Pacific Islands Regiment patrols remote area DPR/TV/623

A remote and largely unexplored region of Papua New Guinea is currently being probed by three patrols from the 1st Battalion, Pacific Islands Regiment. Part of the no stop patrolling programme of the Regiment's two battalions, designed to gain and maintain the goodwill of the Territory's people, to report on habitation and gather topographical information, the patrols are moving through mountainous, jungle covered terrain in Papua New Guinea's Southern Highlands and Western Districts. The patrols are being made by three platoons of "A" Company, 1 PIR, which has set up company headquarters at an Administration patrol post at Nomad River, in the Western District. Accompanied by a constable of the Royal Papuan and New Guinea Constabulary to act as a guide and interpreter, each patrol was flown to its start point earlier this month by RAAF Caribou transport aircraft. One patrol set out from Koroba, in the western sector of the Southern Highlands, moved through the largely unmapped Levani Valley, across the heavily forested Muller Range and is negotiating unexplored mountain ranges on its way to Nomad River. Latest reports from the patrol say that going is hard, tracks are poor and steep and few people have been sighted. A second patrol set out from Tari, in central Southern Highlands. From there it moved south for two days through open, but mountainous country to an Administration patrol post at Komo Village, centre of an industrious gardening community. But only one day's march out from Komo, population was left behind and the patrol is now moving through unmapped rain forest heading for the headwaters of the Nomad River. A third patrol is making a wide circuit from company headquarters through dense, undulating rain forest east of Nomad River. The patrols are being dropped rations each week by Army light Aircraft. The company is expected to return to its home at Taurama Barracks, Port Moresby, on June 12 aftyer more than a month in the jungle. Identified personnel: 2 Lieut. Harry Haneveld, of Perth W.A. checking the map; Cadet patrol officer Gary Staples of Blackburn Vic., warns local people of arrival of the Army patrol; 2 Lieut. Phillip Joyce, of Whitebridge, Newcastle NSW, talking on the radio.