The Oktoberfest bombing was a far-right terrorist attack. On 26 September 1980, 13 people were killed and more than 200 injured by the explosion of an improvised explosive device (IED) at the main entrance of the Oktoberfest festival in Munich, West Germany. The bombing was attributed to the right-wing extremist and geology student Gundolf Köhler, who was instantly killed in the attack as the bomb exploded prematurely.
Monument at the site (2008)
Police officers on the crime scene just after the bombing
Commemorations 25 years after the Oktoberfest bombing. Munich, 2005.
Oktoberfest is the world's largest Volksfest, featuring a beer festival and a travelling carnival, and is held annually in Munich, Bavaria, from mid- or late-September to the first Sunday in October, with more than six million international and national visitors attending the event. Locally, it is called d'Wiesn, after the colloquial name for the fairgrounds, Theresienwiese. Oktoberfest is an important part of Bavarian culture, having been held since the year 1810. Other cities across the world also hold Oktoberfest celebrations that are modeled after the original Munich event.
Oktoberfest
Horse race at the Oktoberfest in Munich, 1823
Portrait of a girl wearing a Dirndl dress
Bavaria statue above the Theresienwiese