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This is the sixth and final leg of the ‘Hexagon’, my Christmas 2022/New Year 2023 series of flights across three South Indian cities. Having arrived from Hyderabad, in the south-central part of India, on the third day of 2023 on AirAsia Malaysia’s 9M-AGO — the fourth A320neo ever built, in fact — all that remained to snap out of holiday mode and back to business was to take the connecting AK705 flight, which touched down at Changi less than an hour after departure. Well before leaving Hyderabad, I’d known that this flight would be operated by the then-almost-four-years-old 9M-RAV, the latest A320ceo to be delivered to the airline — but by no means the newest, since 9M-RAT, RAN and RAO are somewhat younger among sharkletted A320ceos. Unlike the last plane, this one did not seem to be fitted with Wi-Fi or indeed any form of streaming entertainment, not that it mattered in any way on a flight less than an hour long, and not that I’d be using it anyway.
Having pre-ordered two meals for each sector, for as grand total of four — which is unimaginable on even a full-service carrier — I would be anything but hungry on this 40-minute hop, one where Singapore Airlines will serve no more than a glass of apple juice! On the leg from Hyderabad I’d had Bukhara Chicken Biryani and Uncle Chin’s Chicken Rice, while on this one, no sooner were the Chicken & Cheese Sandwich and Thai Basil Chicken Rice handed out that the cabin crew started their preparation for landing. And so it was that I left Changi Airport, suitcases in hand, with an oily bag of food! Unlike for my last few reports, I’m not going to write essays about Air India’s rebrand or Thai Airways’ fleet plans or IndiGo’s (lack of) product strategy, and I’ll dive straight into the report, continuing where I left off when I landed at (the rather underwhelming) KLIA2 for the first time.
Tuesday, 3 January, continued. Passengers arriving on AK68 from Hyderabad were split between those who were going to enter Malaysia and those who were continuing to Singapore, I falling in the latter camp. Unlike at Changi, with HSBC branding all around, or Indian airports with their clutch of local advertisers, the jetbridges at KLIA are completely transparent and devoid of advertising.
Instead, ads are on the outside, namely for telecom conglomerate Axiata, which operates the Celcom network in Malaysia and other networks across the Asia-Pacific region, like Ncell in Nepal, XL in Indonesia and Robi in Bangladesh. Dialog, its Sri Lankan offshoot, also has plenty of advertising on the jetbridges of Colombo’s Bandaranaike Airport. More recently, Celcom completed a merger with Digi, owned by Telenor of Norway, late in 2022 to pose stronger competition to the market leader Maxis, though I wasn’t aware of the creation of CelcomDigi at the time.
As I touched upon in my Thai Airways 787-9 review, a similar development has taken place in Thailand, with No. 2 TrueMove H and No. 3 dtac (also owned by Telenor) joining forces to take on the lime-green dominance of AIS — which, incidentally, uses a very similar colour as Maxis’ fluorescent green.
Here is a shot of 9M-AGO as I deplaned, showing more of the sexy rear, tail and Wi-Fi hump than anything else. Next to us (in the above picture) was 9M-AGV, headed to Malé as AK74.
These were a couple more pictures of the bird from the arrivals corridor, with ads for Celcom Axiata 4G on one side and AirAsia Duty Free & Merchandise on the other.
In the distance stood two A330-300s of AirAsia X: 9M-XXJ, in a livery promoting the Sony noise-cancelling headphones that are (or used to be) handed out to premium AirAsia X passengers, and 9M-XBF, devoid of colours or titles of any kind. Curiously, two more A330-300s (9M-XBG/XBH) are also all-white but have the existing AirAsia logo on the tail and, strangely enough, the new airasia logo on the fuselage. The newer logo — introduced in October 2020 and largely confined to the airasia Super App — has never been used on any other aircraft other than 9M-AHL, an A320 in a special livery to promote the app, which I landed next to during my next flight to KUL on Scoot in May 2023.
Behind passed 9M-AGP, a sharkletted A320ceo headed to Phuket as AK822, with the slightly older ’Now Everyone Can Fly’ titles on the right side that have since been changed for uniform airasia.com billboard-style titles on both sides — as well as the flags of Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines and Japan near the registration, which have also been removed.
AirAsia does not have dedicated registration series for its A320neos, instead mixing them along with sharkletted A320ceos in the 9M-AG* and 9M-RA* series. Thai AirAsia does the same with the HS-BB* and HS-CB* series, and AirAsia India (which will soon cease to exist after merging with Air India Express) with its handful of VT-AT* aircraft, while the Indonesian and Philippine AirAsias (and the defunct Japanese one, where my next plane originally belonged to) have no A320neos at all.
Speaking of which, 9M-RAV, my next aircraft, was ready and waiting, having arrived as AK6052 from Johor Bahru. I wouldn’t have thought that AirAsia would register aircraft in any series other than 9M-A**, so when I saw that it had started to use the 9M-R** series around 2018, it struck me as rather odd. Another thing that IndiGo will never do (adding to my comparison between the two poles-apart LCCs in the previous instalment): it cannot dream of straying from the VT-I** series, let alone adding streaming IFE or special liveries.
Meanwhile 9M-AQM, in a black-and-bronze livery promoting De’Xandra fragrances, would head down to the very same airport — lying just a bit north of Singapore — as AK6051. Unlike most other jet aircraft of any airline, this one’s registration is near the middle of the fuselage, instead of at the rear.
All this would have to wait, however, and I had to dash to the central security screening and back to the gate in order to board the next flight.
Placed at regular intervals were displays showing ads for brands like CIMB Bank and Celcom, which are to Malaysia as UOB and StarHub are to Singapore. In other words, big challengers, but not the leaders that Maybank and Maxis are in Malaysia, or DBS and Singtel in Singapore.
As I sprinted past, I caught sight of the arrivals.
This being my first time at KLIA2, I must say that it looked very boring and not half as impressive or glitzy as its bigger, full-service counterpart.
Adding to the Celcom presence was a kiosk for its discount/prepaid brand, XPAX, which was at the moment unmanned.
Some people needed to get a new boarding pass at the transfer counter, but mine were issued all the way from Hyderabad.
AirAsia had recently started to implement a facial-recognition system, rather unimaginatively called FACES (Fast Airport Clearance Experience System — I rolled my eyes at that one) — which is similar to what the Indian government is doing with DigiYatra.
Only after spending a fair bit of time at the central security checkpoint could I go through to the gates, where several other passengers were connecting.
As if in a shopping mall, information touchscreens were placed every now and then.
The rather underwhelming décor, a far cry from the glittering KLIA main terminal with its model aircraft display and satellite terminal with its array of eateries, was not much to write home about. At least, for my brief four-hour trip on 30 July — come on Ethiopian and return on Jetstar — I got to have a better look at the Gateway@klia2 mall that preceded the check-in counters and the stores inside the terminal itself. But I will always try to use the KLIA main terminal hereafter: all the more so if my flight uses at the satellite terminal (as both my Ethiopian flights, in May and July, did) — as then I will be treated to a splendid bus ride across the apron!
There were at least a couple of pretty under-construction signs, including a cute one for Heinemann Duty Free, which has a presence at KLIA2 like Eraman Duty Free does at the main terminal.
After spending no more than twenty minutes in this rather boring enclosure, I had to practically dash to the gate where AK705 was boarding, as the last few passengers were stepping on board. From a distance, the faded red circles in the sign declaring boarding zones (to the left below) looked a bit orangish, somewhat like Thai Smile.
As I stepped aboard 9M-RAV, the latest A320ceo to be delivered to the airline, 9M-AGV (AK74 to MLE) presented herself in full view: a rare low-cost presence amidst the premium widebodies that fly to Malé’s Velana International Airport, the gateway to one of the world’s most coveted (and usually outrageously expensive) tropical luxury idylls.
The lead purser stood at the entrance, her hands locked together. I believe her name was Intan; it definitely began with ‘I’, from what I recall. (9M-)RAVishingly beautiful, don’t you think?
Flight: AirAsia (Malaysia) AK705/AXM705
Date: Tuesday, 3 January 2023
Route: Kuala Lumpur International (WMKK/KUL) to Singapore Changi (WSSS/SIN)
Aircraft: 9M-RAV, Airbus A320 (sharkletted)
Age: 3 years 11 months at the time (built: 2 February 2019; delivered to AirAsia Japan as JA03DJ: 11 February 2019; delivered to AirAsia Malaysia: 28 October 2021)
Seat: 22A
Boarding: 7:55am MST/SGT, UTC +8
Departure: 8:35am MST/SGT
Arrival: 9:15am MST/SGT
Duration: 40 minutes
Notes:
• Not much to write about, this being a very unremarkable A320ceo flight, other than the fact that this was my first AirAsia flight on the 9M-R** series rather than the typical 9M-A** series.
I must say that I didn’t take too many pictures of the cabin this time, not that I had the time to do so. After settling into 22A, I took another shot of 9M-AGV. Such out-the-window pictures will constitute most of this trip report, there being not much by way of seat-pocket contents or pretty flight attendants: not that their names are announced on non-Indian airlines anyway.
Meanwhile 9M-AQM (she of the De’Xandra livery and the registration in the middle of the plane) set off for JHB as AK6051, where this one had started from an hour ago.
As we taxied, PK-AXT arrived as QZ320 from Surabaya, to return there as QZ321 an hour later.
We were not too far from takeoff now, and I got a good closeup of 9M-XXJ in the Sony noise-cancelling headphones livery.
At a bit over half-past eight, the plane scooted skimmed down the runway, past the fire station, and set sail for Singapore.
Nothing says ‘Kuala Lumpur’ more than the acres and acres of plantations around the airport, located in Sepang district at the very bottom of Selangor state, with the greenery extending all the way into neighbouring Negeri Sembilan state.
It didn’t take long for the food service to commence, something you won’t find much on this sector from Singapore Airlines. Ethiopian at least gives a small pocket sandwich wrapped in an Ethiopian Holidays-branded napkin.
I finished off the Chicken & Cheese Sandwich in a jiffy, while the Thai Basil Chicken Rice would have to wait until lunch hour at office. The service otherwise didn’t amount to much, not that it was needed anyway.
Does flying get any better than this? What more can you ask from a 40-minute flight than picturesque panoramas of verdant green forests at your origin and a scattering of ships in the sea at your destination?
Three things that define Singapore to anyone arriving by air: the multitudinous ships; the Marina Bay Sands; and the Singapore Flyer. At night you will likely see only the first, but now, in broad daylight, was the perfect way to see all three and more.
At ten past nine, 9M-RAV coasted onto the Changi runway, with a small shadow to keep her company.
At the ST Engineering hangar were a number of interesting aircraft, including two from Air Canada (‘toothpaste’ livery to the left, new black livery to the right) and another from FedEx in the centre.
An A330 of Air Hong Kong, a DHL affiliate, was visible alongside a Scoot A320 as we cruised past and headed to Terminal 4.
And so back I was to 9-Ville, where more than half the registrations begin with either 9V or 9M — with anything else, like this Thai 787, being in the minority.
There was also this exotic, extravagant A330-900neo from Aircalin of New Caledonia, which has a pair of such aircraft (F-ONEO and F-ONET) and had sent the former here today. The following month, February, I had the pleasure of capturing her twin sister from the nearby Changi Business Park at Expo MRT on a beautiful Friday evening — this being a short ride from Tampines, my workplace at the time.
A giant Singapore Airlines A380 straddled a puny Citilink A320neo (PK-GTD) and one of two Vistara A321neos at Changi at this time, either VT-TVD from Delhi or VT-TVE from Mumbai. In less than three months’ time I would be flying the latter — which sports a ’50 Aircraft Strong’ sticker on the left side — to Mumbai. But thanks to the SATS catering cart covering up the rear of the plane, I cannot tell whether that sticker was present in the below picture, and therefore which of the two this was.
That registration, PK-GTD, almost made me freeze in horror. It was too similar to PR-GTD, a 737 of Brazilian airline Gol that was involved in the ill-fated G31907 collision-cum-crash in 2006 where everyone perished. Worse still, the picture’s filename was IMG_3054.JPG: the following year, another Brazilian aircraft crashed — this time PR-MBK, an A320 of TAM Airlines — as flight JJ3054. Not only did everyone on the plane lose their lives, but so did some on the ground.
Anyway, there is no good time to talk about crashes that took place nearly two decades ago. Here were some of the other arrivals at 9-Ville: as I said, the lion’s share of registrations began with 9.
That green A320neo and maroon A321neo aside, most of the aircraft at Terminal 3 were naturally of the blue-and-gold variety, including a pair of superjumbos.
We had passed by one of them, 9V-SMS, during the long taxi, with a smidgen of a Korean Air tail visible in the distance to the right.
Another superjumbo took off for Heathrow as SQ308, and my caption fittingly read ‘Up into the (9V-)SKY’.
It would be quite the taxi before we finally made it to Terminal 4, where (like KLIA2) I had never been before. It is now the base of Jetstar’s local Singapore unit, which shifted here in March, as well as some other LCCs across the region like AirAsia, VietJetAir, Cebu Pacific (Philippines) and Jeju Air (South Korea) plus full-service carriers like Cathay Pacific and Korean Air.
Speaking of Cebu Pacific, one of their bright yellow-and-blue A321neos (RP-C4125 as 5J813 from Manila) was standing at the nearby gate. It hasn’t grown as much as VietJetAir, let alone IndiGo, but it has a similar mostly-Airbus fleet structure with a few ATRs, and even a handful of A330-900neos — though the tight 9-abreast configuration is a different matter!
Now that IndiGo’s own turn to order widebodies — years after Cebu Pacific, AirAsia and VietJetAir — is coming, it may go for the A330 like those did, or switch sides and side with the 787 like Scoot. I do hope it orders the A330neo, as in general India (aside from Jet Airways) hasn’t been very fond of the A330, much like Japan and quite unlike China.
Soon my year-end travels, which had begun with rousing cries of We are One (Olé Olá) — the 2014 FIFA World Cup’s theme song — in the aftermath of Argentina winning the Qatar edition, had come to a close on this most humdrum and least exciting little hop of all.
As the others (many of whom were also connecting from other AK flights from Indian cities) proceeded into the terminal, one girl stared wistfully into the distance. Probably, like me, she was musing on the year gone by and the one that had only just got started!
More Indian passengers young and old staggered into the corridor, with deeply insightful HSBC ads on the wall. Little did I know that what formerly called itself ‘the world’s local bank’ — which is responsible for a good percentage of advertising at Changi Airport, including all the jetbridges — would later that month accept my father’s job application for a post in Bengaluru, after which my parents moved there in early May, a year before his retirement.
Then came the immigration counters and baggage claim, with reminders on all sides of how the Jewel Changi was possibly the most wondrous thing to be built at any airport — though I bet Akbar al-Baker would like to have a word or two on this, now that his Hamad Airport has thrown open its ‘Orchard’ (was it named after Singapore’s arterial retail thoroughfare?).
The automated immigration counters are nothing short of a blessing, as they take a minute at most, and a far cry from the surly immigration officers at Indian airports.
Oddly, Singapore doesn’t have its own duty-free brand like King Power at BKK or Eraman at KUL, and so relies on Shilla and Lotte from Korea, as well as the global Dufry chain.
Though the city’s name isn’t clearly seen here, the baggage belts were showing ads for a new flight from Singapore to Sibu (SBW) in the Sarawak region of Borneo. Time and again I confuse it with Sibiu (SBZ), a city in far-off Romania with an extra I in its name and a similar IATA code.
Above were displays for The Cocoa Trees and Gassan, a luxury watch and jewellery brand from Amsterdam, whose only locations outside the Netherlands are all at Changi.
Arrivals were naturally dominated by AirAsia, other than the aforementioned Cebu Pacific flight, while the three major airlines of Vietnam — VietJetAir, Vietnam Airlines and Bamboo Airways — had their turn later in the day, with Cathay Pacific the only other airline visible. This year I intend to fly all three of them for a Christmas/New Year holiday across both Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, specifically with the intention of seeking out VietJetAir’s A330-300 and Vietnam Airlines’ A350. A year that started in Hyderabad will hopefully end in Hanoi!
It took barely any time at all for a Gojek to turn up, and after quickly freshening up at home, I headed straight for work (not to Tampines, though) to begin the year — with a box of sweets from G. Pulla Reddy, a famous mithaiwala from Hyderabad, in hand.
But not before passing by another blue-and-gold double-decker giant, which I hope to fly in the coming years on not only SQ but also Emirates and possibly Qantas.
What about my omnipresent journal, you ask. It was only the following Monday that I’d filled it out, there being neither any interesting event on the flight nor the time to write about it!
For once this is a very short and nondescript report, with barely anything to talk about, and nary a picture to show for it — other than the scintillating views out the window at both takeoff and touchdown, and the colourful aircraft for company. Long story short, AirAsia remains the best way, by a long mile, to fly low-cost in ASEAN — not counting its unrelated Indian namesake — and neither Scoot nor Jetstar are in any way close. (I won’t even get started on IndiGo, an airline that believes that ‘less is more’ when it comes to its catering.)
That you can order two full hot meals on each flight at a minimal cost is a huge factor that sways in favour of AK, not to mention the Wi-Fi and streaming entertainment — though they were a no-show on 9M-RAV — and you can’t get much better by way of service on an LCC in this part of the world. What VietJetAir or Lion Air or Cebu Pacific does I don’t know, and frankly I don’t care, since in general I prefer flying on full-service carriers and/or widebodies for most of my international travels, avoiding the nickel-and-diming you often find on LCCs. If I do fly an LCC, it will be IndiGo or the new Air India Express (after its merger with AirAsia India) within India, and AirAsia to ASEAN.
KLIA2, however, was a letdown, and very drab and humdrum compared to the glittering main terminal. While not offensive like some parts of Bangkok Suvarnabhumi, whose industrial décor can be downright offensive at times, it has none of the charm and curiosity of the KLIA main terminal (three cheers for the model aircraft display!) and satellite building that make it one of my favourite airports in Southeast Asia — and it well may have been my number one if Changi weren’t this brilliant and outstanding of a world-leader.
The Hexagon being successfully closed, my next two reports will also be on the SIN–KUL sector, for a wonderful weekend jaunt I’d taken in May. The onward was on Scoot’s A321neo, on a similarly nothing-to-write-home-about morning flight, but in general I have never been a fan of Scoot’s over-friendly, on-the-nose cheekiness, which is jarring compared to the fun cheer of AirAsia that never irritates. The return was on Ethiopian Airlines, a special flight indeed given that it was the birthday of not only the Star Alliance but also my 787-8, and I enjoyed the exotic fifth-freedom flight so much I couldn’t wait to fly it again (on the 787-9 this time) on this sector in July. These should be up by September at most, after which comes my ‘Indonesia × SkyTeam’ trip to Bali/Denpasar featuring a KLM 777-300ER in SkyTeam livery — no better way for my first flight on this alliance — and two Garuda Indonesia A330-300s with a special sticker. A most ecletic and exciting year indeed for personal aviation, and this pair of flights on AirAsia was how it started off!
Les contributeurs de Flight-Report ont posté 48 avis concernant 10 compagnies sur la ligne Kuala Lumpur (KUL) → Singapore (SIN).
La compagnie qui obtient la meilleure moyenne est Singapore Airlines avec 8.7/10.
La durée moyenne des vols est de 1 heures et 0 minutes.
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1 Comments
Does it mean that readers strongly prefer reading about Singapore Airlines and/or AirAsia flights within ASEAN, excluding India — and conversely that they don’t care reading about exotic airlines and destinations? Or does it also mean that they have no patience for my essays where I ramble on and on about Indian aviation and fleet strategy? I think the latter is a likely reason, as this is a very short report with just the details of the flight and NO backstory about fleet strategies and route networks.
But I’m sorry to say that such short reports will be the exception rather than the norm, as I am far more passionate about packing in my experiences and sharing my views about as many aviation-related things as possible. I do understand that that’s likely not what you’re looking for on a website which should contain far more pictures than text, and that writing about domestic Indian aviation developments is doing no favours for my readership.
Regardless, I couldn’t have done without all your support, so thank you regardless!
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