© Olivier Matthys
The green and white aircraft of the former Equatorial Congo Airlines (ECAir), which has been parked on the tarmac of Brussels Airport on the Steenokkerzeel side for years, will disappear after all. The aircraft will be dismantled in the coming weeks, the airport was told.
Source: BELGA
Yesterday at 9:04 PM
The aircraft, a Boeing 757, belonged to ECAir, the national airline of the Republic of Congo (Congo-Brazzaville). Since the company’s bankruptcy at the end of 2016, it has been blocked at Brussels Airport. It had been parked for years at the airport near the Mechelsesteenweg in Steenokkerzeel and could also be seen from the nearby spotter platform.
The plane was seized for a long time and airport operator Brussels Airport Company could only leave it alone, but eventually became the owner of the aircraft. “It has now been sold to the dismantling company Eco-FLY,” said airport spokeswoman Nathalie Pierard. The dismantling started on Monday and will normally last until the end of March.
A small part of a wing will remain at the airport after dismantling. “We want to use this to set up somewhere strategically, to do tests during winter periods to see what the effects are on an aircraft under specific weather conditions, such as very cold weather and snow,” the spokeswoman said.
For a long time there was a second ECAir aircraft in a hangar at Brussels Airport, but that has been gone for some time.