MovieChat Forums > Little Dieter Needs to Fly (1998) Discussion > Dieter Dengler's cause of death was suic...

Dieter Dengler's cause of death was suicide

posted 14 years ago by Bloodfordracula
1 reply | jump to latest

I just found out that Dieter Dengler's official cause of death was a suicide.

Taken from this article:

"Some 30 years after the war, Henderson was living in Sebastopol and visiting Dengler, who lived in Marin, next to the Mountain Home Inn, a German restaurant he'd owned. That was right about when he was hit with Lou Gehrig's disease. Dengler could face torture, starvation and disease in a prison camp, but he wasn't going to face this. On Feb. 7, 2001, 35 years after his plane went down, Dengler rolled his wheelchair down the Panoramic Highway to the driveway of a fire station and shot himself. He was 62."

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/07/30/DDRE1EJ3OJ.DTL

I always thought he died from ALS - Lou Gehrig's disease.

Although I'd have done the exact same thing if I was in the advanced stages of ALS.

[–] willson_x 13 years ago

Jesus christ, have you read the wikipedia description of ALS? I dont agree with suicide, but in this case, I can see myself doing it if I had it.
Poor Dieter must've been in agony.
Best thing to do is remember his life and what a great man and character he was, there should be more people like dieter in the world to help us all get through life in the tough situations