The wreckage of the aircraft in which former South African cricket captain Hansie Cronje died will form part of a memorial for Cronje, businessman Leon Dorfling said in George on Tuesday.
”A salvage operation (to recover the wreckage) started this morning and should be completed by tomorrow,” said Dorfling, who was a close friend of Cronje.
Dorfling said he planned to set up a memorial for Cronje on premises in either George or Mossel Bay and that he was seeking final approval from Hansie’s wife, Bertha, this week.
He said the wreck would form part of the display and that efforts were underway to find some more personal objects linked to Cronje for exhibition.
”Hansie gave thousands of South African’s tremendous pleasure on the cricket field and I think it is appropriate to create a memorial or museum in his honour,” Dorfling said.
He confirmed that he was paying for the expensive salvage operation, but refused to reveal the costs.
Martin Steinberg, owner of Titan Aviation in George, said he was contracted by Dorfling to salvage the wreck. The salvage operation started on Tuesday morning and involved a team of eight men, who started packing sections of the aircraft into manageable sling-loads for removal by helicopter.
Steinberg said a Russian MI Eight helicopter with a lifting capacity of 5 tons would be used to remove the approximately nine tonnes of wreckage.
”It is a dangerous operation and we have to be very careful. We had lots of rain recently and the wreckage started sliding down the slope of the Outeniqua mountain where it crashed three months ago,” Steinberg said
He said the weather was favourable for the operation and that the first sling-load of wreckage would be removed at 2pm on Tuesday. – Sapa