By Anthony Tan
VIRGIN Communications
email: anthonykhtan@yahoo.co.uk
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| Wings Air Indonesia ATR72-600 |
Wings Air, a subsidiary of low-cost airline
Lion Air Group, has launched a daily flight from Pontianak, West Kalimantan’s
capital city to Sarawak’s second largest city Miri on 15 March. This is Wings
Air second destination after the successful launch of its flight to Sarawak’s
capital city Kuching in January.
Wings Air’s daily flight from Supadio Airport
in Pontianak, which starts at 3:30 pm (local time) is estimated to arrive at
Miri International Airport at 6:20 pm (local time) while its return flight from
Miri, a coastal city that borders with Brunei Darussalam in the island of
Borneo, will depart at 6:50 pm and to arrive in Pontianak at 9:40 pm.
Wings Air will use the turbo prop ATR 72-600,
which can accommodate 72 passengers for this route.
It currently flies to over 107 destinations
both domestically and internationally with its frequency reaching 300 flights
daily.
The airline, which has a fleet of 54 ATR
72-500/600, is expected to add another 20 aircraft this year.
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| Miri Airport |
Lion Air's operational director Captain Daniel
Putut says with the opening of the Pontianak-Miri route, people could travel
between the two cities in just two hours. It is much quicker than driving,
which takes 16 hours, and is also quite affordable at around Rp700,000 (about
RM230) one-way.
Via Pontianak, which offers connections to
other Indonesian destinations such as Jakarta, Batam, Semarang, Surabaya,
Balikpapan, Ujung Pandang, Bandung, Ketapang, Sintang and Putus Sibau, they are
now more options for air passengers from Miri.
On hand to welcome the recent inaugural flight
with 51 passengers to Miri was the Sarawak state Assistant Minister
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Sarawak’s Assistant Minister of Tourism, Arts and
Culture, Lee Kim Shin
(second from left)
posing with Lion Air officials
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of Tourism,
Arts and Culture Datuk Lee Kim Shin and Sarawak Tourism Board (STB) acting CEO,
Mary Wan Mering.
Mary sees Indonesia, which contributes about
60% to Malaysia’s medical tourism sector, as a very important market for
Kuching and Miri, which have unique products for leisure, medical and
educational tourism.
Miri, for instance, has three main private
hospitals that promote medical tourism. They are Borneo Medical Centre, Miri
City Medical Centre and Columbia Asia Hospital that cater for medical tourists
from Pontianak and the surrounding areas.
2018 is also Visit Miri Year with more than 30
events lined up such as the Miri City International Deep-Sea Fishing Tournament
(May 10-13). This is an initiative by the Miri City Council in collaboration
with Miri Resident Office; Miri District Office; STB; Ministry of Tourism,
Arts, Culture, Youth and Sports; Sarawak Forestry Corporation and other local
non-government organisations.
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Sarawak Tourism Board (STB)
acting CEO,
Mary Wan Mering.
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With the connectivity offered by the
Miri-Pontianak route, hopefully STB’s two major annual international events –
the Borneo Jazz Festival in Miri (May 11-12) and Rainforest World Music
Festival in Kuching (13-15 July) will be able to woo more Indonesians to attend
these two events this year.
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The inaugural flight was also welcome by natives
icons in traditional costumes of Sarawak
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Mary hopes the new route will help Sarawak
achieve its arrival target for 2018, which is set to increase between 8% and
10% of the 4.8 million arrivals into the state last year.
Malaysia Airports managing director Datuk
Badlisham Ghazali says while the airport operator continuously engages with
various airlines in its route development efforts, the
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Malaysia Airports managing director
Datuk Badlisham Ghazali
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focus is not just on the
KL International Airport.
Smaller airports such as Miri Airport also play
an important role acting as feeders to our international airports. Miri
Airport, which is undergoing expansion to three million passengers per annum
(mppa) capacity, handled 2.1 million passenger traffic movements in 2017.
Badlisham adds that the opening of
Pontianak-Miri route is in support of the objectives under the BIMPT-EAGA to
increase trade and investment among member countries.
BIMPT-EAGA is a sub-regional economic
co-operation comprising Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Timor
Leste.
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