A. W. D. Mullins

Man Who Established Lae Workshops

THERE was regret throughout the New Guinea goldfields when it became known that, at the end of October, Mr. A.

W. D. Mullins would retire from the posi tion of mechanical superintendent for Guinea Airways Ltd., at Lae, and would return to Australia. Mr. and Mrs. Mullins, during their 10 years’ residence at Lae, endeared themselves to everyone.

The phenomenal success of Guinea Air ways in aerial transport has been due largely to mechanical efficiency and good ground organisation; and Mr. Mullins was largely responsible for that remarkable mechanical efficiency.

When, at the late C. J. Levien’s urgent request, Mr. C. V. T. Wells, of Adelaide, hesitatingly bought in Melbourne a second hand De Havilland aeroplane, wherewith to try out aerial transport in New Guinea, he selected two men to go with the machine — Captain Mustar, pilot, and A. W. D. Mul lins, mechanic. It was a shrewd and happy choice.

The ’plane was shipped to Rabaul. The B.P. steamer met terrible weather. Mustar and Mullins spent most of their time sit ting on the cables which held the 'plane on the deck, helping to keep it from falling overboard. Then came weeks of work in Rabaul, preparing the ’plane for that his toric and hazardous flight along the south coast of New Britain to Lae, where Mr.

Levien had scratched a narrow landing place out of the thick jungle.

Mustar and Mullins piade the flight suc cessfully; and thus was inaugurated the aerial transport industry of New Guinea.

Mustar flew the ’plane in to Wau (finding the cleared hillside ’drome after three at tempts) and, within a week, he was busy freighting by air. Two thousand carriers were promptly withdrawn from that heart-breaking track between Salamaua and Wau, and set to work as labourers on the new field.

Mullins, there in the jungle with a few simple tools, kept the engine of the ’plane in good order. Within a couple of years, his palm-leaf toolshed had grown into a series of great workshops, where his big staff gave ceaseless attention to the grow ing fleet of large ’planes. The Company, recognising his worth, sent Mr. Mullins to Europe and America to make himself thor oughlv acquainted with the great machines he was servicing.

A good comrade and a tireless worker, “Mull” became almost an institution at Lae. His wife, a woman of exceptional character—an army nurse, whom he met in England during the war—joined him at Lae soon after he went there, and helped him to make a home in the tropical wilder ness.

Mr. Mullins was one of the first volun teers from Adelaiie for the A.1.F., and he was one of the 25 who were disembarked near Rabaul in 1914 to put the German radio station at Bitapaka out of commis sion. He got malaria, was invalided home, and was refused when he volunteered a second time: but he went to England as a munition worker, and gained valuable ex perience in the great war workshops.

After the war. he joined the R.A.A.F. at Point Cook, Melbourne and from Mel bourne he went to New Guinea. Mr. Levien always described him as “a wizard with engines.” N Mr. Dennis Hill, a Fiji Government offi cial, arrived in Australia in November on furlough. After a brief stay in Mel bourne, he and his wife went across to Tasmania to spend a short holiday.