A new tourist attraction – or at least a point of interest – is slowly developing in Australia’s Red Centre.
More old planes have recently been arriving at Alice Springs Airport, where the first major aircraft ‘graveyard’ outside of the United States has been established.
The Sydney Morning Herald reports that, after a slow start, passenger jets including a Qantas 767 and four Airbus single-aisle planes are now lining up at the world’s newest ‘boneyard’.
Brisbane-based Asia Pacific Aircraft Storage signed an initial 10-year lease with Alice Springs Airport in 2011 to turn the 110-hectare site, which is on the opposite side of the runway to the terminal, into a giant aircraft parking yard.
The SMH says that the challenge for the operator has been to find airlines and aircraft leasing companies willing to overlook the Mojave Desert in California and Arizona’s 840-hectare Pinal Airpark in favour of Alice Springs.
Experts say that Australia’s dry climate makes many places ideal for aircraft storage. But most places with the right climate lack runways big enough to handle large passenger jets. Alice Springs, in contrast, can be used by A380s in an emergency.
Asia Pacific Aircraft Storage’s managing director, Tom Vincent, told the SMH that he expected at least 15 planes at the site by the end of the year. His company eventually plans to extend the parking space to accommodate several hundred aircraft.
Not sure why they park/store planes? Why aren’t they disassembled and recycled?
Maybe there could be a new Fly-Drive push. Fly in a soon to be discarded doomed plane to Alice Springs then hire/drive back home.