airfield is plain

That lovely new airfield is plain old useless

From a Vavau correspondent Some mistakes are pretty costly, especially when it is a wrongly sited airfield. So Britain is discovering these days in

Tonga.

Although the airfield completed in Vavau in October, 1967, must be one of the most scenic in the world, it has been condemned as being un safe for all but the smallest aircraft under the most favourable con ditions.

Perched along the edge of a precipitous, rocky cliff beyond the village of Leimatua, it boasted breath taking views. Unfortunately, up drafts of air rising from the sea below made inspectors from Britain condemn it.

Luckily for Tonga, the site was chosen by Mr. Joseph Furniss, the Englishman who was in charge of work on the field; so Britain will foot the bill.

Maafu Tupou, Governor of Vavau, says the airfield is 3,400 ft long and cost about ST3 0,000. A new field will be built a mile inland from the present one and roughly parallel to it, and will cost just over $90,000.

The increase in price is explained by the greater length, of just over a mile.

This will make it possible, by an easy extension, in a few years time, to fit it in with King Taufa’ahau’s plans for jetfields throughout the kingdom.

Initial surveying for the new field is over, and hopes are that work will start early this year. The man in charge has not yet been appointed, but this time a New Zealander may get a whack at it.

Vavau’s Governor, who has one son at Hawaii’s East-West Center and another at the University of Papua-New Guinea, Port Moresby, looks forward to the new airfield.

With recent increases in overseas study, many other Vavauans join him.

Vavau people seem indifferent to the new airfield, but once work has started it will be a major topic of conversation. Dreams of rich tourists will again inflame local imagination.