ENGINEERING UNIT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 9 July 1943, Page 4

ENGINEERING UNIT

WORK WITH NEW ZEALAND TROOPS. DIFFICULT TASKS CARRIED OUT. (Official War Correspondent, N.Z.E.F.) NEW CALEDONIA. Any class of engineering, from roadmaking to building construction, will be undertaken by the Works Services Engineers who have now become an established part of the New Zealand forces in the Pacific. It is the first time in the history of the New Zealand Army that such an organisation covering the widest possible field of constructional work, has been in operation, and a big programme lies ahead for those whose task it will be to carry out the ideas framed during the last two years of preliminary discussion of the unit’s organisation and role. Just new the new unit is engaged in constructional work not only in various parts of the island but also in its own main camp where a certain number of men has been retained to com- ■ plete the establishment of storehouses. Warehouses pre-fabricated in New Zealand will be re-erected in quick time and at present one is going up at the main camp. Progress is rapid, for no cutting, bevelling or planing is left to be done, and each section of the building fits snugly into place. The personnel of the unit has been drawn with an eye to the civilian occupation of the soldiers, most of whonv are specialists in the building or road- 1 ing trades. Many have already seen • service in various parts of the Pacific as members of aerodrome construction groups. Military engineering involves two main types of work, operational engineering, which concerns itself with providing facilities to help men to live, to march and to fight—in other words, which constructs buildings, camps, roads, bridges, etc—and service engineering, which is the consolidation that follows the initial stages of an army’s advance and calls for the erection of more permanent buildings and for the making and maintenance of supply routes by land. Included in the latter category is work on wharves or docks, the unloading of ships, and the provision and maintenance of the mechanical plant needed on the wharves. The Works Services Engineers can cover all types—a wide role, and a useful one, one that will dovetail in with the work of existing engineering units and help a modern army to function better than before.