A flight to forget
Oh what a flight
Okuk's Last Flight
B707 Anecdotes
B707 Introduction
A Biblical Story
A Biblical Story 2
A Biblical Story 3
Forbidden Fruits
Joe's Jolly (Poem)
The Golfer
Suitably Restrained
PX Advertisment 1
PX Advertisment 2
PX Advertisment 3
PX Article 1
PX Article 2
PX Article 3
The Check Ride
First and Last Flt.
First Command
DC3 KOK - POM
The Holiday
Friends at Last
History of P2ANQ
Ferry Flight
Crayfish
FO Cassanova
Larry Blackman
Secret Revealed
Airbus A300
Cargo Capers
Doing it Differently
Side Slip
Larry Blackman
4th Floor Memo
International Arsonist
Office Works
Thru Eyes of a Hostie
Airline Anecdotes
FRIENDS AT LAST Posted with the permission of Air Niugini LTD
This article is a reprint of the Air Niugini Publication “Paradise Plus” 1979 - Author - Gerald Dick
Thirty-one years before, they had tried to blast each other off the face of the earth without even knowing of each other’s existence. Now they sat together at a dining table in the Kyoto Royal Hotel in Japan-happily reminiscing, in Melanesian pidgin, about that January day in 1945 when the Royal Australian Air Force set out to destroy ‘Dead-eye Dick’, a deadly Japanese gun installation.
“Dead-eye Dick’ had been causing a lot of trouble to No. 100 RAAF Beaufort Squadron, based at Aitape Papua New Guinea north coast, and it’s US allies.
The gun, just off Wewak airstrip, 75 miles east-south-east of Aitape, had been named by Allied airmen because of its accuracy.
In charge of 100 Squadron at Aitape was Wing Commander John Kessey. Recalling the mission to silence ‘Dead-eye Dick”’ once and for all, Captain Kessey DFC, and now a senior Air Niugini pilot, said: “The most difficult job was to place a smoke bomb on the target so that the squadron could pinpoint the exact locality of the gun. This meant flying at treetop level. Being CO I elected to do it.”
At first all seemed to go well. Roaring in low over the coconut palms, Kessey’s Beaufort pinpointed ‘Dead-eye Dick with a smoke bomb. It was as the Beaufort began to pull out of the attack that the starboard engine cut out. It had been hit by machine gun fire from the ground.
While Kessey, above, contemplated his chances of getting back to Aitape, down below, one Taizo Takahashi, an army officer, was wondering what was to follow the smoke bomb. Two men in trouble - but two men destined to survive and, by coincidence, 30 years later meet as friends.
Of Takahashi’s trials we know only a Iittle. It was the end of ‘Dead-eye Dick’
And he was the lone survivor. In fact he escaped unhurt except for the deep sorrow that is still in his heart today for his fellow servicemen who were killed in action.
Lieutenant Takahashi was in his early twenties when he arrived in the New Guinea war zone with the Japanese Imperial Army. His duty was to protect heavy anti-aircraft gun installations and during his three years in the Sepik region he covered the country thoroughly. He was in Wewak at the time of the Japanese surrender.
Kessey himself recalled the moments after the raid.
He had to get rid of his bomb cargo if he was going to maintain enough altitude to get home. Remembering an ‘opportunity target’ listed by RAAF Intelligence, he headed for the tiny island of Muschu just off Wewak. It was believed to be a fuel dump.
(Artist’s impression of the Beaufort over Wewak with right engine feathered after the initial raid)
As he approached Muschu, Kessey was at 1300 feet, knowing that as he opened his bomb doors the drag would claim some of that height. “I dropped the bombs after waiting to the last moment to open the doors - and then closed them quickly. Almost instantly the crew and myself were pleasantly surprised to see the reaction on the ground. There were numerous explosions and we knew we’d hit the fuel dumps,” said Kessey.
Some RAAF pilots would have argued that a Beaufort on one engine could cover no appreciable distance. Under Kessey’s coaxing his aircraft did make it to Aitape although it was a downhill flight all the way - the Beaufort imperceptibly losing altitude.
With the war behind him, Kessey who had learned to fly in 1939 joined Australia National Airways. Briefly he flew the rare DC5 in commercial operation. Then, in 1946 he was asked to convert military pilots to fly airliners for the planned Trans-Australia Airlines (TAA). When TAA became a fact three month months later he became the company’s senior route captain. On October 1, 1946, he captained TAA’s first Sydney-Brisbane service in VH-AFA - a DC3.
Later, when the British Commonwealth Pacific Airlines (BCPA - owned by the British, Australian and New Zealand Governments) was formed, Kessey flew DC4 and DC6 aircraft across the Pacific from Sydney to Vancouver, via Fiji, Canton Island, Honolulu and San Francisco.
Kessey fondly remembers the DC6 aircraft which provided a form of luxury travel that has long disappeared from airlines - but which may make a comeback. These were the sleeping bunks, Pullman type which folded down from the ceilings, complete with curtains for privacy.
‘Sleeping accommodation for 36 passengers, and excellent service, enabled us to maintain the lion’s share of the Pacific traffic,’ Kessey recalls.
BCPA was at the time operating in competition with Pan American Airways’, Boeing Stratocruisers, sometimes called ‘double bubble’ because of their unusual shape.
While flying a BCPA DC6 on charter to TAA, Kessey set a domestic route speed record from Perth to Sydney by using the ‘jet stream’ - a strong high- altitude westerly which blows across Australia in winter.
Australia later purchased the British and New Zealand interests in BCPA. This meant that for a short period Australia had two international airlines, Qantas and BCPA. Later, the inevitable merger of the two became a fact, and BCPA became the Pacific route operation of Qantas.
It was Kessey’s return to Papua New Guinea in 1961 “for a short spell’ which probably set in motion the sequence of events leading to his meeting with Takahashi at the Kyoto Royal. But the link was still not to be made for many years.
Kessey joined Mandated Airlines in 1961. He stayed with the company after it changed its name to Ansett-Mandated, and later to Ansett. He was still there when Ansett merged with TAA in 1973 to form Air Niugini, Papua New Guinea’s National airline.
It was in the early 1970s that the sequence of events leading to the Kyoto Royal began to unfurl. A chance meeting in Wewak between ‘Mac’ Farland, a long-time friend of Kessey, and a former Japanese Imperial Army general found them talking of ‘Dead-eye Dick’. Farland told the general, an official of the Japanese War Graves Committee, of Kessey’s experience.
Back in Japan the general made some enquiries and found the lone survivor of the ‘Dead-eye Dick’ gun crew - Taizo Takahashi, now owner-president of a kimono factory.
Kessey and Takahashi began writing to one another and then Ted Hicks, a friend of Kessey and former District Commissioner at Wewak, met Takahashi in Japan.
‘Last year I decided that as we were both getting on in years,’ said Kessey, “‘Mr Takahashi and I should meet. I thought it would be the meeting of a lifetime and not to be missed.’
When they sat down to dinner at the Kyoto Royal conversation was difficult. “Mr. Takahashi spoke very little English and I did not understand Japanese”
Then came the breakthrough. Mr. Takahashi was trying to ask, in very broken English, what happened to my aircraft after it had been hit, when he used the word “bikpela” I interrupted by saying “Yu save’ tok pidgin?” (Do you understand pidgin?) To our delight, he replied “Mi save’” His three years in the Sepik area during the war had given him a good grasp of pidgin and that is what we spoke for the rest of our meeting, “ said Kessey
In Captain Kessey’s work today - as Fokker Friendship pilot adding steadily to the 21,000 hours-plus in his log book - there is a constant reminder of his most daring wartime exploits, and of the unexpected friendship it was to produce more than a generation later: on some Air Niugini routes, he passes over the site of “dead-eye Dick” twice a day.
Takahashi also has a souvenir of the grim years he spent in New Guinea during the war. That is his silk battle map of the Sepik region of Papua New Guinea. He produced the map during his meeting with Kessey, who says it was remarkably accurate. The used it to discuss their experiences: and to plan Takahashi’s intended visit to Papua New Guinea and to Wewak, perhaps this year. Needless to say that he will be the guest of airline pilot Captain John Kessey.
-Gerald Dick
This article is a reprint of the Air Niugini Publication “Paradise Plus” 1979 - Author - Gerald Dick
Thirty-one years before, they had tried to blast each other off the face of the earth without even knowing of each other’s existence. Now they sat together at a dining table in the Kyoto Royal Hotel in Japan-happily reminiscing, in Melanesian pidgin, about that January day in 1945 when the Royal Australian Air Force set out to destroy ‘Dead-eye Dick’, a deadly Japanese gun installation.
“Dead-eye Dick’ had been causing a lot of trouble to No. 100 RAAF Beaufort Squadron, based at Aitape Papua New Guinea north coast, and it’s US allies.
The gun, just off Wewak airstrip, 75 miles east-south-east of Aitape, had been named by Allied airmen because of its accuracy.
In charge of 100 Squadron at Aitape was Wing Commander John Kessey. Recalling the mission to silence ‘Dead-eye Dick”’ once and for all, Captain Kessey DFC, and now a senior Air Niugini pilot, said: “The most difficult job was to place a smoke bomb on the target so that the squadron could pinpoint the exact locality of the gun. This meant flying at treetop level. Being CO I elected to do it.”
At first all seemed to go well. Roaring in low over the coconut palms, Kessey’s Beaufort pinpointed ‘Dead-eye Dick with a smoke bomb. It was as the Beaufort began to pull out of the attack that the starboard engine cut out. It had been hit by machine gun fire from the ground.
While Kessey, above, contemplated his chances of getting back to Aitape, down below, one Taizo Takahashi, an army officer, was wondering what was to follow the smoke bomb. Two men in trouble - but two men destined to survive and, by coincidence, 30 years later meet as friends.
Of Takahashi’s trials we know only a Iittle. It was the end of ‘Dead-eye Dick’
And he was the lone survivor. In fact he escaped unhurt except for the deep sorrow that is still in his heart today for his fellow servicemen who were killed in action.
Lieutenant Takahashi was in his early twenties when he arrived in the New Guinea war zone with the Japanese Imperial Army. His duty was to protect heavy anti-aircraft gun installations and during his three years in the Sepik region he covered the country thoroughly. He was in Wewak at the time of the Japanese surrender.
Kessey himself recalled the moments after the raid.
He had to get rid of his bomb cargo if he was going to maintain enough altitude to get home. Remembering an ‘opportunity target’ listed by RAAF Intelligence, he headed for the tiny island of Muschu just off Wewak. It was believed to be a fuel dump.
(Artist’s impression of the Beaufort over Wewak with right engine feathered after the initial raid)
As he approached Muschu, Kessey was at 1300 feet, knowing that as he opened his bomb doors the drag would claim some of that height. “I dropped the bombs after waiting to the last moment to open the doors - and then closed them quickly. Almost instantly the crew and myself were pleasantly surprised to see the reaction on the ground. There were numerous explosions and we knew we’d hit the fuel dumps,” said Kessey.
Some RAAF pilots would have argued that a Beaufort on one engine could cover no appreciable distance. Under Kessey’s coaxing his aircraft did make it to Aitape although it was a downhill flight all the way - the Beaufort imperceptibly losing altitude.
With the war behind him, Kessey who had learned to fly in 1939 joined Australia National Airways. Briefly he flew the rare DC5 in commercial operation. Then, in 1946 he was asked to convert military pilots to fly airliners for the planned Trans-Australia Airlines (TAA). When TAA became a fact three month months later he became the company’s senior route captain. On October 1, 1946, he captained TAA’s first Sydney-Brisbane service in VH-AFA - a DC3.
Later, when the British Commonwealth Pacific Airlines (BCPA - owned by the British, Australian and New Zealand Governments) was formed, Kessey flew DC4 and DC6 aircraft across the Pacific from Sydney to Vancouver, via Fiji, Canton Island, Honolulu and San Francisco.
Kessey fondly remembers the DC6 aircraft which provided a form of luxury travel that has long disappeared from airlines - but which may make a comeback. These were the sleeping bunks, Pullman type which folded down from the ceilings, complete with curtains for privacy.
‘Sleeping accommodation for 36 passengers, and excellent service, enabled us to maintain the lion’s share of the Pacific traffic,’ Kessey recalls.
BCPA was at the time operating in competition with Pan American Airways’, Boeing Stratocruisers, sometimes called ‘double bubble’ because of their unusual shape.
While flying a BCPA DC6 on charter to TAA, Kessey set a domestic route speed record from Perth to Sydney by using the ‘jet stream’ - a strong high- altitude westerly which blows across Australia in winter.
Australia later purchased the British and New Zealand interests in BCPA. This meant that for a short period Australia had two international airlines, Qantas and BCPA. Later, the inevitable merger of the two became a fact, and BCPA became the Pacific route operation of Qantas.
It was Kessey’s return to Papua New Guinea in 1961 “for a short spell’ which probably set in motion the sequence of events leading to his meeting with Takahashi at the Kyoto Royal. But the link was still not to be made for many years.
Kessey joined Mandated Airlines in 1961. He stayed with the company after it changed its name to Ansett-Mandated, and later to Ansett. He was still there when Ansett merged with TAA in 1973 to form Air Niugini, Papua New Guinea’s National airline.
It was in the early 1970s that the sequence of events leading to the Kyoto Royal began to unfurl. A chance meeting in Wewak between ‘Mac’ Farland, a long-time friend of Kessey, and a former Japanese Imperial Army general found them talking of ‘Dead-eye Dick’. Farland told the general, an official of the Japanese War Graves Committee, of Kessey’s experience.
Back in Japan the general made some enquiries and found the lone survivor of the ‘Dead-eye Dick’ gun crew - Taizo Takahashi, now owner-president of a kimono factory.
Kessey and Takahashi began writing to one another and then Ted Hicks, a friend of Kessey and former District Commissioner at Wewak, met Takahashi in Japan.
‘Last year I decided that as we were both getting on in years,’ said Kessey, “‘Mr Takahashi and I should meet. I thought it would be the meeting of a lifetime and not to be missed.’
When they sat down to dinner at the Kyoto Royal conversation was difficult. “Mr. Takahashi spoke very little English and I did not understand Japanese”
Then came the breakthrough. Mr. Takahashi was trying to ask, in very broken English, what happened to my aircraft after it had been hit, when he used the word “bikpela” I interrupted by saying “Yu save’ tok pidgin?” (Do you understand pidgin?) To our delight, he replied “Mi save’” His three years in the Sepik area during the war had given him a good grasp of pidgin and that is what we spoke for the rest of our meeting, “ said Kessey
In Captain Kessey’s work today - as Fokker Friendship pilot adding steadily to the 21,000 hours-plus in his log book - there is a constant reminder of his most daring wartime exploits, and of the unexpected friendship it was to produce more than a generation later: on some Air Niugini routes, he passes over the site of “dead-eye Dick” twice a day.
Takahashi also has a souvenir of the grim years he spent in New Guinea during the war. That is his silk battle map of the Sepik region of Papua New Guinea. He produced the map during his meeting with Kessey, who says it was remarkably accurate. The used it to discuss their experiences: and to plan Takahashi’s intended visit to Papua New Guinea and to Wewak, perhaps this year. Needless to say that he will be the guest of airline pilot Captain John Kessey.
-Gerald Dick
