany Gatow Location within Berlin
Coordinates: 52°29′20″N 13°10′54″E
Country	Germany
State	Berlin
City	Berlin
Borough	Spandau
Founded	1258
Area
• Total	10.1 km2 (3.9 sq mi)
Elevation	35 m (115 ft)
Population  (2024-12-31)
• Total	3,530
• Density	350/km2 (905/sq mi)
Time zone	UTC+01:00 (CET)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+02:00 (CEST)
Postal codes	14089
Vehicle registration	B

Gatow (German: [ˈɡaːtoː] ^ⓘ), a district of south-western Berlin is located west of the Havelsee lake and has forested areas within its boundaries. It is within the borough of Spandau. On 31 December 2002, it had 5,532 inhabitants.

History

Gatow's existence was first recorded in 1258 under the name of Gatho. In 1558, the village of Gatow became part of Spandau. Following the division of Berlin into four sectors at the end of the Second World War, Gatow became part of the British sector of West Berlin in early July 1945.

Gatow airfield

Main article: RAF Gatow

The village church in Gatow

Gatow was between 1934 and 1994 home to an airfield, first used by the Luftwaffe as a staff and technical college, Luftkriegsschule II, and then postwar by the British Royal Air Force (RAF) and Army Air Corps as RAF Gatow. RAF Gatow was one of the destination airports of the Berlin Airlift, including Short Sunderlands of the RAF, the corrosion-resistant flying boats being used to transport salt from Hamburg to Berlin. They landed on the adjacent Havelsee, a wide reach of the river Havel.

The airfield was handed back to German ownership on 7 September 1994 and was kept in use as a German Air Force airfield for a very short time, being closed to air traffic in 1995. It is now called General-Steinhoff-Kaserne, named after the World War II fighter ace and West German Air Force general Johannes Steinhoff; it is home to the Militärhistorisches Museum Flugplatz Berlin-Gatow. This, the official Berlin museum of the German Armed Forces, has many displays and information on German military aviation and the history of the airfield. The history of RAF Gatow and of western forces in Berlin from 1945 to 1994 is told in the Alliierten Museum (Allied Museum) in a different part of Berlin.

The former airfield is now part of the adjoining district of Berlin-Kladow.

External links

• (in German) Gatow page on www.berlin.de
• Gatow Volunteer Fire Brigade (in German)
• German site about a tower in Gatow
• Website of the Gatow branch of the Christian Democratic Union (in German)
• Luftwaffen Museum der Bundeswehr (official website)
• West Alliierte in Berlin e.V.
• Planeboys Spotters' page on Gatow
• The Hans-Carossa-Gymnasium (in German)
• The history of Gatow Airfield in German - a project of the Hans-Carossa-Gymnasium
• Alliierten Museum (The Allied Museum) - museum of the history of western forces in Berlin and Germany from 1945 to 1994