Taskul Airport — Taskul, Papua New Guinea

A Williams (UK) - September 9, 2023
I helped plant grass on the red lateritic soils of the new Taskul runway with my workers for the Australian Govt in Dec 1970 as a Kiap or Field Officer. It didn't take too long to grow in wet climate of approximately 9metres (360inches) annual rainfall and daily 28C (82F) temperature.
I flew from it July 1972 in a Cessna Skymaster or what the local people called a 'push-me-pull-you' that pranged later in boggy end of defunct Puas Mission airstrip north Lavongai or previously named by the Germans as New Hanover. The wreck was still a memorial on the Catholic Mission grounds at Kavieng in the Provincial Capital 2008.
I hold an unbeatable record on my 1972 journey for what must be the quickest flight from Taskul to London Heathrow using five planes to do so. Flying time I guess was quite a bit less than the total 48 hours and unrepeatable because when I was last at Taskul in 2008 I attended a Church service at the terminus end of 'my airstrip' there was a bush material SDA Church with some temporary huts at what was once the airstrip.