Hansie wreck souvenir sale

2004-05-05 09:26

Jan Taljaard

Mossel Bay - Nearly two years after former national cricket captain Hansie Cronje died in an air crash, a controversial George businessman wants to sell pieces of the wreckage as mementoes.

Leon Dorfling, who salvaged the wreckage from the Outeniqua Mountains and exhibited it in a warehouse in Mossel Bay, now wants to cut up the fuselage of the Hawker Siddeley plane into A4-sized plaques.

He plans to engrave Cronje's face and a short biography highlighting his cricket career onto the plaques by means of a chemical process.

Insensitive

Dorfling, who was earlier slammed as "insensitive" by Cronje's father Ewie Cronje, exhibited the wreckage during December 2002 and charged holidaymakers to visit the exhibition.

Cronje was not available for comment on Tuesday.

Dorfling and a marketing consultant, Dr Johan van Zyl, at the time also took bookings for a video of Cronje's career and another of the salvage operation, during which a huge Russian MI-8 helicopter was used.

After receiving complaints about the exhibition, the wreckage was stored in a warehouse in Mossel Bay. But Dorfling recently sold the warehouse to Gauteng developers and has to remove the wreckage.

Dorfling said he had received "hundreds of enquiries" from people wanting mementoes and he has made good progress with cutting up the wreckage.

But it takes time and it costs money because the fuselage is made of aluminium, he said.

He couldn't say for how much he'd be selling the plaques.

Meanwhile, Dr Andre de Kock, who led the Civil Aviation Authority's investigation, said the report on the crash is nearing completion and should be released soon.

- Die Burger