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Home » Singapore » Taylor Swift Lands At Seletar Airport: An Inside Look At Singapore’s VIP Airport
Singapore

Taylor Swift Lands At Seletar Airport: An Inside Look At Singapore’s VIP Airport

Matthew Klint Posted onFebruary 29, 2024 17 Comments

a woman in front of a building

My afternoon in Singapore continued with a drive over to Seletar Airport (XSP), the “other” airport in Singapore that is far less busy than Singapore Changi (SIN). This report happens to coincide with news that Taylor Swift just arrived at this very airport on Tuesday.

An Inside Look At Seletar Airport, The Other Airport In Singapore

Seletar Airport opened in 1928 as RAF Seletar and was used as a defense post when the Japanese invaded British Malaya. The Japanese prevailed in 1942 and occupied Seletar through 1945. Later on during the Malayan Emergency, Seletar was used as a launchpad for strikes against communist insurgents.

After independence from the United Kingdom and later Malaysia, the British handed back Seletar to Singapore in 1971. In 1977, the airport became center sage for a DC-3 hijacking in Vietnam, resulting in the death of two Vietnamese crew members. The hijackers landed in Seletar seeking asylum in Singapore.

With the construction of Changi Airport, Seletar is used for chartered flights and general aviation. Think VIPs like Taylor Swift. There’s only one current commercial operator, Firefly.

On Tuesday, after completing the Australia portion of her The Eras Tour, Swift flew from Sydney to Seletar using a chartered Bombardier Global Express jet (registration 9H-VTD).

Hundreds of fans were waiting for the 34-year-old pop singer she landed. From there, she was whisked off to Sentosa Island, which I coincidentally wrote about earlier today. Swift will be offering several performances in Singapore starting on Saturday.

Let’s take a look inside the airport: it’s like a small-town airport in the USA, only much posher.

There’s easy parking outside. No lines. A single check-in area with flights on Firefly to Subang, Malaysia (SZB) operated on an ATR 72-500 aircraft. SZB is the old Kuala Lumpur International Airport.

a building with trees and a street

flags on poles with a building in the background

a parking lot with cars parked in front of it

a parking lot with cars parked

a sign in front of a building

a car parked in a parking lot

a parking lot with flags and cars

a street with a crosswalk and cars parked on the side

a glass entrance to a building

a room with a large area with a few screens and a couple people

a group of people standing in a lobby

a screen with a sign and text

There’s a restaurant, lush gardens, and plenty of seating as well.

people in a building

a group of people sitting in a lobby

a room with a large window and a large glass wall

a large glass building with a group of people walking

a room with glass walls and plants

a fountain in front of a building

As an aside, there’s a flight school nearby the airport called Aviation Hub and I got to “fly to New York” in a simulator (thanks to a friend of my friend). That was quite a lot of fun. It has been many years since I have flown. I wish I had more time for this!

a cockpit of a plane

CONCLUSION

Singapore Changi may be one of my favorite airports in the world, but Selatar reminded me of a “mini-me” version that is far less hectic. I’m going to have to try flying out of here on a future trip!

Have you flown out of Seletar Airport before?

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About Author

Matthew Klint

Matthew is an avid traveler who calls Los Angeles home. Each year he travels more than 200,000 miles by air and has visited more than 135 countries. Working both in the aviation industry and as a travel consultant, Matthew has been featured in major media outlets around the world and uses his Live and Let's Fly blog to share the latest news in the airline industry, commentary on frequent flyer programs, and detailed reports of his worldwide travel.

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17 Comments

  1. Alert Reply
    February 29, 2024 at 10:23 am

    All rap and rock and rap performers are morons . I’ve seen one or two in FC and they are really really bad news .

  2. derek Reply
    February 29, 2024 at 10:39 am

    Nice article.

    Matthew wrote “With the construction of Changi Airport, Seletar is used for chartered flights and general aviation. ” That might lead the reader to think Seletar was the former main airport. No.

    Paya Lebar is the old Singapore International. Heads of state still fly there. It’s an air force bsse that will be closed and converted to housing and neighborhoods soon.

    Some Malay airlines protested and wanted to fly to Changi, not Seletar!

    One more thing, it is pronounced se LEE tar, not SELL a tar

  3. dfw88 Reply
    February 29, 2024 at 10:48 am

    I flew there last year with Firefly from SZB. Fun little airport. Immigration was sure fast with only one ATR landing at a time. Having flown into KUL, then from SZB to XSP, and finally out of SIN it was quite fun to compare airport sizes and crowds in both Kuala Lumpur and Singapore!

  4. Chi Hsuan Reply
    February 29, 2024 at 11:08 am

    This is even more boring than your dull, “Good coffee in X” crap.

    • Matthew Klint Reply
      February 29, 2024 at 11:29 am

      *yawn*

      • Substitute Steve Reply
        March 1, 2024 at 10:20 am

        I enjoy the coffee reviews as I love coffee and try the local coffee wherever I go. I wish there was a way to filter coffee reviews easily (can that be done?)

    • Jan Reply
      February 29, 2024 at 12:41 pm

      haha

  5. yiannis93117 Reply
    February 29, 2024 at 12:12 pm

    Chi is right.

    • Matthew Klint Reply
      February 29, 2024 at 1:38 pm

      Simple solution. Don’t read it.

      • Chi Hsuan Reply
        February 29, 2024 at 2:53 pm

        Don’t complain blogger boy. You get a few pennies from my clicks and I get a little dopamine jolt from trolling you. It’s win win.

        • Matthew Klint Reply
          February 29, 2024 at 3:40 pm

          I certainly wasn’t complaining.

  6. SINJim Reply
    February 29, 2024 at 1:59 pm

    Seletar is an enormous time saver for those who travel between Kuala Lumpur and Singapore yet so few people know of the option. That, by itself, makes this post quite helpful.

    • Jerry Reply
      February 29, 2024 at 2:15 pm

      How are the transit connections to Seletar? I flew in to Subang once, and though closer to KL, it seemed like it was aimed at locals driving, and out and back business travelers, not so much tourists.

      • dfw88 Reply
        February 29, 2024 at 4:09 pm

        There’s a bus stop out front. It’s about a 10 minute ride to the metro (somewhere on the purple line, I don’t remember which stop exactly). Not as convenient to transit as Changi but not bad either.

      • SINJim Reply
        March 1, 2024 at 3:00 am

        Many of the Seletar passengers are locals who do business in KL and vice versa. Grab is very easy to book but public transportation is not so straight forward.

        • GUWonder Reply
          March 1, 2024 at 6:45 am

          Are there ever private flights being taken between J.B. and Seletar?

          The one guy whom I would have asked that, tragically, I just found out yesterday that he had died in a plane crash in Malaysia earlier in February.

          https://bnnbreaking.com/aviation/tragedy-in-the-skies-malaysian-light-aircraft-crash-investigation-underway

  7. GUWonder Reply
    March 1, 2024 at 6:40 am

    In other singing traveler news, Rihanna has landed in India for the wedding celebrations of the son of an Indian billionaire. And so have a bunch of billionaires. Taylor Swift somehow isn’t on the list — maybe her going rate for private performances is too high at this time.

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