Special service skills DPR/TV/1611

The Eildon Lake area of Victoria - familiar to thousands of tourists and holiday makers - is the setting for an Army special forces exercise which will continue for the next week. The towering Cathedral Ranges proved ideal for men of the Perth based Special Air Service Regiment to conduct cliff climbing training before the tactical phase of the exercise. Soldiers of the SAS Regiment are the Army's most highly trained infantrymen...skilled in deep penetration behind enemy lines. Descending this almost vertical one-hundred foot wall is no trouble to men who have to depend on their physical ability to survive in war. A soldier coming down a cliff face this way might have to carry more than fifty pounds of equipment beside his weapon and ammunition. Ability in the mountains is not the only skill these soldiers excel in. On Lake Eildon they show troops of the Adelaide based Third Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, how they assemble their collapsable canoes, which can be used to travel by night in enemy held waterways. Whoops! the capsize is not by accident. Its meant to show the right drill when they do go over by mishap. When everything is ready the members of a canoe patrol set out. Later, they'll creep in close to the banks and use available camouflage, waiting for nightfall as they approach the tactical exercise area. Ashore, the men disappear until they receive the signal from the patrol leader. Silently they rise, and move off. This is the skill which comes from continual training...