Blazed

The Trail They

Aviation, Which "Made" New Guinea, Now is Saving it From the Japs

PURE chance presented the Allies with the air-base from which they now plan a two-pronged, US-Australian attack on the Japs in the Buna region of Papua.

A couple of months ago, an Allied pilot, returning from operations, lost himself in rain clouds “somewhere over the south coast of Papua.” He cruised around until his petrol was exhausted, then found —miraculously, considering the character of the country—a smooth niece of grassland on which he could land.

He duly reported his discovery, and a partv was sent in to look it over. Asa result, this strip of kunai grass has become the air-base to which American troops were flown, before setting off for the Buna area. Our planes took in troops, ammunition, food and even Jeeps —which are apparently maintaining their reputation for all-round usefulness even on New Guinea terrain—and in a short time a small army with its modern equip ment, was established.

That young pilot’s far-reaching dis covery was sheer good luck. To find flat land, capable of accommodating even a Moth plane, is. in New Guinea, a mighty achievement—New Guinea doesn’t grow that way. The coastal strips are usually honeycombed with mangrove swamps; the mountains begin without any pre liminaries —tiers of peaks that thrust up through the clouds, jungle-covered and perpetually drenched by the rains that pour down, irrespective of whether the calendar says it is the “dry” season or the “wet.”

Yet, in spite of these natural disabili ties—because in out-port New Guinea, the only choice was between foot or plane travel, and foot travel is 100 per cent, discomfort in those latitudes—a chain of landing-fields was developed in Papua and New Guinea, between 1927 and 1939.

CARRYING on the British tradition that the miner opens up primitive country, the Australian prospector put the New Guinea mainland on the map. And. because there was no other way of tackling it, for the first 50 years or so he walked, with a heavily-laden line of native carriers trailing behind him.

In 1927, the first plane came to the Morobe district, following the discovery of rich gold, and thereafter the com munity became completely air-minded.

Many miners still walked about their business, but with this difference: Each, as he plodded on, was determined that as soon as he was “on gold” he would have a landing-field as close as possible

to his place. Gold and planes were synonymous.

When the local natives found that the newly-established “master,” or group of masters, was anxious to find a flat piece of country where a balus could “sit down” in some sort of comfort, they became intensely obliging. Tul-Tuls and Luluais, like members of rival Chambers of Commerce, travelled miles to acquaint the would-be ’drome owners of some mythical tract of land near their villages, which they fondly described as being “straight thas’all—’e no got mountain.”

Examination usually proved these areas to be 20 yards square, and covered with coconut trees: or a small space in the middle of the village sago swamp. But, by a process of elimination and endless trudging up mountains and down valleys, somewhere—perhaps four or five hours’ walk from the nearest camp, but still close for those parts—something would be found.

A river flat, hedged in by so many mountains that the pilots automatically performed a series of aerobatics whenever they took off or landed, or a mountain ridge where the scrub and coconuts could be hacked down, the surface flattened out and the whole made to resemble a third-rate country road, and about as narrow, would be honoured by the name of “drome”—the nerve-centre of the district, the place where civilisation began and ended.

Somehow the pilots of the New Guinea aerial transport companies located these weird landing fields, tucked away among or over the mountains, and acquired an intimate knowledge of their bumps and hollows and gradients, and delivered rice and mining gear, stores and mail to them as casually as the out-back Australian mail-man does his job No pilots grew tougher than the New Guinea breed. They had to be skilful— or else!—and by that skill they implanted intense air-consciousness in the minds of Territories’ residents TT is fitting that in war, as in 'peace, 1 the dominant factor in the success of our enterprise in the New Guinea area should be aircraft, the men who fly them—and landing-fields, Fifteen years ago, when commercial aviation was in its infancy, the plan envisioned by the promoters of New Guinea’s first air company was written off in most quarters as the dream of madmen. But that mad dream became a reality. A town, and all the machinery for a huge gold-mining project, were carried over the mountains by air freighters.

To-day, following the trails blazed by those pioneers, complete units of United Nations troops, and their equipment, can be transported in a few hours, direct from Australian bases to front-line battle

stations in New Guinea.

J.T.