Villages vie for crooked honours

The leaning tower of Pisa, Italy. Photo / Supplied

Forget Pisa's famous tower. The prized title of the "world's most leaning" building is being fought over by a handful of German towns and villages, each with a teetering tower so askew that visitors are frequently warned not to climb them.

Suurhusen, in East Frisia won its "most leaning" status in 2007 after Frank Wessels, pastor at the 13th-century church, wrote to Guinness World Records. The title has helped attract some 10,000 tourists a year.

Pastor Wessels delivers sermons from a leaning pulpit to a congregation surrounded by lopsided walls. The 26m steeple lurches away from the nave at an alarming angle of 5.19 degrees. The leaning tower of Pisa manages a paltry 3.99 degree tilt.

But Suurhusen now finds its claim challenged by other German towns. If angle of tilt is the criterion, a crumbling medieval fortress in Dausenau is ahead by 0.05 of a degree.

Guinness World Records has so far rejected Dausenau's claims because the tower is ruined. But several other churches seem to have even better claims. Many are in the same East Frisian region as Suurhusen, where almost 70 per cent of such buildings do not stand upright.

Experts say this is caused by the region being low-lying and marshy. Many churches were built on wooden supports which are now rotting. A church tower in the village of Midlum leans over at a record-topping angle of 6.74 degrees. But, as Midlum's tower is only 14m high, its top leans a mere 1.6m off the perpendicular.

Suurhusen's status is more seriously challenged by a church tower in Bad Frankenhausen. Its 53m baroque tower began tipping in the early 1900s. The lean may not be as great as its north German counterparts, but because of its height, it projects 4.5m off the perpendicular.

The town council had planned to demolish it this northern summer fearing it posed too much of a risk to the public. But Matthias Strejc, the town's mayor, intervened to save the tower and claim the title with a $3 million rescue scheme.

- INDEPENDENT