A TOWERING SYMBOL OF FRIENDSHIP
PHOTO // Chua Soon Lye
For the past six months, a large olive-green cabin with a Singapore flag emblazoned on its side was a familiar sight at the Sultan Iskandar Muda Airport in Banda Aceh.
This Mobile Air Traffic Control (MATC) tower was loaned to the Indonesian authorities on 8 Jan, to help them co-ordinate air movements at the city's congested airport during the tsunami humanitarian relief efforts, so that relief flights could proceed smoothly.
There was also an urgent need for the MATC as the airport's air traffic control tower was badly damaged by the tsunami.
The MATC is a cabin fitted with air traffic control communications devices. It can be raised about four metres high for air traffic controllers to have better visibility of the airport runway.
Transporting the tower to Banda Aceh from Paya Lebar Airbase was no mean feat as the tower was simply too tall and the tractor usually used to pull it was too heavy for the Republic of Singapore Air Force s (RSAF) C-130 Hercules aircraft.
Major Yeo Chiang Meng, Head of the Air Movement Centre (AMC), decided to dismantle the MATC into two parts, for transportation in two C-130 Hercules aircraft and re-assembled the parts on arrival at Banda Aceh.
A third aircraft carried the equipment needed to unload and assemble the MATC at Banda Aceh.
On 20 Jul, Indonesian Major-General Mardjono S W, Commander of Air Region 1, handed over the MATC back to RSAF's Brigadier-General Jimmy Tan, then Commander of Air Defence Systems Division, at Sultan Iskandar Muda Airport.
