Wind Spoils Supply Drop To Tired Troops

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 29017, 5 October 1959, Page 12

Wind Spoils Supply Drop To Tired Troops

(New Zealand Press Association) LEVIN, October 4. Two Bristol Freighters of the Royal New Zealand Air Force circled the foothills near Levin for half an hour today in a vain attempt to drop food supplies to the 2nd Battalion, New Zealand Regiment, in the second phase of “Exercise Habis.” Although three containers were landed, the major portion of the drop was .cancelled because of strong gusty winds. The exercise is final training for the battalion before it leaves for Malaya. Troops entered the bush in the jungle training area on Friday morning, and emerged today to take part in the air-drop, a planned section of the exercise. Thirty tea chests containing supplies were to have been parachuted to the battalion. One chest was parachuted, and two sacks were landed in a “free” drop before the pilots called off the operation.

The dropping zone was a rough grassed area set between hills, and opening to the south. Biting southerly winds swept up the valley to chill about 900 troops resting there after a trying two days and nights spent in thick bush. A request was made for the supplies to be transported by road from Ohakea and they were due to arrive tonight. The troops had barely enough food left to supply then with lunch today. The Bristol freighters from Ohakea arrived over the dropping zone shortly before noon—and circled several times. Coming low over the tree tops the lumbering planes appeared to swivel and toss as they were caught by the wind. The centre of the drop area was outlined with large T-shaped orange markers and a smoke flare.

Two sacks dropped without parachutes contained 1150 boxes of wooden matches. All landed safely “I am delighted with the per-

formance by the troops,” said the battalion’s commanding officer, Lieutenant-Colonel D. J. Aitken, when summarising progress of the exercise today. “They are most hearty and cheerful chaps—it is their right to grizzle, but they don’t even do that.” The chief umpire for the exercise, Lieutenant-Colonel R. A. Tinker, said he was most satisfied with the way the troops had behaved. As they marched to the air drop zone today, the men, most of them wet and mud covered to the knees, were obviously tired. Some were stumbling. The last phase of the exercise will be a dawn attack on the “enemy” scheduled to take place on Tuesday.