HEAVILY BOMBED

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21112, 4 June 1943, Page 3

HEAVILY BOMBED

WEWAK 'DROMES jap. shipTattacked

VESSELS IN TIMOR (By Telegraph—Press Assn. —Copyright.) (10.30 a.m.) SYDNEY, .lime 4. Sixteen Japanese planes-on Tuesday raided the new Allied base in north-east New Guinea —Bulldog, 40 miles south of Wan. Slight damage and casualties were caused. Bulldog is at the headwaters of the Lakekamu River, .120 air miles north-west of Port Moresby. Its air-strip was used by commercial planes before the war and now has a small Allied ground detachment.

'l’llis raid is reported in General Mac Arthur’s communique and is the first, enemy offensive activity for some days.

Serious damage to parked aircraft and ammuntion dumps is claimed as a result of a heavy raid bv Flying Fortresses and Liberators oa the Wewak area in northern New Guinea early on Wednesday morning. The communique says: “Our heavy bombers executed a night attack on enemy aerodromes about Wewak and Boram, dropping over 24 tons of explosives on runways, dispersal areas and supply installations. Numerous fires ami explosions indicated serious destruction or damage to parked aircraft and ammunition dumps. Intense anti-aircraft lire was encountered. All our planes returned'.

'lmproved flying weather permitted light Allied attacks on other enemy bases. A single Liberator, on a longrange reconnaissance mission) strafed villages and barges along the shore at llollamlia, on the north-east coast of Dutch New Guinea. The same bomber attacked a small enemy cargo vessel 50 miles north-east of Wewak. Liberators and Mitchells, attacking in two waves, raided enemy shipping off Lantern, in Timor. 'They were intercepted by live Zeros, but drove oil' the enemy lighters, probably destroying one of them.