As the Wall was fortified, East Germany imposed more drastic measures to make sure the Wall could not be breached. Several thousand families were evicted from their homes on Bernauer Strasse, where the back of several apartment buildings in East Berlin faced out onto West Berlin. The street was the scene of several dramatic escape attempts out of windows. Several would-be escapees also died as they fell out of those apartments. The East Berlin government later sealed and then destroyed many of the buildings on Bernauer Strasse.