Junkers Tri-motors

[Garfly]

An interesting newish video about the movie career of the Ju-52

 

 

It was three of the earlier model Junkers G-31 that were used in the Wau- Bulolo goldfields in the early thirties.

And for a while, back then, their non-stop ops put PNG at the top of the table for worldwide air-freight volume.

They even came with a special rooftop loading bay for bulky cargo.

A car was the easy bit, considering that this entire dredge - not to mention the entire town - had to be flown in from Lae using the 3 Junkers.

 

 

 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junkers_G_31

 

https://www.goodall.com.au/australian-aviation/junkers ju52/junkersju52.html

 

https://www.baaa-acro.com/crash/crash-junkers-ju523mg-wau

 

https://aeropedia.com.au/content/junkers-ju-52/

 

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

Lae is on the coast, so why not ship it in?

I once saw a pic of a cow being unloaded in the highlands. The colonials needed to have milk for their tea.

[Garfly]

           Ha, ha ... like Fitzcarraldo!    ;- )

[onetrack]

Quote

Lae is on the coast, so why not ship it in?

Yes, Lae is on the coast, which is where the gold-mining equipment was landed. But then it had to go from Lae to Bulolo, which is way up in the highlands, and inaccessible by road.

I can remember one story where upon takeoff with one of the Junkers, the centre engine tore itself clean out of its mountings and tumbled to the ground below the aircraft. The takeoff was aborted.

[pmccarthy]

The dredges are still there and I have clambered over them, now covered in jungle stuff. It was an amazing achievement for the time. The dredge was designed so that the tumbler, the biggest part, just fitted in the Junkers.

[onetrack]

http://www.airwaysmuseum.com/Junkers G31 VH-UOW.htm

 

http://www.airwaysmuseum.com/Downloads/New Guinea Gold.pdf

 

Edited May 9, 2023 by onetrack

[onetrack]

2 hours ago, pmccarthy said:

The dredges are still there and I have clambered over them, now covered in jungle stuff. It was an amazing achievement for the time. The dredge was designed so that the tumbler, the biggest part, just fitted in the Junkers.

I was in partnership from the early 1980's to the early 1990's in a gold tailings treatment syndicate. There were 6 of us in the syndicate - myself, my older brother, his wife, and 3 other unrelated blokes, who all had gold mining and tailings treatment experience.

One of the partnership blokes (Don - he was the oldest at the time, in his 60's) was a WW2 RAAF New Guinea veteran. He was born in Sydney in 1919 but signed up in Menzies, W.A. in 1942, so I think he was chasing gold during the War.

Inducted into the RAAF, he was attached to 2 MWS (Mobile Works Sqdn), which became No 2 ACS (Airfield Construction Sqdn) towards the end of the War. Don got out of the RAAF in Oct 1944, I'm not sure how he wangled that, maybe the Airfield Construction programme was winding down rapidly by then.

 

He related a few PNG tales to us, and one in particular was when he was at Lae, he came into contact with other Australians who had been up at Bulolo, and in the surrounding mountains. Don obviously knew the area was a good gold province and started asking the soldiers if they'd ever found any gold in the streams in the mountains.

He said a few of them (who might have had mining experience, anyway) said to him, "Oh yes, there's a heap of gold in the streams up there in the mountains! We just picked up the bigger chunks, and threw the fines away!!"

(Alluvial miners who seek gold in streams are always intent on making sure they get the fine gold, this is what adds up! - not the few small nuggets!)