Island in the Sky

by R. B. Shaw

  The last thing I saw was the foliage rushing toward us. Lance deliberately pulled back on the stick, flat-stalling the 185 just above the treetops. I heard the terrible hollow din as the rear section dragged through the top branches. A sudden wrenching impact and the foliage pulled us from the sky, plummeting us into the trees. My legs and arms splayed out before me as my face hit the dashboard.

  The first aid and survival kits flew forward, one under the seat and the other smashing the radio panel. There was an endless series of impacts as we careered down through the branches.

  “Run for it!” Lance shouted above the fierce crackling flames. Neither door would open, jammed by fuselage distortion. Like madmen, we kicked at the doors, but in vain. The flames leapt inside the cabin, torching through the broken windscreen. An attempt to kick out the perspex side windows failed when the flames drove us back up the steeply inclined fuselage.

  “Lance! The cargo hatch is still open!” I shouted, and pushed on the obstructed door. Then I remembered the machete that every Tarangau aircraft carried. I pulled it free from the aft bulkhead and chopped at the light alloy hinges. In seconds, the door dropped away. I then hacked furiously at the branches restricting our escape, making enough room to crawl through.

  In the illumination provided by the growing flames, I could see we were still above ground level, the aircraft hanging in the tangled net of vegetation. I swung out onto a branch and dropped into chest-high shrubs. My feet sank to the shins in mud and rotting foliage. Lance soon followed, not ahead of time, as the cabin was now a mass of flames and the port fuel tank would soon be engulfed.

  After Lance tumbled down, we hurriedly hacked a path away from the wreck. We were only twenty metres clear of the blazing Cessna when the port tank exploded. Our dim world was again lit as a blossoming ball of orange flame erupted through the dense top cover. The wet foliage crackled momentarily when sprayed by blazing petrol, but the flames died as the fuel was consumed, the fire confined to the aircraft once again.

  “Let’s get back to the clearing before we do anything else,” I suggested. “You okay?”

  Lance nodded. “Where’s the sun?”

  A slightly brighter area of top cover allowed passage of a single beam of light, alive with insects and floating dust particles. I let the beam fall on my palm and then judged the direction. “Sun’s there and it’s about four o’clock. So the clearing should be this way.”

  Two hours of hard slogging later, we detected the distinctive acrid smell of burnt kunai. The sun was low and we were both exhausted from chopping our way through the maze of laced vines and ploughing through the semi-liquid quagmire. We stumbled into the clearing and lay still on the charred ground, weak and drained of energy. All we could do was pant for breath, too tired to even ward off the growing horde of voracious mosquitoes.

  CHAPTER NINE

  We both collapsed into an exhausted stupor. Hours later, I wearily gazed around; the low rays of the afternoon sun were highlighting an object on the distant side of the charred kunai flat. The white cargo pack stood out clearly against the green backdrop of featureless jungle. I shook Lance and pointed.

  Without a word, we stumbled toward the discarded equipment, my collar bones and waist bruised and tender from seat-belt burns. We sat down on a discarded bench seat and Lance offered me a cigarette.

  “Where will we sleep tonight?” he asked.

  “A bush material hut, if we have time before nightfall, or make a shelter out of the upholstery panels. First, let’s build a bonfire, in case a search aircraft drifts over this way.”

  “They certainly won’t find us today,” said Lance despondently. “I hate to say it, but I think we may have to walk out.”

  I laughed, half sarcastically, half stunned. “Walk out! To where? And through that jungle? You can’t be serious?” I was now aware how much distance lay between us and even primitive assistance.

  “If we’re not rescued within a few days, then we’d better attempt to reach the Ramu River. It probably wouldn’t be more than thirty kilometres distant at its closest point, running from south to west.”

  “As the crow flies,” I added.

  Flammable material was limited to kunai grass and damp timber near the jungle fringe, but soon we had a bonfire ready and a small campfire nearby. The cargo pack became a roof balanced on four truck axles embedded in the ground. We secured the pack to the axles with strong blades of razor grass—I pulled socks over my hands as protection from the sharp edges. We lashed the upholstery panels around the cargo pack roof to form walls, using other sections as ground sheets.

  “What’ll we do for food and drink?” Lance asked.

  “We’ll leave food till tomorrow. Let’s see if we can find some water.” I picked up the battered and discarded propeller spinner.

  “It’s too dry. There won’t be any creeks around here.”

  “Just look for a banana palm.”

  “I saw some further back, but there was no fruit on them.”

  “Doesn’t matter. Where are they?”

  Lance showed me the trees and I marked one just above the ground. With two heavy swings of the bush knife, the four-metre tree crashed to the ground. I hacked at the soft, fleshy fibre in the centre of the stump and formed a semi-spherical bowl which began to fill with cloudy sap. Lance gave me a suspicious glance as I scooped the liquid into the spinner. Three times I emptied it, each time taking progressively longer to refill. Lance tasted the liquid and swallowed it with a grimace.

  “Jesus, it’s bitter!”

  I laughed and covered the stump with a palm leaf to keep out insects, while Lance scooped precious water from another two stumps.

  On our way back to our camp, we found two coconut trees. We tried climbing them, but even with a rope sling couldn’t make it halfway up to the coconuts. The machete made short work of the trunks, and both trees crashed to the ground. We returned to camp with three pints of water, six coconuts tied together by strips of fibrous husk and two coconut palm hearts.

  Lance was greedily chewing at a tender palm heart. “This is bloody lovely. Tastes like flavoured raw cabbage.”

  “In some countries, palm heart is known as ‘millionaire’s salad’ because it’s so rare. The palm tree usually dies once the heart is plucked.”

  Lance wasn’t listening, busily hacking at a coconut husk.

  “That’s not the way to do it,” I said, “You’ll lose all the milk.”

  Lance dropped the coconut and dug the machete into the soft ground. “Okay, Dave, you’ve got some explaining to do. How come you’re such a bloody expert on this jungle bit?”

  “Three years in Vietnam, mainly as a helicopter engineer—I was bored and volunteered for field rescue. The idea was to have a squad ready to rescue downed pilots or pockets of lost infantry. If we couldn’t lift them out with a chopper, then one of us guys would be dropped in to guide them out, living off the land. Each one of us in the volunteer rescue squad was fully trained in jungle survival.”

  Lance gave a wry grin. “Well pal, as far as I’m concerned, you’re the right man, in the right place, at the right time!”

  “At least I can keep us alive until they send in a helicopter to get us out … that’s if they ever find us.”

  The noise of insects increased as the sun dipped into an azure belt of haze above the horizon and distorted to a wrinkled crimson ellipse.

  “I suppose we’ll have to ration the water now that all the coconut milk is gone?” Lance suggested.

  “You should ration your sweat, not the water. It’ll do more good inside you than in the container.”

  We shared the remaining water and settled down near our fire, nibbling on scraps while the insects nibbled on us. The heavy smoke acted as a deterrent to the mosquitoes, but the dense cloud rising from the moist timber made us uncomfortable.

  The noises of the nearby jungle woke us early. Pre-dawn twilight and the previous sunset had established direction for us, so it was a simple matte
r to mark out a compass rose. After walking to the centre of the large burnt clearing, I looked south and saw the vague shape of the Bismarck Ranges now free of cloud.

  Our first task was to reinforce and expand our hut with bush materials. This took less than three hours with the aid of the machete. We added a crude lean-to and water-proofed the exterior, replacing the panels with banana leaves and palm fronds. We carried the beige upholstery panels to a clear area, charred black by the fire, and laid them end-to-end in a large cross—the international emergency code for ‘UNABLE TO PROCEED.’

  We returned to the banana tree stumps and scooped out over a pint of almost clear tainted water and repeated the process on other nearby palms. One tree had a large bunch of green bananas, so we took these back to camp with the water. On the way back, we passed a large patch of bamboo and Lance set to work collecting bamboo shoots. I noticed some old yellow boles of bamboo among the riper stalks, so grabbed one and shook it brutally. After trying three stalks, I came to a stem which sloshed with the giveaway sound of water trapped inside; I hacked at a point just above a joint and half a cup of water dribbled into the spinner. I moved to the next and in less than half an hour the spinner was full.

  We returned to camp jubilant, despite our desperate situation. The yellow bamboo stems made good cups and containers when cut to size, so I put Lance to work clearing out the hollow stems. The fibrous internal hairs of the stems, if swallowed, could seriously irritate the digestive system. While some sweet potato boiled in the aluminium spinner, I elaborated on the preparation of bamboo shoots.

  Suddenly we looked at each other, alerted by the familiar sound of an aircraft. Frantically, I ran to the bonfire and set it alight, before searching the brilliant sky for would-be rescuers. The aircraft, a Twin Otter by the sound of the turbine engines, was little more than a speck in the southern sky. Our fire smoked furiously, but to no avail—the aircraft disappeared into the west. We rebuilt the bonfire, thinking that the Twin Otter was on a search pattern—his next leg might bring him right overhead—but to our deep disappointment, the aircraft did not reappear that day.

  Five days later, Lance finally convinced me that we should attempt to walk out of the jungle. Our situation seemed hopeless. On three occasions, we had seen aircraft and all far to the south west. The search would soon be called off once we weren’t found close to our proposed flight path. There was no reason to remain at the clearing; poor diet was making us extremely nervy and temperamental and we were worrying about dysentery or worse, blackwater fever and berri berri. Malaria and dengue fever were also an ever-present threat. We had been harassed by myriads of mosquitoes, our gaunt faces red and swollen from the bites.

  The lush towering foliage obstructed our path to the south and, looking at it, I winced involuntarily, dreading the dark, mouldy world that buried intruders within its living density. We agreed that the most sensible direction to head would be south-west because eventually it led to the Ramu River, or one of its tributaries.

  We spent the fifth day preparing for our journey and gathered a small stock of foodstuffs. The softer upholstery material was easily worked into a small rucksack, and we filled it with hollow bamboos packed with food. There was little else of value, just Lance’s knife, the machete and our aluminium prop spinner, invaluable as a cook pot.

  The sun rose and shimmered in the haze, indicating we were in for another hot and humid day. We rearranged the panels into a large white arrow pointing south-west, the international distress signal for ‘WE ARE PROCEEDING IN THIS DIRECTION.’

  Wordless, we left our camp and with a last look around, plodded into chest-high ferns at the foot of the vine-strangled mass. I led the way, hacking viciously at any obstruction, following the thinnest vegetation where possible, as long as it led us steadily between west and south. My attempt to use the three-tree sighting system of bush navigation soon failed miserably. It was far too dark beneath the dense canopy, so that, upon reaching the second tree, the first would be lost or obscured. Occasionally a ray of sunlight miraculously found its way through the blanket of vegetation above, and this was our only means of judging direction.

  We had to skirt many impenetrable bamboo thickets within the jungle, but at least took the opportunity to replenish our water stocks. It was disconcerting that we rarely saw any part of our bodies below the waist. Our legs would sink to the shins in a spongy pulp of decomposing vegetation. More than once, I pulled back as I felt something scurry past my leg. Some wild sugar cane provided us with a change in diet. We moved on, chewing the sweet coarse fibres, diverting around a huge spider the size of a dinner plate. In the cane patch, it hung motionless on a frail web rendered almost invisible by the verdant backdrop.

  At last we stumbled into a sunlit clearing; compared to the jungle, it was like a garden of Eden. Soft crinkle-weed carpeted the small area, the pressure sensitive weed collapsing as we passed. It unfolded to full bloom again as we moved on to the centre of the site to set up camp. Large iridescent blue butterflies flitted in and out of the clearing, an oasis of tranquillity in an expanse of hopelessness.

  Lance pointed to a nearby exposed tree. “I’ll climb up there and check for landmarks, then we’d better gather firewood for tonight.”

  While I scoured the ground for timber, Lance made a rope sling and climbed to the higher branches. Back on the ground, he stripped and shook out his clothing, revealing numerous ugly red bites; crushed kurukum ants fell as he brushed himself down.

  “Well, what did you see?”

  “Bugger all,” he replied as he scratched his bites. “Couldn’t get high enough, but what I could see was flat and featureless to the south and west, except for the Bismarcks in the distance. There’s a big storm coming from the west. After all our walking today, those mountains seem just as far away. How far do you think we’ve come?”

  I made an educated guess and then halved my estimate: “Less than eight kilometres.”

  Lance looked shocked. “Ten hours! We must have made thirty at least.”

  “Distance is deceptive in the jungle and so is direction. The sooner we find a water-course, the easier it’ll be.”

  We gathered enough firewood to cook dinner, but suddenly the sky went dull and a torrential downpour swamped the sunset. The vinyl from an aircraft seat covered our wood, but the rain ruined further chances of finding more dry timber. We took good advantage of the situation, washed ourselves down, and filled our water containers. When the rain ceased we cooked a meal, then drank the water in which we boiled the food—we couldn’t afford to waste valuable vitamins in our poor state of health.

  “What about meat? Isn’t there anything we could kill and eat?” said Lance.

  “Tree kangaroos are rare around here, same with birds, and the cassowary is hard to cook. The old saying goes ‘cook a stone with the cassowary and when the stone’s ready to eat, so is the cassowary!”

  Lance gave me a longing glance. “Wouldn’t matter to me at the moment. I could eat the crotch out of a rotten fox.”

  “Try not to think about it. If we get really desperate for a meaty food, I’ll find some giant snails. The Japs brought them here in the Second World War for precisely this reason, as a diet supplement for the Jap troops in the jungle. There were no giant snails in New Guinea before the War.”

  “Speaking of Japs and World War Two, have you got the Jap pilot’s statement yet?”

  “The letter’s still in my pocket. Forgot all about it. I’ll see what it says.”

  Jan had spoken personally to Yoshiro and had taped the detailed interview. Yoshiro was stunned to see his wartime oilskin pouch and log book and in return had gladly given a thorough statement. Jan had later typed a full transcript of the interview, not leaving out a word. As I started reading the actual statement, I noticed Lance had lost interest and settled for the night. It was an extremely dark evening, the only visible details being in the vicinity of the fire and the letter before me.

  With nothing else to distract my a
ttention, the first-person description and my vivid imagination had taken me back to 1942. I felt I was actually climbing into the Zero’s cramped cockpit with Yoshiro, aboard the heaving deck of the aircraft carrier ‘Akagi’.

  Yoshiro Nagura advanced the Zero’s throttle. A sickening resonance shuddered through the controls as the Nakajima engine reached full power. The ‘Akagi’ had turned fully into the wind, the large rising sun flag erect and fluttering aft. The deck officer circled an illuminated green wand, then quickly pointed down the deck. Yoshiro released the brakes, then accelerated briskly, the tail lifted to flight attitude as he thundered past the carrier’s superstructure. He was committed to lift-off now; insufficient deck remained to abort.

  A ditching now meant a crushing death beneath the mammoth bow of the enormous Akagi. It was fly, or die. The wheels left the deck, the propeller clawing at the air. With the undercarriage retracted, the streamlined Zero surged into a shallow circling climb. He winced, blinded, as the red disc on the wing was obliterated by the reflected sunglare on the polished aluminium skins. Thirteen minutes later, the five aircraft rendezvoused as planned, 1500 metres above the Japanese fleet.

  Their reconnaissance flight would take them completely across the Island of New Guinea. Yoshiro had been ordered to take aerial photos of a suspect Dutch Naval outpost at Merauke, in Dutch New Guinea. The flight would then be to Mt Hagen, in the Australian Mandate of New Guinea. The photos would establish if the large number of reported aircraft operations were simply a large-scale airborne evacuation, or supply movements for an extensive military build up.

  So far his mission had been successful and trouble free. Yoshiro led the Zeros, climbing over a range of mountains north of Hagen, en route to Madang and Alexishafen. His secondary mission was to procure more photos for evaluation of suitable sites for an army fighter base on the north coast. His group would then rendezvous with the light aircraft carrier ‘Shokaku’ in the Bismarck Sea. It was imperative the valuable prints reached the new main Japanese South Pacific base at Rabaul.