Page 14 - Beginner's Guide to Aviation

AIRSPACES
Airspaces are basically marked territories known as Flight Information Regions (FIR). They are all over the world and owned by numerous different countries. Let’s take a look at Singapore’s and its neighboring countries’ FIR!
480nm
950nm
Notice how small Singapore is in comparison to its FIR?
That’s because a country’s FIR can extend beyond Its national airspace! Singapore’s FIR includes their national airspace as well as airspace over parts of Indonesia and the South China Sea.
There are 2 main flight rules that operates in these airspaces. First, we have Visual Flight Rules (VFR) which refers to a set of regulations that a pilot may operate under when weather conditions meet certain minimum requirements. VFR flights navigate using visual landmarks on the ground.
Next, we have Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) which refers to a set of regulations that dictates how aircrafts are to be operated when unable to navigate under VFR. IFR flight rely on the instruments on board an aircraft as well as ATC instructions to navigate and maintain separation with other aircrafts.
Singapore’s FIR is approximately 950nm x 480nm!!