MYSTERIOUS PLANES.

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 19201, 6 January 1928, Page 7

MYSTERIOUS PLANES.

OVER NORTH WEST AUSTRALIA.

PROBABLE SMUGGLING PLOT,

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SYDNEY, December 29

Residents of Broome, on the northwest coast of Australia, recently reported that they had seen or heard an aeroplane, and, in a number of instances, two 'planes, flying off the coast near that town. They wore unknown machines, and at first it was alleged that they were on a spying mission for some country. They were certainly not tho 'planes which include Broome as a regular stopping place along their mail routo, and) as oilo of these machines, flying oil the day that the 'planes wero seen, reported that there was no mother ship at sea for at least 150 miles from the coast, the suggestion of an espionage mission was dismissed. The theory is held in that part of the continent that tho 'planes wero out ou a wholesale smuggling mission. Although Federal Customs ami aviation officials were sceptical regarding the reports, men who know tho uorth-west coast svell assert that tho smuggling theory was quite feasible. There is quite n trade in opium in the Northern Territory. Every hut and deserted station homo and blacks' camp reeks with it. The authorities kuow little about it, because most of tho drug slides in by Japanese luggers working across tho Gulf of Carpentaria, or is d'roppod overboard in Darwin HarLuur from vessels from the East, to [hi pieked up by waiting confederates in usumnes. The opium trade in the norlh is fairly well centred .vhtn-© there are Chinese communities. Darwin has a large Chincso population, nearly three times as largo as the white population, and then there is a .settled community of them 200 miles inland at Eumungalan, whilo a chain of Chinese reaches away to the MeArt.hu r river on the north-west coast. On tho Broome sido there are few opium addicts. Japanese form the bulk of the coloured population, but these do not seek the drug, it is suggested that aeroplanes are used to bring the dlrug in bulk to some distributing centre, whence it is trickled out to the various Ohineso communities scattered over those wild and little-known regions. Another suggestion is that the 'planes wero possibly used to transport Chineso into Australia to defeat tho White Australia laws. The instances recently of stowaways on Dutch vessels show how eager Chinese aro to get here, how eager their countrymen legally settled here are to get them for employment, and to what lengths thoy will go to gain thoir objective. As it was claimed then that a Chinese was worth £2OO once landed here, it would not be beyond profit and practicability to use au aeroplane to carry three, four, or even five Chinese from one of the islands to the north of Australia to some plaoe in north-west Australia where they could bo checked, hidden for some time, and then dispatched to anywhere in the country.

The smuggling of pearls nut of the country would also be a profitable use of the' 'planes. Not every pearl found at the bottom of the sea by divers is given to its lawful possessors, the owners of the pearling luggers who employ the divers. It is known that thousands of pearls in this way are illegally obtained, but the difficulty with these, as with the proceeds of all ill-gotten proceeds, is to get rid of them. One or two pearls might safely be smuggled out of sight of the diving "bosses", and then out of the country, but illegal' export on a large scale would be practically impossible through the ordinary channels. Hence it is thought that the 'planes may _ have been employed by some organisation dealing in illicit pearl-buying to carry the pearls beyond the reach of their lawful owners and Australian officials.