Pushing inland on "F"Day, Balikpapan

Troops of the 2/27th Australian Infantry Battalion are seen being transported in landing craft up the Klandasan Besar River soon after they had made an assault landing on "Able Green" Beach on "F"Day (1st July 1945). Some advanced on foot searching for stray Japanese who miraculously had survived the nightmare of our bombardment. Although the time is 900hrs, so black was the smoke from the burning oil tanks that the impression was one of night time. In a bewildering scene of desolation stood a twisted mass of shell-splintered coconut palms and the charred white masonry of shattered buildings, while scattered through it all were native huts burning fiercely, Balikpapan.