For 28 years a 155km-long concrete wall snaked through the centre of Berlin, separating the Soviet-backed East from the capitalist West.
Built in 1961 to stop residents from fleeing communist Germany, it became an enduring symbol of the Cold War.
An era when one-time allies had drifted so far apart in the aftermath of World War II, it felt like the world was balancing on a cliff’s edge.
So when word of crowds gathering at the wall reached then-Europe correspondent Ian Henderson on a cold November day in 1989, anticipation ran high.
He shared what it was like to be there with the ABC for the final season of ABC iview's The Newsreader.
'Something extraordinary is happening'
The veteran ABC reporter was in Germany following the declaration of free elections by East German leaders and the announcement that visas for travel to the West would be freely available.
At that time Germany had been split into two — East Germany, supported by the Soviet Union and officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), and West Germany.
Located in the east and some distance from the West German border, Berlin had also been divided among the allies but was effectively cut off from the East by the wall.
But not for much longer.
"We arrived at the wall around about 10 o'clock at night — having gone back to our hotel to edit up what we thought was going to be the story of the day, which was that the next day you'd be allowed to apply for permission to go West," Henderson told the ABC.
"But we got some frantic messages from people who were down at the wall saying, 'You've got to come here now, something extraordinary is happening.'"
Arriving on the scene Henderson and his crew were greeted by something remarkable.
"There was this huge press of people at Checkpoint Charlie … in fact, I was sitting on top of the wall," he said.
"You could never do that before but my burly cameraman, Neale Maude, physically hoisted me up there and said, 'There you go, Hendo, let's go. You've got to say something.'
"I'm not sure that it was the most word-perfect piece to camera I've ever done but we were there, and we were in the moment.
"It was pretty amazing, and you could just feel the adrenaline rushing through everybody's system."
Weight of the crowd buckled the barriers
Checkpoint Charlie was a notorious border crossing between East and West, and the scene of numerous failed attempts.
Sitting on the Berlin Wall would have been unheard of just two weeks earlier, and most likely would have got Henderson shot.
Watchtowers manned by armed guards with strict shoot-to-kill orders should anyone breach the barrier were located at regular 250-meter intervals.
While guard dogs, electrified fences and landmines helped fortify the wall, which was commonly referred to as the "death strip" by those in the West.
According to the Berlin Wall Foundation, there were 140 deaths at the Wall, with at least 90 at the hands of GDR border soldiers.
In the face of former soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev’s political reforms — known as perestroika and glasnost — the authority of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany had slowly diminished.
Henderson recalled how unexpected the night the wall came down was.
"It wasn't meant to happen, of course," Henderson said.
"There was to be an orderly process of applying for a pass to visit the West the next day — they were going to liberalise things.
"But as often happens with the grapevine, the message got changed a little as it went from word of mouth to word of mouth.
"All of a sudden people were being told you can go down to the wall now and walk through, so this huge press of people gathered at the wall.
"Basically, over time, the weight of the crowd buckled all the barriers."
More importantly, border guards refused to shoot.
In now familiar scenes, people scaled the wall to celebrate, chipping away at it with pickaxes as they celebrated, drinking and dancing in scenes of jubilation that were beamed around the world.
"When that message came out that, yes, you will be able to cross to the West tomorrow, people just took things into their own hands, and there was not the will at the wall to stop them," Henderson recalled.
"And the rest is history. You could feel history moving under your feet."
‘I’ll never see anything like it again’
Henderson couldn’t help but delight in the good news story unfolding before him.
"There weren't many of them but when they came along, you really enjoyed them," he said.
"You can feel the palpable joy of those people whose families had been separated by the wall for so long, whose lives had been sundered by it thinking that it would never happen in their lifetime and then, all of a sudden, one magic night it did.
"They felt deeply hurt and a long-suppressed disappointment, anger and everything …. came bubbling to the surface and had this release.
"It was like a three-day carnival, just absolutely extraordinary. I'll never see anything like it again in my lifetime."
Henderson's memento
Today a small piece of brightly coloured concrete is Henderson’s only physical reminder of the extraordinary turn of events.
"This was my little memento from the night", he said, holding up a small piece of the wall.
"You will see footage of people standing on top of the wall with pickaxes. The wall was quite gaily decorated on the western side because it was much graffitied [but] on the eastern side, it was a very sombre grey.
"But I picked this up on the night from the ground where they were having a go at it — literally hacking it away.
"It brings back special memories."
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