Durchbruch Lok 234 (1963)

Train driver Harry Dölling lives in Oranienburg, north of Berlin, with his wife Ilse and their sons Arno, Hellmut, and Dieter. When Harry’s eldest son denounces a friend’s father at school in response to his teacher’s questioning, Dölling sees no future for himself and his family in the East. He devises a plan to break through the border with a passenger train beyond Albrechtshof station. This is the border station from which a track still runs to West Berlin. He volunteers for extra shifts and, because of a staff shortage, is indeed assigned to the route. But there is very little time left for preparations. Ilse agrees only on the condition that their relatives can come too. On the day of the escape, ordinary passengers board the train alongside those who know about the plan. The assigned stoker, Krause, wants to get to the West as well. Tension mounts during the journey. Railway workers and transport police grow suspicious. But at last the locomotive, pulling the passenger train, breaks through the border and comes to a stop in West Berlin. Harry Dölling and his companions are happy that their escape has succeeded.