A SUSPECT has been arrested after a fire erupted at Adolf Hitler’s “Eagle’s Nest” mountain retreat in Germany.
Around 200 firefighters battled the roaring blaze at the Nazi dictator’s remote and hard-to-reach compound in the Bavarian Alps.
They saw flames rising high into the air as they approached the scene, before finding the building “completely ablaze,” said.
“A suspicious person was taken into temporary custody,” they said in a later statement, adding that nobody has been injured.
Police spokeswoman Lisa Maier said firefighters struggled to tackle the inferno due to the building’s location at an altitude of around 6,000ft.
The complex was only accessible with “heavy breathing apparatus”, she added.
Authorities were alerted to the fire on Friday evening, when a smoke detector triggered an alarm at around 9:50pm local time, police said.
No cause for the fire was given, but investigators suspect arson.
As snow fell on the Alpine peak, the Eagle’s Nest was still engulfed in flames in the early hours of Saturday, a camera showed.
Officers were also seen blocking access to the road leading to the retreat.
The firefighters found no one inside the building.
Maier, the police spokeswoman, said the was still ongoing, while a news conference is expected later today.
A motorcyclist was arrested after police came across them on their way to the scene, according to Bild.
Built between 1937 and 1938, the Eagle’s Nest forms part of the toxic legacy of Hitler’s Third Reich, which was responsible for the deaths of millions of Jews along with Roma, LGBTQ people and Communists in the .
It was designed to serve as a monument to Hitler’s rule, though the dictator himself rarely visited the complex.
Built of stone and granite, the residence offers an exceptional view of the picturesque Bavarian Alpine landscape and was designed to impress foreign diplomats.
It survived the Second World War undamaged.
Since 1952, it has hosted both an exhibition recounting the house’s Nazi history and a restaurant.
