
Ingo and Saddiq after Tioman Checkout
Pulau Tioman was the last island with a usable airfield around the Malaysian peninsula I hadn’t been to. One reason is that I was busy exploring the other places along the East and West coast, and the other reason is that you need to get checked out by a flight instructor first before you can fly there on your own. The FRAS checkout consists of three successful landings with a flight instructor.
My first attempt failed. Last weekend, I stayed a couple of hours at the club hoping that the weather would clear enough to have a good chance to return to Johor, but no such luck. This weekend, the weather was better. Lots of CB with a base of about 2000 feet and nice blue sky in between. On Saturday, I practices a couple of landings and on Sunday Saddiq was available and the weather still held, so we took off at around 13:00. With a tail wind of 10 to 12 kts, we arrived at Tioman a bit after 14:00. Saddiq did a good job briefing me about the approach and I managed to slam the piper into the runway with lots of room to spare. I had the same problems as in Pangkor – too slow on approach and not enough flare. Nevertheless, I did two more landings to satisfy the club requirements and we went back with no drama. Now I am signed off for Tioman and hope to get back there on my own soon.
For the readers of my blog, I have drawn a little map and provide a couple of notes on the procedures to approach and land in Tioman. You can download the Tioman map here.