MAMMOTH WORKSHOPS

Evening Star, Issue 25113, 1 March 1944, Page 7

MAMMOTH WORKSHOPS

" SOMEWHERE IN AUSTRALIA " SERVICING OF AMERICAN AIRCRAFT (N.Z.P.A. Special Aust, Correspondent) SYDNEY, Feb. 29. Hidden iu the scrub " somewhere in Northern Australia " are huge camouflaged buildings coveriug many hundreds of acres. They house the United States Fifth Air Force Service Command Depot, the largest installation of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere. The equipment and machinery alone are valued at more than £45,000,000Probably more than any other single factory/ these repair workshops helped to turn the tide of the South-west Pacific aerial war in the Allies' favour. The depot, the existence of which is now officially revealed for the first time, was established in the dark days of 1942. when'the-Japanese were driving towards Port Moresby, and the utsun on Guadalcanal was still !n doubt. Then only a thin stream of sorelv-needed aircraft was trickling into the Pacific theatre, and the future looked uncertain. It was at this stage that Lieutenantgeneral George Kenney, commander nf the Allied air forces in the Southwest Pacific, made the decision that changed- the aerial fortune of t-h« Allies in this theatre. Since the greatest use had to be made of every available machine, he decided to transfer the main plane repair base of his command from the south of Australia to the north. Such a move would result in the savins; of from three to four days in ferrying damaged planes to workshops and back to combat areas. It was in November, 1942, that the work of constructing the new base began. Every man was expected to work up. to 18 hours a day. Later this was slackened off to. 14 hours, but the work was pushed ahead seven days a week. Only 30 days after the ground had been broken the new engine overhaul shop turned out its first completed job. To-day the mammoth wor3fshops undertake every type of aircraft repair and reconstruction. The base has also been developed as an important centre for the improvement of fighter aircraft in the Pacific. Machines are modified and altered for enhanced performance in this theatre Many of the improvements made havp become part of the standard design There is no part of a plane" which cannot be supplied from the depot's ordnance stores or manufactured -in its workshops. Warehouses, which J'ovni part of the establishment, list 155.000 separate items of stock. Tho driving force behind the rapid development- of this key Allied ceiitrn was Colonel Victor Bertram! Dins, vice-president of the Douglas Aircralt Company, .who Hew with the famous American ace of the last war, Captain Eddie ißickenbacker.