Hornbill Airways or Flying over the Skies of Sarawak

Top: AgustaWestland AB139
Bottom: EH101

KUALA LUMPUR: With Malaysia Airlines or a subsidiary is taking over the Sarawak rural air service from the fast-paced people of FAX, we wonder whether maybe its time the flight operator (who ever it is) used helicopters for some of the route.

Flights to Miri and Bintulu from or to Kuching should be flown by fixed wing planes basically because of the long distance involved.

For other routes maybe medium-size helicopters like the AgustaWestland EH-101 or the Super Puma, should be used instead of the current F-50 Fokker.

Back in the 50s, when helicopters were first introduced, it was envisioned that it would replace land-based transports for intra-city/district commuting.

It didn’t work out that way but Sarawak offers a new possibility. If the EH-101 is deemed to expensive or having too much capacity, twin-engine helicopter like the Augusta AB139 or the Bell BA609 tilt-rotor.Since helicopters have been used for years in the Sarawak Offshore industry as air taxis, deploying medium size or smaller (at least in the five ton category) helicopters for intra-city/district travel should not be that difficult.

For intra-city commuting, perhaps a regional jet like the Embraer 100-series … or the Bombardier Regional Jet to replace the Fokkers.

One must remember however, the main reason, Malaysia Airlines passed the rural air services to FAX was simple, it is simply unprofitable. So for a new operator to recapitalise the service with new planes and helicopters it quite farfetched.

The answer is simple, of course, one that had been used before. Sarawak Government in the early 90s funded together with Ekran Group the East Asia airline. The airline collapsed in 1997 following the East Asia financial crisis.

With about RM300 million, the Sarawak rural air service would be recapitalise with new planes and helicopters. The company providing would not make money, so the Sarawak and Federal governments must budget about RM50 million to subsidise the service.

It is not much money but it with proper oversight it will ensure the operator have a decent operating profit to maintain the rural air service.


What is the use of having petro-money but not used it for the sake of the people?

Change The Flight Plan II

KUALA LUMPUR: Transmile Group is in the news for all the wrong reasons.

That is why I am feeling uneasy that its planes are flying over schools in TTDI Jaya during their pre or post-maintenance flights.

I understand that the Subang Airport came before the schools and the housing estates surrounding it but could they not fly over schools where children as young as seven are schooling.

I do not want to say it but what if the unthinkable happened? And by the way since pre -or post maintenance flights are planned before hand couldnt they fly this type of flights on weekends.

If its too much, the least they can do is not to over-fly the schools. The picture below shows how much deviation these planes need to take to overfly the schools.

Berjaya Air planes fly straight off the runway, why couldnt other planes follow the same route. I understand that for touch and goes planes do not need to use the whole runway, half-way I believe, meaning that the pilots turned starboard right away.

And since the RMAF base is located also on starboard, I assume that the planes that overflew the schools in TTDI Jaya would have given the airbase quite a miss. So they bypass the airbase but then over-fly the schools. Smart, right?

Change The Flight Plan

KUALA LUMPUR: "Change The Flight Plan" was created as an e-campaign to change the flight plan of planes flying out of the Old Subang Airport. Some of these planes including RMAF planes tend to drift starboard (right) off the runway and fly over two schools in TTDI Jaya, Shah Alam namely Sekolah Kebangsaan TTDI Jaya (primary school) and Sek Men Keb TTDI Jaya (secondary school).

The primary school is the worst off. Its location from the edge of the runway is about one km (plus or minus). Hence even if the planes continue to fly straight up, its noise footprint will drown out the school.

This is especially true for the older planes like the Boeing 727, Fokker F-28 and even the Boeing 747 SP.

But the biggest problem is the tendecy of planes to over-fly the schools still with the gear in down position where the noise is the loudest.

I have been trying to catch these planes in the act (from Cessna 172s, helicopters and Hercules C-130 of the RMAF) of overflying the school not more than 2000 feet.

But without a radio scanner it is very difficult to get in the right position with my video camera. Today May 15, I was luckier although I did miss the shot where the plane was flying over the school

The video below was shot by a Nokia N73 handphone. Although I did not managed to shoot a reference point or the actual time when the plane overflew Sek Keb TTDi Jaya, the video reveals much.

And this is from a handphone! If I did have a HD video camera and a scanner you would have seen the pilots from this Transmile MD11.



Did you hear the sound of the three jet engines? Believe me it was loud.






A picture of an MD11 of Transmile. Picture from the company's website

Idris Jala part II

It seems that my blog on Idris Jala blog have been viewed with interest within Malaysia Airlines.

It is unfortunate that no comments were made but at least I received an email from someone whom I had interacted when I was working with The Malay Mail..

I will not share his name but the email made me wonder what I posted was correct. But Idris remained quiet. However, upon checking my records, I do recall that his contract is up within this year.

Idris does not need to quit. He needs only to ensure that the three year contract is not renewed and he can go free, away from the maddening crowd.

If you think that he will be leaving Malaysia Airlines personnel in the lurch after what had happened in the last three years, do a recap. Idris is just a salaryman, highly paid of course but he is not Tajuddin Ranli.


He can and should walk away from this mess, with his head held up high. Many people thought they were expendable (Datuk Zulkifli, Tan Sri Rahim Noor, to name a few) and left their service with their reputation in tatters.

Idris had turned around Malaysia Airlines. He deserved better than what Chang Kong Choy placed on him

Make Money Online

Yeah, I know I am far away from the other top bloggers already online. But I am not giving up easily. My original blogspot Malaysian Defence is already out there. It may not be the best read blog around but the defence news have never been that highly read in the country.

For those who want to know an advance version of making money online please read John Chow Dot Com.

I know we are all amateurs but John did not reach the level now without first doing what we are doing now. I have followed some of his writings but certain things is still beyond me especially my own DOT COM.

One simple reason is the lack of funds. Hopefully this will be corrected soon.

Firefly, FAX or Idris Jala or The Malaysian Airlines story so far

NO GOOD MALAYSIAN DEED GOES UNREWARDED


Pity Idris Jala (his the Malaysian Airlines MD). Just when he got the airline back on track again, boom came an uppercut. courtesy of FAX, the off-shoot of AirAsia.

Under the rationalisation plan of the Malaysian airline industry, FAX was given the license to operate the rural air services for Sabah and Sarawak.


FAX has other things in mind though, it has launch AirAsiaX to take low fare travel for long haul flights and now it want to ditch the rural air services back to Malaysian Airlines.


Cue our Transport Minister Datuk Chong Kong Choy who only a few days after FAX bosses cane out with the statement that the Cabinet had approved the proposal.

The rationalisation plan that allow Malaysian Airlines to hand over the rural air services to FAX took almost one year to be studied. I am not making any accusations here just facts. If you dont believe me check it out yourself at the NST archives, you can do the timeline yourselves.


Clearly, Idris Jala is the victim here. He simply cannot win. Just when you thought that Malaysia Airlines finally has a good captain, those in powers would try to muck it up again.

Malaysia Airlines have not responded to the latest development. In my posting on AeroMalaysia Forum, I suggest that Idris was trying to find a diplomatic way to say no to the diktum.

But how is Idris going to say no to the Cabinet? The only way for him now is to accept the proposal no matter how bad it is on his bottomline.

Being a Sarawakian, Idris certainly knows the importance of the rural air service but as the MD he had made the necessary decision to cut off the black hole of Malaysian Airlines.

Idris certainly has an obligation to his shareholders but his biggest shareholder is the Government itself.

The best way out for Idris? Quit, passed this strange turn of event to the next guy. Certainly it was the Government which is holding his hand.

Couldnt he returned the favour? As the subtitle says No Malaysian Good Deed Goes Unrewarded