Almost home

Heavy lift: Some of Spt Coy’s equipment departs Timor-Leste on board the commercial shipping vessel Arafura Endeavour. Photo by Cpl Damian Shovell

By Cpl Damian Shovell

HALF of the Australian peacekeeping equipment in Timor-Leste has returned to Australia on board the commercial shipping vessel Arafura Endeavour.

The ship loaded 27 pieces of equipment and shipping containers at Dili harbour on June 22, under contracted management by British Aerospace Engineers (BAE), and delivered it to Darwin the following day.

Trevor Evans, of BAE, said the shipment included container loads of communications, medical, office and computer equipment, along with Unimog and Mack trucks and engineering plant, and followed an earlier shipment of ADF peacekeeping equipment last month.

“Before this we sent 38 containers of military equipment that included items from Kevlar body armour to workshop equipment,” he said.

He said a further 25 vehicles to be sent back to Australia were at the BAE compound in Dili being cleaned and readied for transport.

“We want it all out by July 22, but that’s dependent on shipping availability.”

Maj Karlo Terz, OC Force Extraction Team (FET), said this was the first time a contractor had been used by the ADF to manage the clearance and return of equipment to Australia.

He said the FET would check all the equipment once it reached DNSDC in Sydney to ensure contractual requirements had been met before it was placed back on to the national inventory.