Inside Thailand’s aeroplane graveyard where luxury jets were left to rot when an investor’s tourist business collapsed
Failed tourist attraction creates plane graveyard with giant crafts left to rot
TWO aeroplanes have been left to rot, creating an eerie giant machine graveyard after a cash-strapped investor was forced to abandon an ambitious business venture.
The two MD-82 jetliners have been left to the mercy of the elements, creating an unconventional tourist site in Thailand's Bangkok.
Formerly operated by Orient Thai Airlines, the planes were initially supposed to form a special outdoor bar but had to be abandoned after the businessman went bust.
Photographer Dax Ward visited the site, taking a peek inside the stripped aeroplanes.
He said: “The planes were supposedly placed there few years ago by a foreign investor who wanted to create a special outdoor bar using the fuselage as a stage for the bands and service rooms for the bar crew.
“The project was a fiasco and the foreign investor left the site as it is.
“As far as I know, there are currently no plans to move them, although the land upon which they rest is quite expensive.”
As the registration numbers of the two planes have been painted over, it is hard to decipher when the planes were operated or retired.
The interiors of the plane have been mostly stripped away to reveal the bare bones of the giant crafts, but the carpeting, overhead bins and bathrooms remain intact.
Echoing the destruction of a plane crash, oxygen masks, safety manuals and other debris are also scattered about the hollowed out craft.
The 36-year-old photographer said: “It is very eerie in the graveyard.
“There are children's toys and other personal objects scattered around, left by people who have stayed there for whatever reason, almost making it feel like a crash site.
“In Thai culture places like this are often seen as haunted, even if no one has actually passed away at the location."
Visiting tourists are charged 300 baht per person and the site is looked after by a lady who lives on the site with her extended family in some converted fuselages.
Ward added: “Thailand is a country that flourishes with culture, and such dynamic cultures tend to also include a deeply-rooted spiritual dimension.
“Thailand is filled with ghost stories and superstitions regarding spirits and locations which are haunted by them.
“These can arise from someone actually dying on the site, especially from a violent self-inflicted death, or because they believe there are ghosts residing there to protect the place.
“These beliefs of a haunting can also arise simply because a place looks scary, which is why I think the plane graveyard would have such an image.”
Exploring supposedly haunted places might be too much to handle alone for some explorers, but Dax says he finds the experience almost meditative.
He said: “I'm pretty happy exploring alone. Sometimes my girlfriend comes along with me and either takes photos herself or models.
“I think, although I really enjoy her company, being completely alone in certain places can be meditative and peaceful.
“Also, there is usually someone hanging around the locations, be it human or animal, so I am rarely completely alone.”
Delving into the depths of the aeroplanes was a refreshing experience for the photographer, who reflected on the rarity of the opportunity to see inside the corpse of a static aeroplane.
He said: “I’m not familiar with aeronautical design so it is interesting for me to see the different levels in the plane and to get a sense of it's actual size.
“It is a truly impressive feat in engineering and physics that allows for such large, heavy objects to be propelled through the sky at high speeds.
“Those of us that travel regularly get so used to aeroplane transit that we sometimes forget all that is involved in a single flight.”
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