Airbus Café 🇧🇪

For about twenty years, this former Airbus A310 converted into a restaurant-bar, has attracted the attention of many passing visitors. Active since 1985, the plane was given a second life when a couple of entrepreneurs decided to buy it in 1999 for commercial purposes. The new restaurant becomes popular and changes concept over the years, it was for instance a nightclub at some point. At 46 meters long, the Airbus could accommodate 220 people seated. Today, it has become a symbol in the landscape of Charleroi.

For some time now, the place was the subject of a real estate project and the closed Airbus was put out for sale. It was bought in 2019 by a French group which was to organize its dismantling and move it the coming months. The whole process was delayed due to the Covid-19 crisis. This Tuesday, November 17, 2020, the Airbus A310 was the victim of a fire and went out in smoke, for reasons still unknown. Thus ends, sadly, the journey of this beautiful machine.

I remember walking past this plane since I was a child. Its location in the Carolo region has always been fascinating, and the news of its recent sale had caught my attention. I therefore contacted the real estate developer to request access to the place in order to photograph it. He and the owner kindly allowed me to take some pictures ... Pictures that I preferred not to publish at the time of my visit, because I wanted to preserve the place from any curious, who are not always armed with the best intentions. After my visit, the place was squatted and ransacked on several occasions, which confirmed my fears. Today it is with anger and sadness that we deplore the damage.