Wings of a dream: I Coast tycoon sees new life for wrecked planes

Wings of a dream: I Coast tycoon sees new life for wrecked planes

“That one’s a DC-10, next to it you have a Fokker 28, over there are Boeing 737s…” Aziz Alibhai is showing the visitor his big love-an astonishing collection of plane wrecks that he wants to turn into an atypical tourist attraction. Airliners in various stages of genteel decline lie on his property in Songon, located between forest and lagoon about 30 kilometers (20 miles) from Ivory Coast’s economic capital, Abidjan. But Alibhai, an affable entrepreneur in his 70s, doesn’t like to hear the site described as a “graveyard.” For him, these former giants of the skies are worthy of respect, and they are a potential dollar-earner too.

In the wake of the post-electoral crisis of 2010-2011 that killed some 3,000 people in Ivory Coast, the businessman set out to buy planes that had been left abandoned at Abidjan airport. “It cost me an arm and a leg but I was so excited,” he says, preferring to “not even remember” the price.

Eleven disused planes were hauled to the vast site of his construction machinery rental company-it also houses the facilities of Ivoire Academie, a third division football club of which Alibhai is the president. Eight of the aircraft are lined up on