S.W. PACIFIC RAIDS

Grey River Argus, 7 June 1943, Page 5

S.W. PACIFIC RAIDS

WEWAK AND THE NORTH

Bad Weather Hampering

Allies

(Special to N'.Z. Press Assn.) (Rec. 7.50) SYDNEY, June 6. _ In eight days 74 tons of Allieo bombs were dropped in four attacks on Wewak, New Guinea. The latest raid was made by Flying iortresses and Liberators early on iriday morning. The planes then delivered eighteen tons of high explosive, fragmentation and incendiary bombs on the enemy’s bomber drome, at WeWak and on nearby fighter strips at But, Boram and Dagua. It is believed many grounded aircraft were destroyed in these raids. ~i . - There are jstorm conditions f ana heavy clouds which have made enemy targets in the entire Solomons Sea area hard to find. But Allied bombers used a break in the clouds to press home the latest attack against Wewak. Conditions in this area worsened on Saturday. General MacArthur’s communique today reports that air operations over the entire north-eastern sector of the South-west Pacific were limited to reconnaissance. Several light raids have been made in the past 48 hours on Japanese targets north of Australia. In a raid on the Dobaru Islands, a direct hit was scored on a small enemy coastal vessel, while fires were started among shore installations and were visible for 40 miles. In an earlier attack on a seaplane base in this .area Beaufighters engaged 9 enemy float planes, shooting down one and damaging two others, without ,suffering loss. Catalinas raided an aerodrome and seaplane base at Babo, in McCluer Gulf, Dutch New Guinea. One large fire, probably a burning fuel dump, lit up the planes at a height of 9000 feet. Numerous small fires are believed to have indicated burning aircraft. Allied bombers on armed reconnaissance on Saturday were over Amboina and Langgoer, in the Kai Islands, in Banda Sea.