HEAVIEST RAID

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 23, 28 January 1944, Page 5

HEAVIEST RAID

ADMIRALTY ISLANDS

SYDNEY, January 27. The heaviest raid yet made on the Admiralty Islands is reported by General Mac Arthur's communique today. It was made on Tuesday by Mitchell niedium bombers escorted. by Lightning fighters. The Admiralty Islands are just 240 miles north of the Huon Peninsula, New Guinea. The same targets had been punishingly attacked on Monday. At the Lorengau and Momote aerodromes buildings were demolished, eight grounded fighters destroyed, and gun positions damaged. A small freighter and barges were burned in Lorengau Harbour. Three of our planes were tost. The recent smashing attacks on Rabaul and Lorengau follow reports of increased enemy air and shipping movements in these areas. While the South-west Pacific air war maintains its rising tempo, the ground fighting in the various theatres has been on a reduced scale. The Australians in the Finisterre Range, New Guinea, are advancing and are in contact with the enemy. American marine patrols at Borgen Bay, western New Britain, on Monday killed another 30 Japanese and captured a number of automatic weapons. At A-rawe, in southern New Britain, American patrols are also active, but no contact with the Japanese has been reported. Allied patrol torpedo-boats on Sunday night sank three troopladen Japanese barges off the northeast New Guinea coast.