Does this belong to you?

OUT OF HOURS BULLY'S TRUCKSTOP BAR (INTERACTIVE)
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The Boeing 737 stuck in city road
By Monica Chadha
BBC News, Mumbai

No-one is assuming responsibility for moving the plane

Residents of the Indian city of Mumbai (Bombay) are wondering how long it will take to remove a disused Boeing 737 that has been abandoned in a busy road.

The decommissioned aircraft was being driven through the city at the weekend when the driver got lost and then abandoned the plane.

The Boeing used to belong to the private company Air Sahara.

Some locals are angry that no action is being taken to move the plane. Others say it is a tourist attraction.

It appears that after taking a wrong turn, the driver found himself facing a flyover that was too low for him to take the plane under.

The driver has not been seen since and no-one is assuming responsibility for the 737.

Sunday surprise

Restaurant owner Ramji Thapar is one of the puzzled residents of the Chembur area of the city.
He woke up Sunday morning to find the aircraft on a giant trailer abandoned on the road.

“Saturday night I shut shop and go home and everything is fine,” he told the BBC news website.

“Sunday morning when I get here, this aircraft is here near my restaurant!”

The fuselage of the decommissioned aircraft, with the engine, wings and tail removed, was being taken by road to the capital Delhi late on Saturday night.

Reports say it was supposed to be used at a flight training academy.
The plane has become the centre of attraction with people coming from all over the city to take a look.

“I’ve been fascinated with planes and never seen one so closely,” engineering student Vamsi Shastri said. “It’s huge!”

His friend Ankur Rane said, “It’s fascinating to see an airplane on the roads when one is only used to seeing cars and auto rickshaws.”

No joke

However, for Pradeep Malhotra, who runs a catering service in the area, the plane has become a huge problem because it is parked right in front of his shop.

“My work is suffering because the food cannot be loaded in the big vehicles,” he said.

"I have to load it in the smaller vans and then carry them to the bigger ones parked at the back.

“I don’t know how they are going to take it out because you can’t reverse it, its too big, and you can’t go further down the road.”

Some residents said they had not complained simply because they assumed that the authorities would be making it a priority to get the plane out of the city.

Five days on, it is still not clear who is responsible for the aircraft and its transfer to Delhi.

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A good place to drop a trailer ? :laughing:
Don’t Panic!!!

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His SatNav told him to go that way.

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Yeah. He’s delivered it to wrong Indian take-away. If only people would write the addresses more clearly when they post Boeing 737s.’

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Problem is harry, it looks nothing like the planes on the websitehe ordered from

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Probably the same as the the Take-away the driver delivered it to. It looks nothing like the one in the brochure.For a start the car park was bigger. :laughing:

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They could always use it for extra seating in the restaurant. Use the trays as tables.

“Sit down, belt up and beware of turbulence!!”

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There used to be an old DC 3 in Swiss or Belgium ,I think, that was used as a restaurant. But the Boeing would be a giant step for mankind.

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I like the two yellow straps holding the plane to the trailer. I thought they could get away with one! :smiley:

Is that method of securing Boeings in the text books?

Alternatively, have they thought of shipping it to Hackney to house the Polish builders living in the public toilets! They could fit a few in there!

Calv

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Its probably fully booked/ occupied as a flight in transit! Thats why they call it long-haul.I mean air freight goes by road so it was only a matter of time when they would combine the passenger & freight services into one smooth operation:lol:

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Update

You can’t leave that there
By Peter Foster in New Delhi
Last Updated: 6:10am BST 05/05/2007

The streets of Mumbai are among the busiest in the world, but even by the chaotic standards of India’s commercial capital, this abandoned Boeing 737 passenger jet has presented traffic police with a problem.

The plane has become a home for local street dwellers

For the past five days the 75ft-long jet fuselage — minus its wings, tail and wheels — has been stranded off one of the city’s busiest roads after a lorry driver took a wrong turning as he attempted to leave the city.

According to local reports, the driver — who immediately fled with two companions when he realised his error — was trying to enter the main Eastern Express highway when he found his path blocked by a low flyover bridge.

The plane, formerly the property of India’s domestic carrier, Air Sahara, was being transported by road to New Delhi where an entrepreneur planned to install it as an attraction at an amusement park.

This week, however, hundreds of Mumbai street kids and passers-by got a free “ride” in the Boeing, clambering into the fuselage and sliding off its nose until police belatedly moved in to cordon off the area.

By the time police arrived a group of homeless had already set up a makeshift kitchen in the cargo hold while another group of “pavement dwellers” had found the stumps of the wings a handy hook for a clothes line.

Despite an explosion of business for the Indian civil aviation sector, air travel remains a distant dream for most Indians, a fact which has only served to heighten curiosity levels.

“I have seen planes in the sky but never this close and I only wish I could go inside,” said 10-year-old Sarika, a resident of a nearby tenement.

Local businessmen were less enamoured with the abandoned plane, complaining that it was blocking access to their shops and restaurants and causing massive inconvenience.

“My work is suffering because the food cannot be loaded in the big vehicles,” a local catering firm manager Pradeep Malhotra told the BBC, “I have to load it in the smaller vans and then carry them to the bigger ones parked at the back.”

Experts have now been called in to try and think of a way to “free” the plane which is stuck down the narrow street, with no way forwards and no way back.

Opinion is divided as to whether it will have to be dismembered where it lies or lifted out by crane, with several local scrap dealers hoping they might pick up the aluminium shell for a song.

Police also want to speak to the haulage company responsible for the mix up who, it is alleged, failed to inform the authorities of their plans to transport the over-sized load up the road to Delhi.

“The trailer cannot be moved out of the narrow road and will now require at least three or four cranes to get it moving,” said a local police spokesman, “Since any attempts to get it moving in the day would choke the traffic, we will ensure that it will be moved out tonight,” he said.

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news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/6623901.stm

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There is a team of wheel clampers from Essex on their way out to Mumbai this week

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Flying out ■■? :laughing: