Flying has always been something I wanted to do in real life but due to a variety of reasons, I wasn’t able to do so until recently where I go through a 2-years journey to obtain my Private Pilot License and fulfil my childhood dream of flying a plane myself.
Information on the internet is limited when I first researched on this topic as the General Aviation (GA) regulations and communities are quite small in South East Asia at this moment when compared to their counterpart in the North America or Europe region.
If you are a Singaporean, there are a few options you can take to get a Private Pilot License (PPL).
- Take a Singapore restricted private license in Singapore with CAAS
- Take a US FAA licenses by either going to US to do a flying course or do a partial course in Singapore followed by a 6–8 weeks full time course in US
- Take a Malaysia PPL by joining a flying club in Johore
Each option has its pros and cons and I will elaborate why I decide to do my PPL ultimately in Malaysia.
Singapore Restricted PPL
This option is the most expensive of the three but is probably the more convenient since you can do most of your flying in Seletar. There’s a few schools that offer such a course (e.g. Seletar Flying Club). Based on their website, it takes around 12–24 months to complete it part time and cost 50–60K. Afterwhich, you will be issued a Restricted PPL which only allow you to fly a Singapore registered plan in Singapore Airspace.
Why I didn’t go for this option?
- Cost (it cost a lot more to go through this option)
- Restricted License (only allowed to fly within Singapore airspace which defeats the purpose of using your license to fly to places where you would otherwise have to drive a long distance) ~ there’s only 1 airport in Singapore for General Aviation (GA) so there’s not much ‘cross-country’ to do.
- If I wish to get the restriction removed, I’ll need to go to Malaysia to do the cross-country course.
US FAA PPL
The only reason I didn’t opt for this option is because I couldn’t take 6–8 weeks away from my work to go to the US to do the course full-time. Otherwise, this option is the best as it allows you to get a full fledge FAA PPL license which is probably the most widely accepted PPL license in the world. Furthermore, maintaining the validity of the license is much easier and I will elaborate later as maintaining your license after the issuance of the PPL is also something you need to factor in. Unlike a driving license, you need to maintain your license and it isn’t perpetual.
Why I didn’t go for this?
- Unable to commit 6–8 weeks full time in US
- Cost (it might cost you less per hour flying the plan but if you factor in the travel and lodging, it wouldn’t be too far from the other 2 options)
Malaysia PPL
Now, this is the option I choose and I will elaborate more the pros and cons of choosing this option.
First.. the cons:
- Travel Time: I spent more time driving to the school every weekend than flying the actual plane. With the causeway being jammed most of the time, each trip will take a minimum of 5–6 hours with half of it spent on driving. And unless you drive, taking public transport into Malaysia is probably going to add more stress to you as well.
- Paperwork & Processing Time: In my 24 months journey of getting the PPL, more than half of the time is spent waiting for the paperwork to complete with the Malaysia authorities. Processing time is measured in months and sometimes when 1 paperwork is approved, the other paperwork will expire which will add in a few more months in between. Things have significantly improved recently but you can still expect more than half your time waiting for paperwork than the actual flight training.
- To maintain a Malaysia PPL, it requires a Certificate of Test (equals to a checkride (‘flight test’) like the one you did to get your license) every 12 months. Getting a flight examiner is quite tough these days as the number of examiner is getting lesser (~ 10 now for the entire country) and each CoT add more cost / effort to maintain your license annually.
and now comes the pros:
- Cost: Flying in Malaysia is slightly cheaper although cost has gone up significantly over the last few years. The per hour cost is more than US but lesser than Singapore. However, if you factor in the time & fuel, it might not exactly be much cheaper. Budget around $30K-$40K.
- It’s a unrestricted license which means you are free to fly cross-country with the license.
- It’s a lot more fun: Malaysia is a very beautiful country and flying in Malaysia allow you to explore places you haven’t been to with a wide variety of landscape (mountains, coastal, etc.)
With all those factors above in mind, I ultimately choose to do my flight school in Malaysia.
So.. before you run to a flight school and start signing up as a student pilot, here’s a list of requirements that you need to fulfil:
To be enrolled as a Student Pilot in Malaysia, you need to obtain a Student Pilot License (SPL) from Civil Aviation Authority of Malaysia (CAAM). For a Singapore, there’s a few requirements that is unique to us:
- Above 30 years in age
- Pass medical test (you can do the test in Singapore as there’s a approved aviation doctor in Serangoon Area)
- Obtain a professional immigration visa from the Immigration Department of Malaysia (your flight school will need to sponsor you)
After you’ve done the above 3, you will then be issued a SPL which authorise you to start your flight training with the club/school. The waiting time for the above 3 items usually take 2–3 months as it requires multiple approval and lengthy paperwork to be completed — most of which will be facilitated by your club or school. During this period, there’s nothing much you can do except to wait and watch Youtube videos of people flying.
Once you obtain your SPL, you can now do 2 things in parallel and this is the exciting phase:
- Ground School and Exams
- Flying Lessons
Ground School
I will strongly encourage any student to quickly get all the ground school and exams completed as soon as possible. The exams are conducted in Kuala Lumpur and you are likely to fly there a couple of times to complete all the papers/tests. Furthermore, there’s also a requirement to do an English Verbal Exam and Radio Test in KL as part of the PPL requirement.
Key learnings:
- Make sure you study prior to taking the exams because while it’s MCQ, they can be quite tricky and there is a maximum number of retakes you can have before you are barred from taking the exams for a period of time (which will most likely ruin your entire timetable and probably force you to quit this dream).
- Try to complete the different test and papers in the same day so you can minimize the trip to KL.
- You need to complete your Radio Exam before being allowed to do your cross-country solo lessons. Booking the examiner can be tricky at times as it’s up to his schedule and without the test prior to your long navigation solo, you will be grounded.
Flying Lessons
Here’s the fun part and also the most stressful part of the entire journey. Your flying lessons are broken into 3 parts:
- Flying Fundamentals
- Cross Country
- General Flight Test
For Flying Fundamentals, you will spent a lot of time with you instructor flying dual sorties around Senai airport and the surrounding area (in this case, it’ll be around the north, south or east of Gunang Pulai Training Area. The whole purpose of this phase is to prepare you for going Solo which will come around 10–20 hours of your flying lesson (depends on your flight instructor’s confidence in you).
One you get the fundamentals right and have done multiple circuit trainings with your instructor, you will be signed off to do a solo circuit yourself. This will be a huge milestone as you will be in total control of the aircraft from startup to shutdown. This will be one flight you will never forget in your life.
Once you finish the first solo circuit, you will then move onto do your area training and area solo followed by the next phase of the training which is cross-country.
For cross-country, you will need to fly for a longer distance outside of your home airport. In Malaysia, this will likely be to Malacca Airport and Subang Airport and for some adventurous student, you may go as far as Penang Airport.
In the cross country phase, you will have the most fun as you will learn more about flight planning, routing, navigation and also making a wide variety of radio calls. On top of this, you will likely experience different terrain such as hills, coastal, wide plains, rivers, etc. where you are supposed to learn where they are and try to spot them as part of your navigation training. The flights are also considerably longer in terms of duration and some stretches 4–5 hours per training session as you go further away from Senai and back. It is important for you to finish and pass your Radio Exam in during this phase because it is a mandatory requirement before you are able to go for your solo long navigation exercise.
Upon completing this phase, you will be back training at your home airport for the other more complex drills (e.g. forced landing at airport, etc.) before going for your profile and General Flight Test (GFT).
For the General Flight Test (GFT), there are also pre-requisite that needs to be fulfilled before you can attempt it.
- You need CAAM to be notified and approve for you to do the exam
- You need to book a flight examiner who will conduct the GFT for you
- You need to fulfil all the requirements necessary to get a PPL (e.g. pass all ground exams, finish the minimum hours, etc.)
Once all the pre-requisite are completed, you can then attempt your GFT with your examiner.
The actual GFT consist of a few components and last around 90–120 minutes. It is advisable to be done in the aircraft that you’ve trained on so you are familiar with it. It consist of several drills which you would’ve learnt during your flight lessons.
Upon completion of the GFT, and obtaining a pass, you will then wait for your application for PPL to be processed by CAAM. This may take a few weeks and before you know it, you will receive the official PPL which makes you a full fledge pilot.
After getting your license….
Upon getting your license, your training and exams doesn’t stop here. To maintain your PPL, you will need to fulfil the following requirements in order to maintain your PPL.
- Ensure you maintain your medical validity
- Ensure you have 3 take-off and landing in the past 90 days if you intent to carry a passenger
- Renew your PPL every 2 years
- Ensure you pass your annual Certificate of Test (CoT) with an examiner (the structure is the same as a GFT) and fly at least 5-hours per year prior to doing the CoT.
- Ensure you re-validate your english test (if you didn’t get the score required to get a waiver)
What’s next?
After your get your Malaysia PPL, you have a few options:
- Apply for FAA license to tag onto your Malaysia PPL. This will allow you to fly on N-series (US registered) plane which is common in both Malaysia and Singapore. This itself is a journey itself and I will discuss more in another article.
- Continue to work on your flying skills with flights to other airports
- Start to offer rides to your friend for trips to Malacca and Subang
- Learn to fly a different plane of make/model
- Plan for flying trips while travelling overseas (a very complex process which I will attempt and share)
Welcome to the world of ultimate freedom!
I always view the issuance of the PPL as the start of a learning journey as you get to learn new things with every trip, flight, aviation video, talking to follow pilots, etc.
So get out and start flying!
