The Kokoda Track from Above: 1965 - 1970

[poteroo]

I've never walked the Kokoda Track, but I spent many hours flying into all the small strips that are located in the Owen Stanley Ranges. The well known Kokoda Gap, which is negotiable at around 7500 ft, is only 47 nm from Port Moresby, and by then the highest mountain,(Mt Victoria), towers over you 13,000 ft. There are several strips located on the track itself.

 

The first strip away from Port Moresby was Naoro. It is now abandoned I think - but it was only 2000 ft up, flat, wet and slippery and 400m long. The 2nd strip we serviced was Efogi - 3700amsl, 600m long and average 12% uphill, (17% just in from the bottom threshold. And it had a dogleg as well. There was just enough 'good' strip at the top to get ones tail off the ground - then over the edge you went. There was no turning back from there. The other strip which we occasionally went into was Kagi - now off the main track, but infamous because it was the site where the Japanese enacted the 'night-of-the-lanterns' in full view of the Aussies digging in on the other side of the valley at Brigade Hill. Kagi was notable for it's katabatic winds early am - couple of serious crashes due this.

 

My checkflights into these strips began on 24/4/1967 in a C185, VH-KRD. My last flight was in C180 VH-PNE on 27/1/1970 - the very day my youngest son was born by co-incidence. We moved local passengers and freight to and from Port Moresby - only 15-20 mins away over some rough country.

 

On weekends, we often did Aussie passenger runs with people interested in the Track, the Gap, and we usually landed at Kokoda so they could view the memorial there. So, I boned up on the WW2 history so that I could give them some value. The Track wasn't all that 'popular' in the 60's and the number of walkers we dropped off and picked up could be counted on your fingers in a month.

 

One trip that I made was very memorable. It was 1.00pm, and we were all planning to quit for the day when a call came in for an Aztec charter over to Kokoda and back. I drew short straw - nobody volunteered for a Gap crossing after lunch because the buildups by then were quite awesome. As luck would have it - the aircraft was a non-turbo Aztec C, (VH-COO), which was less fun than the turbo C that was also on line. My passengers made up for it. I had the honour of flying Bert Keinzle and family back to their rubber plantation at Kokoda. Bert was the legendary boss and organiser of the entire WW2 Kokoda Campaign carrier line, (some 15,000 local men). he must have walked that track tens of times and he knew every hill and creek along it. Without this backup support - the Campaign could well have been lost and the war lost. It was a difficult job - we had to climb to 14,000 and clear the ranges east of the Gap - then descend into the Kumusi R valley and fly low level back to Kokoda. Took twice as long as usual - but Bert was pleased to get home in one piece. He owned the airline so time wasn't the object - not hitting the scenery was!

 

Another interesting location was the Myola 'Lakes' which were really just bare, grassy swamps located just under the 'false' Kokoda Gap at 6000amsl. During WW2 this location was a drop zone to resupply troops, but due to the ever present low cloud and rain - these drops were hit & miss efforts. So, the Aussies then built a strip along the driest part of the grassland after the area was retaken in late 1942 and it was used to stretcher out wounded cases using a Piper Cub or a Stinson. We used to fly around there often en route without a load and found several wrecked aircraft still there - mostly tri-motor Fords or Junkers. It was a pretty tight circuit area even in our modern Cessnas so hats off the those WW2 pilots with overloads and real pressure to get through.

 

So, that's a little about this famous battlefield from my experiences. Having walked over some other parts of PNG, I can certainly empathise with our troops who really did it tough.

 

My 'closure' on the Kokoda story was on attending the Brig Potts memorial dedication at Kojonup in 2007. He will be remembered long after his generals.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[willedoo]

Thanks for posting that story, poteroo. You should write a book about the experiences one day.

 

Cheers, Willie.

 

 

[fly_tornado]

this was on twitter this morning

 

http://www.bushflyingdiaries.com/2015/11/bush-flying-drone-photos.html

 

 

[poteroo]

Thanks for posting that story, poteroo. You should write a book about the experiences one day.Cheers, Willie.

Have a draft done - but it's hard work!!

 

 

[Kununurra]

 

 

 

[Kununurra]

[Kununurra]

[frank marriott]

Have a draft done - but it's hard work!!

Have heard many stories, and seen "slides" of various strips from friends who operated up there. Would be very interested in reading a book of the experiences as a lot of the details etc. are forgotten, and many have passed on without committing anything to paper. Hope you continue with the effort.

 

 

[poteroo]

I trawled through my early logbooks today and found that I had made 196 separate trips from Port Moresby into the 4 major Kokoda Track airstrips. Noted about 40 Gap passages to the N side as well. In all of those trips, there were only 3 aborts due wx. Didn't add up the hours but it was usually about 40 mins per trip, unless you went from one strip to the other, (Efogi to Kagi was 4 mins!). All of them except 8 were done in 260 HP Cessna 185 aircraft - the 3200 lbs MTOW models. No nosewheel Cessnas ever serviced the track strips to my knowledge. The Pilatus Porters were beginning to takeover the Track work by 1970.

 

These C185s were all fitted with cargo pods and we used them every load to keep the weight forward. Surprise, surprise - we did weigh a lot of the freight and used a standard weight for national passengers. Each departure required a completed load sheet, pax manifest, and cargo manifest - making the paperwork quite onerous. It was really difficult to keep track of who was where, and what had been loaded into the aircraft while you were distracted with other tasks.

 

Efogi was so steep that we usually used only 20 deg flap and 65 KIAS on approach because the roundout was so marked that more flap made it problematical. When you have to land on a 15% or more uphill slope - there's a huge deceleration involved. Hence we kept some power on right thru the roundout. Takeoffs were greatly enhanced by the slope on most strips. You just shut out any thoughts of an EFATO later than 30 kts - too horrible to consider! Anyhow, we were young and full of the right stuff so the risks were not too deeply considered!

 

Have attached a map of all the airfields at Port Moresby during WW2. Many of them were still in good shape in 1965.

 

 

 

 

[facthunter]

I only flew OVER that area. Never into it. Poteroo did the hard stuff, and he must have been up to it or he wouldn't be here . My last trip to LAE was Aug 4 1968 VH- TAF, Return to Essendon next day via BNE. Hydraulic failure at BNE. We got rid of the 4's not long after that. Bit sad really. Fairly long range aircraft that took me to Cocos islands, New Guinea, Norfolk is, New Zealand and of course Tassie many times during the night when sensible sleep comfortably in their beds. Nev

 

 

[poteroo]

Further pics of the Kokoda Track airstrips.

 

The pic of Efogi with the Twin Otter on a long final shows the 150m of 'flat' strip and it then disappears downhill at close to 17% in parts. Never having watched a Twotter landing there - I'd only be guessing at their technique. My guess is that they don't carry full flap, and use a swag of power to keep the nosewheel from touching the steep slope at too great an angle. I remember a C206 being broken at Efogi sometime in the 60's and it was because the elevator command wasn't good enough and it hit nosewheel 1st.

 

The DC3,(VH-PAT), pic below was actually taken by Robyn Keinzle, (daughter of legendary Bert), loading at Kokoda in early 1961. Look at the 'tropical' clothes! This was the last pic taken of PAT because about a month later, it was 60nm NW of Port Moresby with a load of supplies for the Health Dept in Minj,(Western Highlands),when the crew saw smoke coming under the door. They made an emergency descent from 10,000 ft and landed at Bereina, a mission strip on an island. The flight crew and the sole supernumary, (a recently employed,and their 1st, flight attendant called Patti Gollum), evacuated via the cockpit windows. The aircraft exploded in flames due it's undeclared load of chemicals and was a total write-off. Luckily for all concerned the Captain was e highly experienced wartime pilot called Myles Lewis.

 

I was based in Mt Hagen at that time and thought little more about it. In 1989, I was purchasing an aircraft in Arizona, and was invited to stayover with the people concerned. After a bit of note swapping - to my amazement, the lady turned out to be the same Patti Gollum who had escaped the DC3 accident in 1961. What a co-incidence!! We have all become good friends and we see them on any US visits.

 

I have posted a pic of a Piaggio 166 VH-PAP, below. This aircraft became one of the many to disappear, or crash, in the Kokoda Gap. It was in early 1961, not long after I had arrived in Mt Hagen and began to fly,(as a pax), around various wild and woolly locations in the Western Highlands. The 'Pig' was flying Popondetta to Moresby mid afternoon - in the usual appalling weather - and disappeared near Mt Obree, just to the east of the Gap. It has never been found.The pilot had only been flying in PNG for 2 months and was relatively inexperienced. While searching for this aircraft, another wreck was spotted on Mt Obree - which turned out to be a USAF C47 which disappeared under similar conditions in 1944. Almost every year or two, a WW2 wreck is found somewhere in PNG. Pretty sobering stuff!

 

The other 2 pics that I've posted are of the active volcano, Mt Lamington, which is nearly on track the Kokoda Gap to Popondetta - about 30nm or so. It exploded violently in 1951, killing 3000 local people in a fast moving gas cloud akin to that of Pompeii. Although calm in the 60's it still gave a spectacular sight for tourists when we flew around the crater rim - sometimes even inside it.

 

Finally, a comment on one of the earlier pics which showed the point of impact of a Twin Otter in 2012. One of the techniques we never used was to pull off power on passing the Gap and try to descend 'straight in' to Kokoda - probably because we didn't have the same ability as the Twin Otter with its' 2 turbines. The route endorsing system we used called for maintaining altitude until level with or even past Kokoda - then turning back and descending through the more broken cloud away from the main range. Worked for us.

 

happy days,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[John Werner]

I used to fly in a Beech Baron from POM to Safia airstrip near the Musa River and Wanigela on the coast, sometimes to Tufi to refuel.   The flight path took us through the Pakia Gap in the Owen Stanley Range, not the Kokoda Gap as in this post.  This was in the period 1970 - 1972 in support of crew changes for Geophoto Resources Consultants exploration fly-camps with a base camp at Safia airstrip.   The stream sediment sampling was carried out with the helicopter support by Helitrans of Lae with a Bell 47G-3B-2 chopper flown by Captain "Chas" Keith, a former Senior Captain with TAA in PNG mainly on Fokker Friendship F27 aircraft on the Moresby-Goroka-Mount Hagen route.  Prior to that, Captain Chas was a crop duster pilot in a Pawnee in the Riverina of NSW.  Unfortunately, Chas vanished on  Mount Bellenden Ker in FNQ in about 1973 whilst undertaking a high-altitude test of a Bell Jet Ranger of Helitrans out of their new Cairns base as part of a Telecom transmission tower installation on the mountain.  No trace was ever found of the crash site owing to the dense rainforest on the range.  I have attached a photo of the Helitrans Bell 47G-3B-2 (call sign VH-PDX) that Chas Keith flew and I was a passenger in many times in PNG pictured on the ground at a helipad at Mount Hagen airport in 1971.

[onetrack]

This is the crash report of the Bell that Capt Charles Keith was piloting. There was also a LAME on board, one Grahame Thompson. The machine was actually a Bell 47GB3-1 (VH-FJO), and the disappearance region was in the vicinity of Gordonvale.

 

https://www.atsb.gov.au/sites/default/files/media/24597/197200016.pdf

 

Edited Saturday at 05:56 AM by onetrack

[John Werner]

Thank you so much for this crash report, onetrack.  It has cleared up a few miosconceptions that have developed over the years since, like the type of helicopter and the crash location.  Captain Chas was a dear friend whom I flew with many times in PNG over the period 1970 - 1971.  Apart from the many flights we had around the Musa River and Sisiworo River basins out of Safia, Chas also flew the Bell 47G-3B-2 to the top of the nearby Gorupu Mountains at an altitude of 3,078 m AMSL to drop me off for a few days' reconnaissance.  Just before I exited the Bell, Captain Chas remarked that, if the engine stalled at that altitude, they would have to fly in an air compressor to restart it.  Fond memories indeed of a remarkable aviator and man.

[John Werner]

Expanded PNG coverage to include devastation of Rabaul, East New Britain by volcanic eruptions in September-October 1994.  Airlink was an airline based in Madang with scheduled and charter operations through hubs at Wewak, Mount Hagen, Kavieng and Rabaul from about 1990.  Airlink lost four aircraft in the 1994 Rabaul volcanic eruptions which covered the town and surroundings with ash and pumice up to seven metres in depth.  The company ceased operations in August 2007 after suffering the additional losses of two aircraft - firstly an Embraer EMB-110-P1 Bandeirante (Pioneer) in March in West New Britain with the loss of both pilots then in April Airlink lost a Cessna 404 Titan at Goroka airport without loss of life.  Prior to this, in 1999, Airlink had lost a Britten Norman Islander also in West New Britain, killing all on board and another Embraer Bandeirante near Goroka.  However, Airlink could have been proud of their legacy with regards to the Rabaul eruptions as their personnel responded magnificently to the situation by the transport of supplies and equipment to the Rabaul refugees from Tokua airfield with the assistance of Heli Niugini helicopter support.  Airlink pilots involved were Bill Kerr, Brad Marsh, Michael Knight and Chief Pilot Rod Marsland.  Attached are photos from the time recording the events.  I would love to go back to Rabaul now as I knew it in the 1970s well before it got smashed when I worked on the Panguna copper-gold mine on Bougainville and took R & R in Rabaul, staying at the Travelodge and Hotel Allen in Mango Avenue there.  Who said nostalgia isn't what it used to be?

[Blueadventures]

Today and yesterday is an anniversary of the planned Japanese invasion landings in the area north of Yeppoon; fortunately, the battle of the Coral Sea prevented his occurring.