Abdul Rachman Saleh Airport is a small class 1 commercial airport serving

Malang Malang (; ) is a landlocked List of regencies and cities of Indonesia, city in the Indonesian Provinces of Indonesia, province of East Java. It has a history dating back to the age of Singhasari, Singhasari Kingdom. It is the second most popul ...

, the second largest city in

East Java East Java ( id, Jawa Timur) is a Provinces of Indonesia, province of Indonesia located in the easternmost hemisphere of Java island. It has a land border only with the province of Central Java to the west; the Java Sea and the Indian Ocean bord ...

province of

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

. This airport is named after Abdoel Rachman Saleh (1909–1947), an Indonesian aviator and physiologist whose aircraft was shot down by the Dutch while landing in Maguwo Airfield (now

Adisucipto International Airport Adisutjipto (or Adisucipto) Airport ( id, Bandar Udara Adisutjipto) is an airport serving the Yogyakarta Special Region, Yogyakarta area on the island of Java (island), Java, Indonesia. It was formerly the principal international airport servin ...

Sleman Regency Sleman Regency () is an Indonesian regency ( id, Kabupaten) on the island of Java. It is located in the north of the Yogyakarta Special Administrative Region, Indonesia, and has an area of , with a population of 1,093,110 at the 2010 CensusBiro ...

Special Region of Yogyakarta The Special Region of Yogyakarta (; id, Daerah Istimewa (D.I.) Yogyakarta) is a Provinces of Indonesia, provincial-level Autonomous administrative division, autonomous region of Indonesia in southern Java. It has also been known as the Special ...

, during the

Indonesian National Revolution The Indonesian National Revolution, or the Indonesian War of Independence, was an armed conflict and diplomatic struggle between the Republic of Indonesia and the Dutch Empire and an internal social revolution during Aftermath of WWII, postw ...

. The airport was temporarily closed in October 2009 due to numerous damage found in the

runway According to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a runway is a "defined rectangular area on a land aerodrome prepared for the landing and takeoff of aircraft". Runways may be a man-made surface (often asphalt concrete, as ...

, but has opened again after some repairs were done, as a result of Rp 130 million funding by three local authorities. The new terminal was opened on 30 December 2011, replacing the old terminal that is now used by the

Indonesian Air Force The Indonesian Air Force ( id, Tentara Nasional Indonesia Angkatan Udara (TNI-AU), literally "''Indonesian National Military-Air Force''") sometimes shortened as IDAF / IdAF, is the aerial branch of the Indonesian National Armed Forces. The ...

(TNI-AU). The new terminal is located near the south-west end of the runway, adjacent to the old terminal. In 2007, the dimensions of the main runway (17/35) was . In late 2012, it was extended to . , 17/35 is reported as further extended to . Its second runway (17L/35R) is . It has an aircraft parking area of , measuring .

History

Airlines and destinations

The following airlines offer scheduled passenger service:

Statistics

Accidents and incidents

*On 18 January 1967, a Grumman HU-16A Albatross operated by the Air Force of the Republic of Indonesia (AURI), military registration 302, en route to Malang-Abdul Rachman Saleh Airport (MLG/WARA), was reported as missing with the loss of all 19 occupants onboard. *On 1 November 2007, at 13:24 Western Indonesia Time (WIB) (06:24 UTC), a Boeing 737-230 operated by

Mandala Airlines Tigerair Mandala (''formerly Mandala Airlines'') was a low-cost carrier headquartered in Jakarta, Indonesia and an associate company of the Singapore-based Tigerair Group. The former full service airline repositioned itself as a budget airline/ ...

flight number In the aviation industry, a flight number or flight designator is a code for an airline service consisting of two-character airline designator and a 1 to 4 digit number. For example, "BA 98" is a British Airways service from Toronto-Pearson to ...

RI260 (also reported as MDL 260) (

serial number A serial number is a unique identifier assigned incrementally or sequentially to an item, to ''uniquely'' identify it. Serial numbers need not be strictly numerical. They may contain letters and other typographical symbols, or may consist enti ...

: 22137/788),

registration Register or registration may refer to: Arts entertainment, and media Music * Register (music), the relative "height" or range of a note, melody, part, instrument, etc. * ''Register'', a 2017 album by Travis Miller * Registration (organ), the ...

PK-RIL, was

written off A write-off is a reduction of the recognized value of something. In accounting, this is a recognition of the reduced or zero value of an asset. In income tax statements, this is a reduction of taxable income, as a recognition of certain expenses ...

following substantial damage resulting from a severe heavy landing on runway 35 at Abdul Rachman Saleh Airport. Originating from Jakarta-Soekarno-Hatta International Airport (CGK/WIII) on a scheduled passenger service, the subsequent investigation found that the pilot failed to observe the excessive 1,000 feet per minute

rate of descent In aeronautics, the rate of climb (RoC) is an aircraft's vertical speed, that is the positive or negative rate of altitude change with respect to time. In most ICAO member countries, even in otherwise metric countries, this is usually expressed ...

during the approach for landing, thus creating an unstabilised approach. The 45 year old male pilot in command was criticised for further failing to respond to any of the audible warnings from any of ground proximity warning systems (GPWS), particularly the initial "Sink Rate, Sink Rate" and the three subsequent "Pull Up, Pull Up" aural warnings. Data recovered from the

flight data recorder A flight recorder is an electronic recording device placed in an aircraft for the purpose of facilitating the investigation of aviation accidents and incidents. The device may often be referred to as a "black box", an outdated name which has b ...

revealed that after a rate of descent of 1,750 feet per minute, the aircraft bounced around following the severe heavy landing, and that there was no attempt by the crew to initiate a

go around In aviation, a go-around is an aborted landing of an aircraft that is on final approach or has already touched down. A go-around can either be initiated by the pilot flying or requested by air traffic control for various reasons, such as an unstab ...

, which is the normal recovery action following a heavy landing. In mitigation, the flight crew were hampered with "marginal visual meteorological conditions" during their approach, specifically heavy rain and reduced

visibility The visibility is the measure of the distance at which an object or light can be clearly discerned. In meteorology it depends on the transparency of the surrounding air and as such, it is unchanging no matter the ambient light level or time of ...

. Of the 94 total persons onboard (two pilots, three cabin crew, and 89 passengers), there were no fatalities and no serious injuries.

References

External links

Live arrival and departure data for Malang Abdul Rachman Saleh Airport (MLG/WARA)
— at Flightradar24.com
WARA Abdul Rachman Saleh Airport - live flight tracking
— at FlightAware.com
METAR WARA - Abdul Rachman Saleh Airport
— live weather report, from METAR-Taf.com
History of Malang Abdul Rachman Saleh Airport
— at Bandara.co.id * *
Photograph of damage caused heavy landing at MLG to Mandala Airlines RI260 Boeing 737-230 Advanced PK-RIL
— from NTSC (''KNKT'') at Aviation-Safety.net {{Authority control Airports in East Java Transport in East Java Indonesian Air Force bases