Spain's Chinese rescue package: €1b 'ghost airport' snapped up for just €10,000

A Chinese company that was the only bidder for one of Spain's "ghost airports" wants to revive the site as a cargo hub for the Asian market.

Ciudad Real airport, one of the most notorious emblems of Spain's economic crash, cost €1 billion (HK$8.4 billion) to build and was on sale at a knockdown price of €40 million.

Tzaneen International was the sole bidder in the bankruptcy auction, however, and it offered just €10,000.

The facilities of the deserted site, 160km south of Madrid, include a runway long enough to land an Airbus A380, the world's largest passenger plane, along with a terminal that could handle 10 million travellers per year.

It is also in pristine condition because it has barely been used, having opened to international flights in 2010 as the euro-zone crisis raged, only to shut two years later.

Appropriately for such a vainglorious project, the La Mancha airport was previously named after the region's most famous, and deluded, literary export: Don Quixote.

But the Chinese company, which was set up in March with just €4,000 in capital, believes it can succeed where others have failed.