Strange Blips Which Led To A
pp. 69-71 · Read in the full issue
amatic Incident March, 1943
Fateful Battle
’ was late in the night of March 1, 1943. An Australian Beaufort plane, in command of Squadron ider Smibert, cruised slowly over f waters of the Bismarck Sea lich is the part of Huon Gulf, in New Guinea area, nearest to the stern end of New Britain). he Beaufort, from the Milne Bay e, had been told that three Jap troyers were believed to be lewhere in that area, and he had n instructed to locate them, here were four men in the plane gineer, navigator and radio man, addition to the pilot) and the ti in the front of the picture i “Sparks”. He was searching the k sea round about with his radar ipment. resently, he cursed aloud. “I light I had ’em,” he complained. ?ot a couple of blips—now the jhine’s gone on the blink, and " getting blips from everywhere, k at it!” ire enough, if the radar was to believed, there were a lot of »s down there. They did not be -5 the radar. ut the skipper decided to make s. He swung away that way, and y again this way, -sewhere, the radar behaved nally, but it repeated the blips ;he same place, when they re led. [EN the crew awakened to the fact that, quite without warn ing, they had stumbled upon an ny fleet at sea. They kept iing, while sending an immedi radio report to their base. There no reaction —no shot, and no of a hostile plane—from the :ened ships. low many ships shall I say?” d “Sparks”. “I counted eighteen, that seems fantastic.” )th pilot and navigator, who had ;hed the screen, agreed that e were between sixteen and ity.
Setter be on the safe side, and e it fourteen,” said the skipper; the first message went out. »r three to four hours the ifort kept circling, reporting the and steady westwards progress he fleet. The Beaufort had no bs, but it carried flares, which it ised from time to time to tiinate the surface of the sea, the ships. len the Beaufort set off for e. st before dawn, it passed dron after squadron of Aus an and American planes—in came within a whisker of col
llding with a Flying Fortress.
The alert American-Australian command had taken no chance —it had sent out, from every available base, every plane, it could summon up, for the kill.
AND a mighty kill it was. For that lone Beaufort, by sheer luck, had contacted the great fleet of
transports which the Japanese had assembled in secrecy in a last desperate effort to retrieve their fail ing campaign in the Lae-Salamaua- Buna-Wau-Bulolo district of New Guinea.
There were 12 transports (carry ing 15,000 men), 10 warships and some scores of planes—although the latter took little part in the defence of the convoy. The convoy was headed for Lae.
As dawn broke over the Bismarck Sea, in the morning of March 2, the fleets of Allied bombers and fighters literally fell upon the great convoy.
A few small warships may have escaped, but—as far as is known— not one transport got away.
The ships fought back valiantly, and the Japanese died bravely—but
e slaughter was of a character dom exceeded in that South cific War. The Allies lost only ir planes. rhe Beaufort’s crew was asleep ping March 2. But on March 3, lie the bombers and fighters were 11 out clearing up the Jap [inants, the Beaufort went back reconnaissance; and it reported it smashed ships, debris and dead n were scattered over hundreds square miles of Bismarck Sea.
Siat was the story as told to me a quiet-spoken man who sat be -5 me recently in a plane, en route Fiji. [e was Mr. N. S. A, Layton, and was the navigator on that lufort plane. He told it to me as imple incident of wartime service iren now, he did not realise that fortunate appearance of those ormal blips on the radar screen ned the way to one of the most matic battles of the Pacific War, I to a Japanese defeat which ictly changed the course of the rhen they lost that convoy, in t way, in the Bismarck Sea, the s knew they never could take t Moresby; and that, without ■esby, they must abandon their towards thrust through the •mons against Australia, New land and Fiji. r. Layton now is an officer of Colonial Sugar Co., of Queens l and Fiji, and he is responsible
for the technical and intensive training of managerial staff. He is in Lautoka for a few weeks, con ducting a school for selected men
of the CSR Co. staff in Fiji.-