Following Space-Talk with director Oliver Schwehm, ESA-expert Rainer Kresken and Dipl.-Ing. Frank Wukasch (OTRAG) // Host: Dirk Wagner (hr-iNFO)

When Elon Musk was still in diapers, Swabian engineer Lutz Kayser was already developing a concept for low-budget rockets, which in 1975 led him to found the first private astronautic corporation worldwide. Orbital Transport- und Raketen AG, based in Neu Isenburg, provided the essential support in funds to get the corporation going – and flying. He also knew how to avoid the German prohibition of rocket launches. Mobutu Sese Seko, president of Zaire, was the benevolent backer who leased a gigantic area for tests to OTRAG. But the young visionaries soon found themselves in the middle of a global political conflict.

Involving impressive original images and accounts of participants, Fly Rocket Fly tells OTRAG's crazy story in the midst of the make-believe paradise of Central Africa.

Oliver Schwehm was born in 1975 in the small town Alzey. Today, he still likes to return to his Rhine-Hessian hometown. After all, he gained significant cinematic experience there in his teens. In 2015, this led him to shooting the documentary Cinema perverso – die kaputte Welt des Bahnhofskinos (the beat-up world of the train station cinema), which was, among other places, set in the Bali-Kino (cinema) in Alzey. 

Space-Talk

WED 27^th of March / Cinema at DFF / 8:30 PM

In the late 70s, the Orbital Transport- und Raketen Aktiengesellschaft (OTRAG), the first private astronautic corporation, was at the centre of attention with its aim at creating a cheap alternative to the American Space Shuttle – the so-called Bündelrakete. The undertaking shortly failed. Dirk Wagner (hr-iNFO) talks to director Oliver Schwehm and the former OTRAG-engineer Frank Wukasch about the origin of OTRAG and engineering adventures in African wastelands.

Discussion with: Dirk Wagner (hr-iNFO), Oliver Schwehm (director), Frank Wukasch (OTRAG)