Veteran reporter recalls standing atop the Berlin Wall as it crumbled

Twenty-five years have passed since the fall of the Berlin Wall, but for those who were there on that freezing cold night, the memory is as clear as when it happened.

From 1961 to 1989, the heavy concrete barrier kept residents of the Soviet-controlled East Berlin from fleeing to the free and affluent West.

While roughly 2000 managed to escape each year, at least 136 died trying.

9NEWS US Bureau Chief Robert Penfold was there when the Berlin Wall was pulled down, and to this day, it remains one of the most extraordinary experiences of his four-decade career.

Watch the video for the original news report from that day.

He and his team had been deployed to Germany to cover the ongoing unrest in the capital, and late on the 9^th November 1989, he received a phone call alerting him to activity down by the wall.

Earlier that day, guards had forced news crews to keep their distance, but by midnight, East Germany has cracked and residents of both sides had begun to chip away at the wall.

"The day after it happened we stood on top of the wall. If we had done that the day before, we probably would have been shot,” he said.

Etched in Robert Penfold’s memory is the almost stunned look as East Berlin residents poured into the West, many for the first time in their lives.