Jaisalmer Airport, India
Wikimedia CommonsThis abandoned airport isn’t as old as many others on this list, but it is just as chilling.
This abandoned airport in the remote city of Jaisalmer, India, is located in the heart of the Thar Desert. It cost $17 million to build in 2013 and has yet to see a single passenger. Unlike many abandoned airports on this list, it never even began operations.
Inside the “new arrivals” lounge, conveyor belts that should be rotating excited travelers’ baggage collect dust. Pigeons roost in the ceilings. The runways are cracked and sprouting weeds.
The government planned this airport (and more than 200 others like it) in order to encourage travel throughout India. However, politics being what they are, local governments that probably did not require full-service airports bid on these projects.
“You should come here on your own. It’s scary,” said the airport’s chief engineer.
Wikimedia Commons
Eight other airports just like the one in Jaisalmer sit empty and abandoned throughout India. Over $50 million dollars was poured into these structures, and they never opened.
“They (the government) need to realize it’s not a case of ‘build the airport and we will come’,” Sanjiv Kapoor, chief operating officer at SpiceJet Ltd. told Reuters.
These off-the-beaten-path airports can’t operate unless routes become available from larger airports, and the busy airports are too competitive to open routes for places where few need to go.
So sadly, what’s now dubbed the “ghost airport of Rajasthan” will likely continue to host more pigeons than people.
