Army Would Build Airstrip In Niue

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30953, 8 January 1966, Page 1

Army Would Build Airstrip In Niue

(From Our Own Reporter)

WELLINGTON, January 7. Completed plans and specifications for a 6000 ft sealed airstrip on Niue will be taken by the Minister of Island Territories I Mr Hanan ) when he leaves Auckland tomorrow’ in the Government ship Mana Roa to visit the island.

If built as now planned, the airfield will be able to take aircraft up to the size of Electras.

Preliminary cost estimates put the pri work at about £130,000. Construction, wl Army engineer unit, could be completed in

Tentative cost estimates excluded the cost of paying and quartering the sappers, said Mr Hanan today. “The job is only economic if carried out as a military construction exercise.”

The Cabinet has so far given no final decision on whether and when construction should proceed. Nor has a final verdict yet been given on current proposals to upgrade the Rarotonga airfield in the Cook Islands, at a cost of some £400.000 to take Elec tras flying direct from Auckland.

The job at Niue is much cheaper partly because Civil Aviation Department, Ministry of Works and Army engineer studies begun a year ago have proved the terrain to be ideal. Strip On Rock Several inches of topsoil would first have to be scraped off the site of the strip. It could yield promising farming land. The airfield would then be built virtually on exposed rock. The land has yet to be secured. Mr Hanan will discuss its possible purchase during his visit.

Work would not. in any event, begin for about six months, because plans call for the construction of a landing ramp near the existing jetty on the island, at which materials and machines

could be delivered, possibly from a landing craft borrowed from the Australian military authorities. Up to 20 Niueans could be employed on the construction work.

Army engineers have had recent experience in building I similar airfields, both in Thailand and at Waiouru. What was originally envisaged at Niue was merely an emergency strip of minimum standard to take the R.N.Z.A.F. Orions. The promising terrain led to a more ambitious revision of plans. Of about 110 square miles, Niue has no harbour and its only regular communication is by the Tofua, in which Mr Hanan will travel part of the way, during her round trips from Auckland.

Stop-over Point The 5000 Niueans are New Zealanders, Because of the importance to their future welfare of good air services. Mr Hanan regards his visit as the most important in the history of the island. The Polynesan Airlines DC3 which at present makes 800mile direct flights from Samoa to Rarotonga can carry only

ice of the engineering lich would be by an about a year.

12 passengers because of the ! long flight. If restrictions of the length of DC3 flights to be imposed this year do not interfere. an airfield at Niue would Sallow that plane to refuel there, to carry twice as many I passengers and to provide a I service for the island

Constitutional development is not a topic Mr Hanan expects to take up in Nuie. Last February, Professor C. C. Aikman, professor of constitutional law at Victoria University, checked islanders thoughts on a future constitution. But reports so far indicate no great enthusiasm in Niue to follow the example of independent local government adopted last year by the Cook Islands.

Tokelau Problems Mr Hanan will also visit the Tokelau Islands, mainly to discuss a resettlement scheme under which up to 1000 Tokelauans may be relocated in New Zealand over the next five years. With no significant employment prospects in the islands and with a labour shortage in metropolitan New Zealand, the proposal is to have New Zealand firms sponsor their migration here. I The islanders are educated, I but unsophisticated in modern i life, and much careful plan- | ning, even for their staged admission at the rate of 200 a year, has yet to be done. ; There are far-reaching implications of the scheme. At last count, there were only 1835 Tokelau Islanders. What is at present envisaged will, therefore, be a first and major step in the virtual depopulation of i the group