LUFTA History
Our Story
The Farm
Ladang Puchong (Puchong Farm) was once an active plantation with crops and cattle roaming freely. Rumor has it that once upon a time, the farm was home to every single species of durian in the world. Going back even further before the area was cleared, the farm was a thick rainforest where families of tigers and panthers used to roam. In the early 2000, cobras and pythons could still be found lurking in the bushes. Wild boar footprints could be seen on soft ground and monitor lizards were often mistaken as crocodiles due to their sizes. More than 20 years later, some of these wildlife are still roaming around the farm today, although, not as frequently as before.
In 2001, an urgent need for an exclusive UAV flight testing site surfaced in Malaysia. 3 government research projects were awarded to UPM to be completed within 3 years. Without a dedicated flying site close to Kuala Lumpur (KL), it was impossible to achieve this mission in time. After exploring a few places around the university, Ladang Puchong was chosen as the location to build a UAV runway. Because the farm was pristine and blessed with its natural beauty, no one wanted to destroy the site just to build a runway. Hence, a decision was made to build it on a hill. It was argued that by this choice, least amount of disruption and destruction to nature would be caused to the surrounding nature. So how did we build a flat runway on top of a hill with a peak? By slicing off the top. It was perhaps our version of the Kill Devil Hill at Kitty Hawk, NC.
The A-Team
A team was quickly assembled in UPM to think of a way to complete this mission. The team, was pure class. Aerospace engineers and Civil engineers, with top class university management at that time, had to have the same vision and work closely together to perform this feat, within the shortest time. Aerospace engineers just wanted a runway - any runway - so that the UAVs could takeoff and land. But Civil engineers had better long lasting ideas. For instance, the final choice of materials to use to make the runway was not just normal concrete. If normal concrete had been used it would crack easily under the hot tropical weather over time. Instead, an airport runway grade concrete was proposed and chosen for LUFTA. Only the best. It was the right choice because more than 20 years later, the runway is still super strong and serving faithfully. Today the runway not only had served fixed-wing UAVs and drones, it had welcomed manned helicopters which dropped in, just to say hi (and satisfy curiosity).
Vantage Point
Choosing to build a runway on top of a hill added another advantage. For UAV pilots, operators, scientists and engineers, we could see the prototype flying machines at all times within the Line-of-Sight (LoS). On a good day the UAV team could see the aircraft as far as 10km away with a pair of binoculars. The clear LoS empowered the pilots and commanders to take immediate action should the aircraft misbehaved at any time.
The Runway Construction
The runway specifications given to the engineers were simple: 150m long and 6m wide with headings 300deg and 120deg. A 'T' section was built at one end (Runway 30) for fixed-wing aircraft to make a U-turn. The concrete runway is still holding strong today thanks to the superb team that worked tirelessly to make it the best.
