Podcasts about Arundel

Welcome to the world of Hexagonia 01. [HEXAGON] Goshfather - Where Were U02. Don Diablo, Nelly Furtado - Doing Nothin'03. David Guetta, Cedric Gervais - If (A Better World)04. Jengi, JADED, Alex Mills - Burnin04. [HΞXHIBITION] Brian Cross & Joyse - GOOTF05. Disco Lines, Tinashe - No Broke Boys06. Flume & Toro Y Moi - The Difference (Eyezic Flip)07. [FUTURE] SIREN - Vertigo Ft. Tima Dee08. [DEMODAY TRACK] Zodoo - TOO MUCH09. NXSTY & RYA - Listen Up10. Chris Lorenzo, Max Styler, Audio Bullys - London's On Fire11. Longstoryshort – DON'T DO IT12. [THROWBACK CLASSIC] Big Pineapple - Another Chance (Don Diablo Edit) ARUNDEL GUEST MIX: 13. Arundel - if u want me to

Welcome to episode 10 of Season 3!The Toasty Indian & Unreasonable Hospitality In this episode we have an update on Sefton Place in #Arundel, we set the record straight on the new regulations impacting the short-stay rental industry in the UK and we talk to the amazing Rashmi Bhat. Rashmi is a hospitality entrepreneur, hotel operator, and the founder of multiple brands including Lazy H Retreats and Reso Hospitality. She manages over 100 doors across boutique hotels and vacation rentals, and shares the behind-the-scenes of growing a hospitality empire through her brand, Toasty Indian. Rashmi is passionate about design-forward stays, unreasonable hospitality, and helping STR owners scale without burning out.You can follow Rashmi on social media @toastyindian and be sure to check out her websites lazyhretreats.com & resohospitality.com We also mentioned the Professional Association of Self Caterers (PASC). here is their website: https://www.pascuk.co.uk Please help us spread the word with a like, follow and subscribe and drop us a follow over on instagram @secretservicedpodcast#property #podcast #vacationrentals #airbnbhosts #hospitality #aparthotels #hostaway #staycation #strregulations #pasc ABOUT THE SHOW Dive deep into the heartbeat of the hospitality world with Mark Winship and Caroline Winship, your hosts and the power couple behind a burgeoning empire of hotels, serviced apartments, and vacation rentals. Witness the real story, unscripted and uncensored, as they unveil the daily hustle, the surprises, and the passion that fuels their ventures. From nerve-wracking live reactions to fresh guest reviews in Review Roulette to the enlightening At Your Serviced chats with fellow vacation rental magnates, every episode promises a rollercoaster of emotions and insights. Laugh, cry, and learn with us- This is not just another property podcast! This is a candid and entertaining insight into the world of serviced accommodation, holiday-lets, vacation rentals, aparthotels, and property investment. Hit subscribe and join the journey where the secrets of hospitality come to life! GETTING IN TOUCHPlease like/follow/subscribe to the podcast wherever you are listening!You can follow what we are up to over on Instagram @secretservicedpodcast Send us a voice note or a DM on Instagram @secretservicedpodcast for your chance to appear on the pod! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Al Roxburgh and Jenny Sinclair talk with Jo Gilbert about discipleship and parish life in a fast-changing city. Jo works within a large and dynamic church community, and with students across the city, creating opportunities for formation, community events and local civic partnerships. Jo was raised as part of a Benedictine lay community and this, along with her other gifts, brings an openness to the Spirit into the life of the local church. The vitality and witness of this parish and their growing connections into the city are striking, not least their humility as they learn to walk with young adults for whom Christianity may be new. This is a conversation full of life and insight into living out the Gospel in community.Jo Gilbert is part of the leadership team at East Brighton Catholic Parish, a group of churches in the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton on the south coast of England. Made up of clergy and laity, the team is focused on serving the communities of a growing city with a shifting demographic and a large student population. Jo is also co-ordinator of the Catholic Student Ministry Team serving Brighton and Sussex universities and has worked with students and young adults for 20 years.LinksFor Jo Gilbert:https://www.eastbrightoncatholic.org.uk/leadership-teamhttps://www.facebook.com/StJosephsBrighton/?locale=en_GBhttps://www.eastbrightoncatholic.org.uk/catholic-student-and-young-adults-grouphttps://catholicstudents.org/about/For Alan J Roxburgh:http://alanroxburgh.com/abouthttps://www.themissionalnetwork.com/author/alan-roxburgh/https://journalofmissionalpractice.com/alan-roxburghTwitter: https://twitter.com/alanjroxburgh?lang=enFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/alan.roxburgh.127/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thecommonsnetworkBooksForming Communities of Hope in the Great Unraveling: Leadership in a Changing World (with Roy Searle)Joining God in the Great UnravelingLeadership, God's Agency and DisruptionsJoining God, Remaking Church, Changing the World: The New Shape of the Church in Our TimeFor Jenny Sinclair:Website: https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/from-jenny-sinclairLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenny-sinclair-0589783b/Twitter: https://twitter.com/T4CGFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/TogetherForTheCommonGoodUK This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit leavingegyptpodcast.substack.com/subscribe

Fiorella de Maria returns to Radio Maria to introduce us to her children's series about a skating home-schooling family. Compelling and heart-warming, these novels bring out the joys and challenges of a modern English family.Fiorella is an author and mother from leafy Surrey in the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton. JUST LIFE is a human formation programme brought to you by Radio Maria, airing on weekdays at 10am and rebroadcast at 10pm. If you enjoyed this programme, please consider supporting us with a one-off or monthly donation. Visit RadioMariaEngland.uk/donations/ to find out more. It is only through the generosity of our listeners that we are able to be a Christian voice by your side.

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On 13th April 1630, a remarkable woman passed away—Anne Howard, Countess of Arundel. She was no ordinary noblewoman. In a time when Catholicism was outlawed in England, she risked everything to protect priests and defy the authorities.   Who was this fearless countess, and why did she go to such great lengths for her faith? Watch to uncover the fascinating and daring story of Anne Howard, the Priest Harbourer Countess.   Don't forget to like, subscribe, and hit the notification bell for more Tudor history deep dives!   #TudorHistory #AnneHoward #HiddenHistories #PriestHarbourer #CatholicResistance #ElizabethanEngland #TudorNobility #TudorScandals #HistoryMakers

Fiorella de Maria returns to Radio Maria to introduce us to her children's series about a skating homeschooling family. Compelling and heartwarming, these novels bring out the joys and challenges of a modern English family.Fiorella is an author and mother from leafy Surrey in the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton. JUST LIFE is a human formation programme brought to you by Radio Maria, airing on weekdays at 10am and rebroadcast at 10pm. If you enjoyed this programme, please consider supporting us with a one-off or monthly donation. Visit RadioMariaEngland.uk/donations/ to find out more. It is only through the generosity of our listeners that we are able to be a Christian voice by your side.

1. Zeds Dead - Vertigo 2. Pink Floyd - Another Brick in the Wall (KVSH Private Mix) 3. Goosey - Funky Shit (feat. Dope Earth Alien) 4. Zonderling - Schaduw 5. Fraxy - HIGHER 6. Tchami & OOTORO - Late Night Secrets 7. Arundel - if thats okay with u

Welcome to a new series of The English Wine Diaries and my first guest to join me to talk about all things English wine in 2025 is Trevor Clough, CEO and head blender of Digby Fine English. Trevor and his husband, Jason Humphries, launched their first Digby wines for sale in 2013 having swapped the corporate grind of London for Sussex, in the heart of English wine country. Impelled to give English sparkling wine the same fanfare as its international counterparts, they developed a method of ranking England's burgeoning vineyards to find the finest grapes going, carefully building their grower portfolio across the southeast. In 2021, the couple acquired their best Pinot Noir site, Digby's Hilden Vineyard, in Hildenborough, Kent, and their dedication to the maturation process was solidified the following year when they secured their own winery space in Madehurst, West Sussex.Their house blending style celebrates the satisfying sharpness of English fruit while bringing a sumptuous texture and roundness to the wines through long ageing; it's a style they like to call “sophisticated yet racy.” Over the years Digby Fine English has received much critical acclaim; they've won numerous trophies, have beaten the likes of Krug and Dom Pérignon in a prestigious 2017 blind tasting, and in 2020 became the official English sparkling wine supplier to the House of Commons Gift Shop. To find out more about Digby Fine English and how to visit their Arundel tasting room, follow them on Instagram @digbyfineenglish or visit digby-fine-english.com.With thanks to our series sponsor, Wickhams, The Great British Wine Merchant. Visit wickhamwine.co.uk to see their award-winning range of English wine with free delivery on orders over £40. The English Wine Diaries listeners can also get 10% discount on their first purchase by entering the code TEWD10. Please drink responsibly. Thanks for listening to The English Wine Diaries. If you enjoyed the podcast then please leave a rating or review, it helps boost our ratings and makes it easier for other people to find us. To find out who will be joining me next on the English Wine Diaries, follow @theenglishwinediaries on Instagram and for more regular English wine news and reviews, sign up to our newsletter at thesouthernquarter.co.uk.

Louis The Child sets the mood with a fresh new episode of #PlaygroundRadio, featuring tracks from Breaka, jigitz, Taiki Nulight, Ravenscoon, Pawsa, Beltran, Bullet Tooth, MELVV and more! 01. jigitz - tell you straight 02. Montee - In Case You Wonder 03. Breaka - The Startup 04. Louis The Child, 1996Montana - Supercharger 05. MELVV - Wake Up 06. Conducta - Needed U 07. Borne, Taiki Nulight - Out of Control 08. Ravenscoon - Soul (Zeke Beats & Ravenscoon VIP) 09. Arundel - if thats okay with u

Your wedding cake should be as unique as your love story. Sweeter Side Bakeshop, now serving Anne Arundel County, MD, and beyond, creates custom wedding cakes designed to reflect your desired style and color palette for the unforgettable showstopper you deserve. Learn more at https://www.sweetersidebakeshop.com/gallery Sweeter Side Bakeshop City: Pasadena Address: 107 Mountain Rd. Website: https://www.sweetersidebakeshop.com/

We're on a break at the moment, researching and writing our sixth series, but, to fill the gap, this is the first of six new compilation episodes containing a trio of stories from across our earlier series. We've entitled this episode Three Tales of Chivalry because, following on from our 25-part retelling of Gawain and the Green Knight, we imagined listeners might be jones-ing, for some shining armour and talking horses. As such, this episode contains three of our more knightly stories, including our second-lap Cornwall story, The Once and Future King; or The Mad Man's Dream, our second lap Northamptonshire story, Dionysia The Female Knight, and our live retelling of The Many of Adventures of Arundel the Horse, and His Blundering Knight, Sir Bevis of Hampton, as performed at The Chichester Festival last summer.We really hope you enjoy them, and will be back with a new compilation episode next Monday. Or, if you're a Patreon Supporter, on Thursday and Saturday with new episodes of the Three Ravens Film Club!The Three Ravens is an English Myth and Folklore podcast hosted by award-winning writers Martin Vaux and Eleanor Conlon.Released on Mondays, each weekly episode focuses on one of England's 39 historic counties, exploring the history, folklore and traditions of the area, from ghosts and mermaids to mythical monsters, half-forgotten heroes, bloody legends, and much, much more. Then, and most importantly, the pair take turns to tell a new version of an ancient story from that county - all before discussing what that tale might mean, where it might have come from, and the truths it reveals about England's hidden past...Bonus Episodes are released on Thursdays plus Local Legends episodes on Saturdays - interviews with acclaimed authors, folklorists, podcasters and historians with unique perspectives on that week's county.With a range of exclusive content on Patreon, too, including audio ghost tours, the Three Ravens Newsletter, and monthly Three Ravens Film Club episodes about folk horror films from across the decades, why not join us around the campfire and listen in?Learn more at www.threeravenspodcast.com, join our Patreon at www.patreon.com/threeravenspodcast, and find links to our social media channels here: https://linktr.ee/threeravenspodcast Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As a new boys basketball season begins across Frederick County, Thomas Johnson head coach John Manley is this week's guest on The Final Score podcast. Manley is the longest-tenured boys basketball coach in the county, having been the head coach at TJ for 17 years and on staff there for 22. He chats with host Greg Swatek about his longevity, what keeps him going in the job, how he has evolved and become a better coach over the years and how much longer he might keep doing it. He also talks about his team at TJ this season and whether he feels it can make a run deep into the playoffs. The Patriots share the same region (Class 4A West, Section I) with the reigning state champs in 4A, Frederick High. TJ nearly ended the Cadets' quest for a state title last season. The Patriots led by 14 points early in the fourth quarter before eventually falling in a regional final, 49-45. Plus, with the holidays approaching, how does a veteran coach handle all of interruptions of routine and habits that this time of year typically presents. Prior to that conversation, FNP sports writer Alexander Dacy joins Greg to discuss Linganore's 35-7 loss to Arundel in the Class 3A football state final last Saturday in Annapolis and offer a bit of a winter sports preview for county teams, particularly when it comes to boys and girls basketball.

We're delighted to welcome back to Radio Maria author Fiorella de Maria. Today she talks to us about her new book Courage Under Fire: Father Willie Doyle SJ, Priest and Hero of the First World War bringing to life for us a lesser known figure of tremendous courage and holiness. Fiorella lives in leafy Surrey in the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton. As well as being an author, she is a mother of four. JUST LIFE is a programme that encompasses a wide range of everyday topics, broadcasting live on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday, rebroadcast 10pm, and Saturday 11am and 8pm. If you enjoyed this programme, please consider making a one off or monthly donation to Radio Maria. It is only through the generous support of our listeners that we are able to be a Christian voice by your side. www.radiomariaengland.uk

John is proposing learning Rust to enhance Gophers programming knowledge. I do enjoy learning new thing personally, Rust always has been or at least seems to required an extra effort to get started with. John is trying to make it more approachable.Links:John's websiteThe secrets of Rust, ToolsJohn on TwitterIf you enjoy the show the best way to support it is by sharing and talking about it to your circle and if you can by purchasing my courses (50% off for listeners of this show). Build SaaS apps in Go and Build a Google Analytics in Go.

In this episode of the Speaking Business Podcast, host Maria Franzoni sits down with award-winning speaker and Professional Speakers Association founder, Rikki Arundel. Rikki shares their inspiring journey, from early beginnings to receiving the Speaker Awards' Lifetime Achievement Award, revealing valuable lessons for speakers at all stages. They discuss the power of finding your niche, the importance of resilience through career shifts, and what it takes to craft a message that truly resonates. Tune in for Rikki's insights on building a brand, making an unforgettable impact, and navigating the challenges of a speaking career that speaks volumes.

Alan Lewis - A former International Irish cricketer and former International rugby union referee. He played 121 times for the Irish cricket team between 1984 and 1997 including eight first-class matches against Scotland and 23 List A matches. He captained Ireland Cricket team 35 times and is one of only six players to have played more than 100 times for Ireland, behind only Peter Gillespie and Kyle McCallan. In 1995, Lewis won the man of the match award in a Benson & Hedges Cup match against Kent, this added to his 1991 Man of the match award in the NatWest Trophy against Middlesex. This made Alan the only Irish player to win man of the match awards in both competitions. He also played a match for the MCC against Scotland in 1995. Alan played eight further times for Ireland that year, including a match against Australia, before his final match against the Earl of Arundel's XI on 20 August. He played twice more for the MCC against Scotland, in 1998 and 2002. Alan also played rugby union but his career was cut short by injury so he took up refereeing. In no time Alan reached the highest level of refereeing and was selected for the 2003 and 2007 Rugby World Cups. Alan gives his views to Gary Cooke on where we have come with refereeing at the highest level and have, we gone too far ! and a lot more !

No episode this week, as Shay's celebrating Rosh Hashana and John's moving countries. So enjoy this replay of our interview with John Arundel from episode 21 of the show!Interview with Go

A twist in the tale. Arundel's spur-of-the-moment fabrications about Lady Droitwich captivate Scrap, igniting her wistful affection for her mother while fostering an atmosphere charged with humorous and tender discoveries. As dusk descends, the villa of San Salvatore thrums with a quiet anticipation that culminates in a crescendo of heartfelt revelations and unspoken yearnings.Rose, caught in a whirlwind of past fears and newfound courage, confronts a momentous and unexpected encounter that promises to shift the entire balance of her world. With lush descriptions and intimate reflections, this chapter pulls you deeper into the characters' intricate inner lives, illuminating the transformative power of love and the timeless allure of hope. Don't miss this emotionally charged reading that leaves you buzzing with anticipation and yearning for more of San Salvatore's enchanting promise.

Best Restaurants in Maine No One Knows About | Hidden Gems Off the Beaten Path Looking for a culinary adventure in Maine that's off the beaten path? In this video, I'm showcasing three amazing restaurants that might have flown under your radar. Whether you're planning a trip or just looking for something new, these hidden gems are sure to impress. Stick around for the last one—it's worth the wait! 1. Bandaloop in Arundel, ME Address: 1200 Portland Road (Route 1), Arundel, ME 04046Contact: (207) 967-4994Website: bandalooprestaurant.comEstablished in 2004, Bandaloop offers global flavors with local produce, all while maintaining a steadfast commitment to green practices. Housed in a quintessential New England three-story barn built in the 1700s, this spot offers a variety of dining experiences—from the dining room to outdoor seating when weather permits. It's a must-visit for anyone looking for a unique dining experience in a historic setting. Do you want to see us visit Bandaloop? Drop a like and a comment! 2. Krista's Restaurant in Cornish, ME Address: 2 Main St, Cornish, ME 04020Contact: (207) 625-3232Website: kristasrestaurant.comKrista's Restaurant has been a community favorite since 2004, offering a family-style dining experience in a cozy setting. Located near the Moose Trail Mountain Farm, this spot offers not just amazing food but also a chance to explore secluded glamping on nearly 300 acres. Dinner here feels like eating with family, making it a perfect spot for a relaxed and comforting meal. Don't forget to subscribe for more hidden gems like this! 3. The Alna Store in Alna, ME Address: 2 Dock Rd, Alna, ME 04535Contact: (207) 586-6388Website: thealnastore.comThe Alna Store is a charming restaurant and market located in MidCoast Maine, dedicated to sustainable food systems. The menu here changes frequently, allowing for creativity and the use of fresh, local ingredients from nearby farms, fishermen, and artisans. With its warm hospitality and delicious options, this hidden gem is a true culinary delight. I'm Doug Schauf, a Realtor with the Make Maine Your Home Team at RE/MAX Oceanside. If you're exploring Maine, why not explore these amazing restaurants too? Remember, if you Make Maine Your Home, you don't have to do it alone! To contact Doug you can call or text to 207-838-5593, email to doug@makemaineyourhome.com or check out http://www.MakeMaineYourHome.com. See the Blog:    

Join the conversation with C4 and Bryan Nehman.  C4 & Bryan recap the interview between BPD Commissioner Worley & TJ Smith.  Columbia University President resigns.  A youth curfew is coming to Arundel Mills Mall.  More schools in the area are adopting cell phone policies.  MONSE Director Stefanie Mavronis joined C4 & Bryan in the studio.  Adults 35 and younger are no longer drinking or cutting back.  Orioles pitcher Albert Suarez joined the show.  Listen to C4 and Bryan Nehman live every weekday from 5:30-10:00 a.m. ET on WBAL News Radio 1090, FM101.5, and the WBAL Radio App!

FOLLOW UP: MORE CERTIFICATION WOES FOR TOYOTAFollowing on-site inspections, by Japan's transport ministry, more certification violations have been found. A further seven models have been found to have been incorrectly certified, including the RAV4 model, resulting in a call for “drastic reforms” from the government. To learn more, click this link to a Reuters article. JULY 2024 NEW CAR REGISTRATION FIGURESThe Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) released the new car registration figures for July 2024. Overall the figures are up 2.4%, year on year. EVs are up 18.8% for the month but still only a 16.8% market share, year to date. Hybrids and Plug-In Hybrids are also up, with petrol down slightly and diesel a lot. Private registrations are down significantly again, with Fleet being 60% of the market. SMMT call, again, on the Government to do more to incentivise consumers and do more for the infrastructure. Click here to read more, from SMMT. AUDI UK GETS NEW MANAGING DIRECTORAndrew Doyle is leaving Audi UK to become CEO of Peter Warren Automotive, an Australian dealer group. He will be replaced by José Miguel Aparicio who is moving from Audi Spain, taking up the role on 1 October 2024. If you want to learn more, click this AMOnline article link here. UK PUBLIC CHARGING POINTS INCREASE TO 64,632 DEVICESThe UK, as of 1 July 2024, has 64,632 public charging devices available for use. This is an increase of 47% on July 2023 numbers. However, the location of these chargers is uneven across the country. London has the best coverage, with Birmingham second, then it is very patchy across the rest of the country with the north of England particularly poorly served. Click this Autocar article for more. BARCELONA HARNESSING METRO TRAIN ENERGY FOR EVSIn Barcelona, the first charging station that uses regenerated braking energy from metro trains, has opened. Complimenting this are solar panels placed on metro buildings. We like this very clever idea and are now wondering where else energy can be captured from! To read more, click this electrive article link here. FIRST UK EV LORRY CHARGING HUB BEING BUILT IN IMMINGHAMImmingham port is the location for the UK's first HGV EV charging hub, which is due to open in November 2024. This is also the location for a lot of off shore energy being brought into the country, therefore will make it easier to connect the chargers to a source. If you want to learn more, click this Current News article link here. STONEHENGE TUNNEL CANCELLED The proposed tunnel under Stonehenge has been cancelled, along with the Arundel bypass, whilst other road...

Yesterday marked the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings in Normandy. Along with the military commemorations, there was a very special one created in yarn, by hundreds of knitters & crocheters around the globe - The Longest Yarn.Tansy Forster, who has lived in Normandy for over 20 years, was inspired by the Post Box toppers she saw when she traveled to visit Arundel, in southern England. She thought she would have a go at something similar for her garden gate to commemorate this special anniversary. That idea soon morphed to create an 80 metre long yarn masterpiece showcasing scenes from the build up to and of the landings themselves as well as the days immediately after.Tansy, with the help of Facebook, soon enlisted the help of hundreds of makers from around the world to create metre long panels, each with a scene from that time.  Not only that, Tansy has written a book about the project too. The Longest Yarn has featured on TV shows and news programmes around the world, and is set for a tour around the UK, then onto the United States before returning to Carentan in Normandy, where it will remain on permanent display.In this episode, we hear from Tansy Forster and from Diane McCoombs and Gill >>> from the North West of England, who contributed one of the metre-long panels to the Longest Yarn. You can find out all about The Longest Yarn on their website.For full show notes for this episode, please visit the Making Stitches website.To join the mailing list for the Making Stitches Newsletter, please click onto this link.The theme music is Make You Smile by RGMusic from Melody Loops .The Making Stitches logo was designed by Neil Warburton at iamunknown.You can support Making Stitches Podcast with running costs through Ko-fi.Making Stitches  Podcast is supported by the Making Stitches Shop which offers Making Stitches Podcast merchandise for sale as well as Up the Garden Path crochet patterns created by me & illustrated by Emma Jackson.Making Stitches Podcast is presented, recorded and edited by Lindsay Weston

Today, I have a collection of tales! I start the podcast with some snippets from my upcoming book, The Witch and the Wildwood. Then, I head out on a journey to Arundel, Sussex, to indulge in Wassail and a walk around in muddy fields looking for Witch Hares!

In this episode I talk with John Arundel about cryptography in Go. John wrote a great book on the subject called Explore Go: Cryptography.Security is a growing concerns and you should up your game as a Go programmer. We're lucky to have such a solid crypt package in the standard library. I'd encourage you to get familiar with it if you haven't yet.Links:Explore Go: CryptographySubscribe to John's contentJohn on TwitterAs always, if you want to support this show the best way (other than talking about it) is by purchasing my courses: Build SaaS apps in Go and Build a Google Analytics in Go, here's a 50% direct discount for listeners of this podcast.

Jenn from Arundel and Marie from Stockton-on-Tees are in it to win it!

On January 30, 1956, a devastating fire broke out at Arundel Park during a church fundraiser and oyster roast.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We're talking County Championships on an all new Hawk Talk. Host Tom Frank is joined this week by Trent Shipley, Jackson Peeples and Aidan Healey to run down last weekend's County Championships. South River Wrestling, despite missing out on a 3rd consecutive State Championship, came back strong to crown three County Champions and win the overall Team County Championship. And then we shift to basketball and welcome Coach Darren Hall to talk about this week's upcoming County Championship games for our Girl's JV basketball on Friday night as well as both Boys and Girls Varsity Basketball on Saturday. Don't miss a minute of the action!Hawk Talk is produced and distributed by Merrick Creative and hosted by Tom Frank. Follow us on Instagram @SRHawkTalk, help support the show at https://srhawktalk.buzzsprout.com and spread the word Seahawk Nation. #WERSRThis Week's Championship Schedule:WEDNESDAY, 2/21/24Indoor track (V) States at PGSLC - 1:30pmFRIDAY, 2/23/24Girls (JV) Basketball County Championship vs Severna Park at Arundel HS - 7:00pmSATURDAY, 2/24/24Wrestling (V) Regional Tournament at Old Mill HS - 9:30amBoys (V) Basketball County Championship vs Severna Park at Arundel HS - 12noonGirls (V) Basketball County Championship vs Broadneck at Arundel HS - 2:00pmSupport the show

I survived the music weekend! I am so pleased to be home, enjoying a nice chat with you. I hope you're keeping well. I had a nice walk and some fresh air this morning at the Wetlands Wildfowl Trust in Arundel this morning. The weather is gloomy and horrible but summer is on its way.

Turf Business TV catches up with James Askew from Arundel and talks about the growth in the turf industry. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Officials hosted a town hall meeting on Juvenile violence in South Baltimore.  Torrey spends time reflecting on the remarks of the Secretary of the Department of Juvenile Services, Vincent Schiraldi. We discuss the role of trauma and mental health on crime.  We also speak with WBAL TV 11 reporter Kim Dacey about her observations at the town hall. The Anne Arundel County Council unexpectedly fails to pass an affordable housing bill and County Executive Steuart Pittman threatens retaliation.  Maryland Comptroller, Brooke Lierman, laments federal efforts to prevent using ESG scores for investments. Also, a local transportation advocacy group gives the State of Maryland a D+ score for poor transit options.

On this week's Education Gadfly Show podcast, Kara Arundel, a senior reporter at K-12 Dive, joins Mike to discuss two decades of private school choice in D.C. Then, on the Research Minute, Amber reports on a new study investigating the success of science-of-reading interventions in California.Recommended content:“‘Opportunity' knocked—and stayed: Two decades of private school vouchers in the nation's capital” —Kara Arundel, K–12 Dive“‘Opportunity' knocked—and stayed: Successes and flaws of D.C.'s private school voucher program” —Kara Arundel, K–12 DiveSarah Novicoff and Thomas S. Dee, “The Achievement Effects of Scaling Early Literacy Reforms,” Annenberg Institute at Brown University (December 2023).Feedback Welcome: Have ideas for improving our podcast? Send them to Daniel Buck at dbuck@fordhaminstitute.org.

Read by Christopher Kendrick

Today, on this Table Talks episode, I invite Rikki Arundel, MSc, PSAE, FBSA, FRSA, ALAM(Hons) to chat at my coffee table.  Rikki is an award winning virtual keynote speaker, presentation skills and storytelling coach, and Gender expert. After founding the UK and Ireland Professional Speaking Association (PSA), their career as a sales and technology speaker came to an abrupt end when they came out as transgender non binary. Faced with considerable discrimination, Rikki completed a master's degree in gender research and established themselves as a social entrepreneur and popular international speaker on gender issues and LGBTQ history, including delivering two successful TEDx talks. Today Rikki works extensively with organizations keen to raise awareness of gender inequality and create a more inclusive workplace. They also draw on their extensive speaking experience and qualifications to coach leaders and speakers in advanced presentation skills and storytelling.LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/rikkiarundelLink Tree –  https://linktr.ee/rikkiarundelSpeakers Ecademy – Free to join - https://www.linkedin.com/groups/14238395/https://www.facebook.com/groups/speakersecademyTo connect with Keith on Instagram, visit here.To visit Keith's website to learn more, CLICK Here.Free Resources:FREE: Keith's Community (Facebook)FREE: "Towardations" (TM) for the BisexualFREE: 10 Questions you should ask yourself before coming outFREE: "5 Questions for the Bisexual Couple"FREE: Journal Prompts for the BisexualFREE: Guide to better Biblical InterpretationProducts:Wipeout Trauma Digital CourseInlet Journey: Are you part of the Bi+ Community and could use some personal help from me? If so, be sure to use this link to check out my coaching opportunities. You don't have to go through this alone. I am here for you.Coaching Could you use a practical game plan that you can use daily as you work toward you healing of identity trauma? If so, this is a great option for you. This is the plan that I, along with numerous clients, have used to get healing in life. Check it out by using the link.Wipeout Trauma Digital Course There are three ways to support this podcast: 1) Give it a honest 5-star rating and review on whatever platform you use, 2) share the podcast with your friends, and 3) join the $5 a month membership on Patreon. Thanks and blessings, Keith Support the showI hope you get a lot from this podcast. Obviously, I am limited with the ability of help I can offer here but I always strive to provide as much practical help as I can to help you heal your trauma and create a fantastic life. If you could use more help from me, I encourage you to visit www.JKeithBrown.com and check out all the ways I can work with you. With all my love,Keith

Last time we spoke about the mop up operations on New Georgia and the continued drive upon Salamaua and Lae. Munda had fallen, New Georgia was certainly a lost cause, but that did not mean there wasn't come cleaning up to do. The Americans were stuck mopping up places like Arundel and Baanga seeing fierce Japanese resistance. Sasaki ordered his men to fight as hard as they possibly could while others made their way to evacuation points. Over on Green Hell, the Australian and American forces had just taken Mubo and Lababia ridge, prompting General Nakano to create a last line of defense in front of Salamaua. Now the allies had to cross the francisco river and face multiple hills, ridges and knolls. Forward units forded the francisco river and grabbed a few knolls catching a glimpse finally of Salamaua, but a glimpse was all they were going to get as the Japanese fought tooth and nail to push them back. This episode is Operation Postern Welcome to the Pacific War Podcast Week by Week, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about world war two? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on world war two and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel you can find a few videos all the way from the Opium Wars of the 1800's until the end of the Pacific War in 1945.  The time has come at last. For months, we have seen the Australian and American forces fight for each hill, ridge and knoll, cross over ravines, rivers, swamps, a green hell of a landscape filled with more horror than just the Japanese. From the Jungles of Way to the rugged mountains of bobdubi and Komiatum, through the endless rain, mud and death. Operation Postern was to finally be unleashed, landings at Lae and Nadzab would commence. Now back in August, Admiral Barbey and General Wooten were forced to postpone D-day for September 4. For Lae the plan called for two battalions of Brigadir Victor Windeyer's 20th brigade to land on Red Beach; the 2/15th battalion would hit the eastern flank and the 2/17th to western flank closer to Lae. The 2/13th would hit Yellow beach; the 2/23rd battalion with a company of engineers, a field ambulance, a force of artillery and light anti-aircraft section would join the landing phase; the 26th brigade would follow up the initial landings and move right through the beachhead. The planners were concerned with possible Japanese naval action against their beachheads at night, as this had occurred at Guadalcanal and Milne Bay, so the defense of Red Beach would be coordinated with the 2/2nd machine gun battalion. Red Beach was selected as it was close to Lae, just a bit due east, but out of range of her large gun batteries. Yellow beach was further east and selected as an additional landing area to protect the eastern flank of the main beachhead that would be at red beach. The allies could not provide continuous air cover thus Brigadier Victor Windeyer's 20th brigade would have to land and unload quick as all hell. The initial plans called for a time of landing known as “h hour” to be between 3am and 4am in line with Wooten's request that it occur two hours during moonlight before dawn. They estimated they would need 9-10 hours for the unloading phase, the LST's would then retract at around 1pm. However, when the landing date was postponed for September 4th, this changed everything. Now there would be no morning moon, thus H hour could not be scheduled until after sunrise to allow time for the allied navy to identify the correct beach on a coast that was covered by a low-lying swampy jungle terrain, there was no prominent landmarks it would be difficult. This delayed the landing until 6:30am, resulting in the loss of around 3 hours of unloading time. Alongside that came the decision to retract the LST's by 11am as the allied air cover could not be guaranteed after 11am. This the unloading time was now reduced to 4.5 hours, that a hell of a lot less than they needed. It was also expected that the troops would take at least 1 to 1.5 hours to disembark leaving just 3 hours to unload supplies. Again logistics are not sexy, but this is the kind of problems needed to be overcome to win wars. So Brigadier David Whitehead's 26th brigade was going to follow up the initial landings, moving straight through the beachhead with the 2/2nd machine gun battalion who were earmarked to guard red beach. Furthermore General Heavy's brigade would dispatch some amphibian scouts with the 532nd engineer boat and shore regiment to go in on the first wave to establish red and yellow markers for the two beaches. To make things even more confusing, there was this enormous fringing reef along the thousand mile coastline with a few breaks. One break in the reef line near a village called Tauali was going to be marked Green beach as a back up landing area. The one and half mile of good narrow beach was to be Yellow beach 1, and yes there was a yellow beach 2, closer to Silimati. Admiral Barbey was going to employ every vessel he had; 4 Destroyer transports, the Gilmer, Humphreys, Brooks and Sands; 20 LCI's, 18 LCT's and 13 LSTs. From August 20-22nd Barbey had a full-scale landing rehearsal carried out at beaches on the south coast of Normanby island. The men learnt a few things from this experience. The first was that the surfacing of tracks with steel mesh was too slow to allow the vehicles to clear the beach. They decided that more stores would be loaded as bulk cargo and more labor would be provided to clear the landing crafts. Thus on August 29th, the 2/13th battalion was taken to Normanby island on destroyer transports were the men were disembarking from the LCVP's up to their necks in water. There were major differences as you can imagine for the conditions in Australia vs New Guinea. As Patrick Bourke remarked ‘the country fringing the beach was the worst we had been in. Almost impenetrable jungle grew in waist deep swamps, crisscrossed by much deeper creeks.' There was also a pre-emptive naval bombardment of Finschhafen as reports began to come in indicating enemy troops and supplies were being moved down the coast from Finschhafen by night. Vice Admiral Carpender ordered Captain Jesse Carter, commander of destroyer squadron 5 to sweep the Huan Gulf by night and hit Finschhafen. One of Carpenders staff noted  ‘It will be worthwhile to prove the Navy is willing to pitch in, even if we get nothing but coconuts,”. On August 22nd, destroyers Perkins, Smith, Conyngham and Mahan departed Milne bay enroute for the Huon Gulf. This was the furthest allied vessels larger than PT boats had ventured along the New Guinea coast since the beginning of the pacific war. Early on August 22rd, they opened fire on Finschhafen, firing 540 rounds of 5 inch shells within 10 minutes before hauling ass out of there. It was the first naval bombardment of Japanese forces in New Guinea. As for the battle for the skies, General Kenney was preparing to launch a series of air raids against Lae to support Operation postern. On the day before the landing, 21 allies bombers would hit Lae Airfield to try and knock out their aerial capabilities. Now all of that was just for the Lae landing, we got an entire other operation to hit Nadzab, designated as Z-day which because of the postponement was changed to September 5th. 96 C-47's, 82 carrying the regiments, 5 carrying artillery and 9 for supplies would be employed by Colonel Paul Prentiss's 54th troop carrier wing to transport Colonel Kenneth Kinsler's 503rd parachute regiment. Alongside this, Brigadier Eather's 25th brigade were earmarked to be the first flown in after the initial landings. On August 31st tossed 3 battalion commanders, their operations and communications officers with supplies using a Flying fortress at a very low altitude over the drop zone. They were acting as a sort of reconnaissance and they would uncover vital information to ensure safe location markers for accurate future drops. Hell they even performed meteorological analysis to figure out the wind conditions for jump areas. Meanwhile they keep saying everyday here in montreal its gonna be sunny and its rained for 5 days straight.  There would be rehearsals for the parachuting forces before September 3rd when the final plan was issued. Kinsler's 1st battalion led by Major John Britten would hit field B with the task of securing the Nadzab airfield site before establishing a defensive perimeter and beginning work on the airfield. Meanwhile the Australian 2/2nd pioneer battalion led by Lt Colonel J.T Lang would cross the Markham to help construct a new airfield. Alongside this Kinsler's 2nd battalion led by Lt Colonel George Jones was going to hit field A to capture the Gabsonkek area which would prevent the Japanese from advancing from the north or northwest. Kinsler's 3rd battalion led by Lt COlonel John Tolson would hit field c to capture Gabmatzung and prevent the Japanese from advancing from the east. Furthermore Prentiss would drop 22 dummy paratroopers in the forests south of Yalu right where Japanese forces occupying Heath's plantation would be able to see them. It was hoped this deception would delay advances towards Nadzab. By the way I took the time to educate myself a bit more on what is known as Paradummy's, because honestly until writing this episode I had no idea it was a thing. These were burlap cases filled with straw and plant waste, they kind of look like sackboy to be honest. As you can imagine from ground level looking fairly high up they do look like real paratroopers and they often were dropped alongside real paratroopers to give them a fighting chance against enemy bullets. The more you know.  After all the planning was done Barbey's little armada departed Milne Bay on the morning of September 3rd. Their journey was uneventful as they disembarked at Buna for a short break before re-embarking in the afternoon. After this point Heavy's Morobe base was hit by 9 Rabaul based Betty's with 27 Zeros for escort which tried to high altitude bomb them, doing little damage. Because of the deceptive campaign against Salamaua, termed the Salamaua magnet, very few IJA forces were left guarding Lae. At Lae were Companies 10 and 11 of the 115th regiment to the right bank of the Markham; Company 6 of the 238th regiment at Markham point; the 2 machine gun company of the 238th regiment were spread between the Bunga river and Bulu River; the 15th independent engineer regiment, 2nd company of the 5th battalion of heavy field artillery, the 25th, 29th and 30th machine cannon companies would all be at Lae proper. Aside from the few IJA troops, Rear Admiral Fujita Ruitaro had the 7th base force, formed around the 5th Yokosuka and 5th Sasebo SNLF and the 82nd naval garrisons anti-aircraft and coastal defense units. The Japanese were having a hell of a difficult time supplying their forces at Lae. To supply the near 10,000 or so men present within the Lae-Salamaua area each month required, 150 barges carrying 1500 cubic meters of supplies. Only large type barges could manage to get through the Dampier straits rather rough sea, smaller barges were too dangerous for the task. After each passing month, the naval ships used for transports were decreasing and by May the supplies were being carried by 6 submarines, cutting the volume in half the following month. After that supplies began to be carried overland from Wewak and Madang and a new barge route was established through Sio and Finschhafen. Regardless the Japanese were barely able to keep Lae and Salamaua supplied. This saw barely 300 fit men left to guard Lae with 2650 troops, malnourished, sick, wounded or suffering tropical ailments. The Japanese did have some big guns however, 28 75mm, 4 105mm and two 155mm for the coastal defenses, but their ammunition supply was quite limited. The 155mm's only had 30 shells a piece, while the 105mm had 50.  By late July, General Adachi decided to place Major General Shoge Ryoichi in command of the defenses at Lae, talk about a shitty promotion haha. Ryoichi's rd battalion, 238th regiment was sent first to Salamaua, then Company 6th and the 2nd machine gun company of the 238th regiment managed to reach Lae, but by the time things cooked up the rest would be stuck in Finschhafen. Therefore Rear Admiral Mori Kunizo was sent to grab command of the 7th base force in the meantime while Fujita would lead all the IJN and IJA units currently at Lae. By nightfall on September 3rd, the final voyage began. The allied vessels got to the assembly area unhindered and undetected and by 5:50am on the 4th identified the beach markers. The destroyer transports lowered the landing craft carrying the first wave while performing a 6 minute bombardment. The first landing craft hit the beach at 6:30am and at his guard post at the Japanese anti-aircraft positions overlooking the Lae airfield, private Wada Kiichi heard the sound and saw the flashes of a naval bombardment out in the Guon Gulf. He wrote this ‘Suddenly, there was a booming sound from the sea, and in a split second, I sighted red and yellow tracers come flying on a half moon ballistic arc. Where would the huge fleet land?‘Aren't they, in fact, landing right here in Lae?  ‘If I must die, I will fight with courage and die like an imperial navy man without shame.' Brigadier Windeyer's troops began to land at Red and Yellow beach, only meeting 30 members of the 2nd machine gun company of the 238th regiment who they brushed off around the Bulu plantation. General Kenney unleashed air raids against the Japanese airbases. At 7:45am 13 RAAF bombers, 10 Beauforts and 3 A-20 Bostons hit Gasmata; at 9am 24 Liberators hit Lae; at 9:30am 9 Mitchells hit Tuluvu on Cape Gloucester and 3 Bostons returned to hit Gasmata again in the afternoon. As the 22nd squadron War diary noted of the Gasmata raid “the strip is considered unserviceable”. The second wave approached the beach in the larger LCI's, managing to unload 6 companies without any opposition other than some very annoying reefs near the shore. Thus two waves hit the ground uncontested, but danger did lurk in the skies above. 6 Ki-43 Osca'rs and 3 Ki-51 Sonia's took off from Lae at 7am and 4 minutes later the Oscars began strafing 7 LCI's carrying the 2/23rd battalion and its division HQ while the Sonia's bombed two LCI's. One of the bombs crashed through the main deck of LCI 339 just forward of its pilot house setting the ship on fire before it began listing to port taking on water. The LCI ran ashore and was abandoned by the crew, 10 of which were wounded. Another bomb narrowly missed LCI 341 exploding near the bottom of the vessel, blowing a large hole amidships on her port side flooding two compartments. The list to port was corrected and the LCI managed to run ashore and would be salvaged later. 9 men were killed with 45 wounded during the attack. 8 Boomerangs and 2 Wirraways came over from Tsili Tsili to aid the next echelons as they began to unload units. The LSTs began clearing the landing area by 11am. The LCT's took a lot longer to unload than expected, they had arrived at 8am but only cleared the area over the course of 6 hours. Meanwhile, General Imamura frantically launched a strong air raid towards Law consisting of 12 Betty's, 8 Val's and 61 Zero's. The 81 aircraft strong party departed Rabaul, but was soon discovered by destroyer USS Reid lingering off Cape Cretin at around 1pm. Reid's report gave enough time for the allies to toss a counter air wave to intercept them consisting of 40 Lightnings and 20 Thunderbolts. A few vals tried to bomb Reid in the meantime, resulting in all misses. The interception saw the loss of 23 Japanese aircraft, mostly Zero's while only two lightnings were shutdown. However many Japanese aircraft continued towards Morobe where they descended upon the 6th echelons LSTs just off Cape Ward Hunt at around 2pm. These were carrying the Australian 2/4th independent company and the 2/2nd machine gun battalion, just 33 kms east of Morobe heading for Lae. 6 Vals managed to land two bomb hits on LST-473 and the Betty's one torpedo hit against LST-471. This killed 51, wounded 67 mostly from the 2/4th independent company. The Japanese lost an additional 4 Zeros and 3 betty's while 15 other aircraft were badly damaged. The remaining LSTs continued on towards Red beach, while some were ordered to divert course to assist the damaged LST's from the aerial attacks. Destroyer Humphrey's would grab the wounded and bring them back to Buna. Everything arrived on schedule by 23:00. Thus Admiral Barbey had managed to land 7800 personnel, of which 3780 were combat troops, alongside 3300 tons of supplies. After the landings, engineers at Red and Yellow beach got to work constructing roads while Windeyer's combat troops began to extend their perimeter. By nightfall the 2/17th battalion had crossed the Buso river and by 7:30am the 2/7th field company had built a single-girder bridge across it. To defend against further aerial raids upon the beachheads, a battery of the 2/4th light anti-aircraft regiment landed two detachments at Red and yellow beach. By mid afternoon the 2/13th had extended the yellow beach perimeter around 3000 meters inland and 2000 meters east to west. Lt Colonel Colvin's 2 companies of the 2/13th advanced inland towards the Bulu plantation sending the 30 Japanese who tried to contest them earlier further north towards some hills. Aside from them there were no signs of other enemy, by 2pm patrols of the 2/13th and 2/15th were forded the Suez river between Bulu river and Red beach. Colonel Grace's 2/15th battalion were given the task of protected the beachhead, while Lt Colonel Simpson's 2/17th began to advance towards the Buso river at 9am. Two companies of Major broadbent advanced northwest across the Buso going another 4 miles finding no enemy. Two companies of the 2/13th would also advance east along a track going towards Hopoi where opposition was expected. General Wootten wanted to speed up the advance towards Lae to prevent the Japanese from any time to organize a defense east of the Busu river. Wootten gave Brigadier Whiteheads 2/17th battalion the task of passing through the 20th brigade and continued the advance towards Buso river. Over on the other side Admiral Fujita began deploying his forces in a defensive perimeter between the Markham and Busu Rivers, with most of his naval units taking up positions on the right bank of the Busu while Companies 10 and 11 of the 115th regiment, around 127 men were sent to hold Singaua point. General Shoge rushed over as quickly as he could to take command at Lae, while General Nakano sent Major Mukai Masatake to assume command of the frontline actions. The next day the Australian advance going east and west continued still with no opposition. Simpson's men went west, advancing through some horrible wet and boggy terrain. To simpsons north was Broadbents men who got lost for a little while fording rivers until they made it to the Singaua plantation. Meanwhile the 2/23rd and 2/24th battalions followed behind them led by Lt Colonel Gillespie and Major McRae. They bivoucked south of Apo where Whitehead placed his HQ. During the morning hours, Brigadier Bernard Evan's 24th brigade embarked on 20 LCI's over at Buna and began to land at Red Beach by nightfall. As the Lae operation was moving along full swing, it was now time for Z-day. A B-24 liberator crashed on take-off after clipping a branch and rammed into 5 troop trucks full of soldiers waiting to debark. Its 4 500 lb bombs exploded tossing 2800 gallons of fuel in all directions killing 59 and wounding 92. It was a horrible disaster and a bad omen. The armada of C-47's were being escorted by 48 Lightnings, 12 Airacobras and 48 Thunderbolts a very intimidating force. Generals Kenney, Vasey and MacArthur accompanied the armada aboard some flying fortresses. Kenney said to MacArthur “They're my kids and I want to see them do their stuff”, apparently MacArthur hesitated for a moment before replying “you're right George We'll both go. They're my kids too”. Kenney worried about the consequences of both of them being killed by “some five dollar a month Jap aviator”. MacArthur only worried about becoming airsick and throwing up in front of his colleagues. General Vasey who had witnessed German paratroops in action over Crete back in 1941, watched the drop from above and would write to his wife “I wanted to see paratroops land from the top rather than the bottom as in Crete”. Over 302 aircraft crossed the Owen Stanley range. Heading the armada at 1000 feet were B-25 strafers carrying 8 .50 caliber gun in their noses and 60 frag bombs in their bomb bays. Behind that at about 500 feet were A-20's ready to lay smoke as frag bombs exploded. At around 2000 feet behind them were 96 C-47's carrying the paratroops, supplies and artillery. To all their sides were the fights sitting at around 7000 feet. Following this were B-17's loaded up with 300 lb parachute bombs to be drop ordered by paratroopers. Then even further behind that were B-24's and more B-17's who were going to hit Japanese defensive positions at Heath's plantation and other points between Nadzab and Lae. Air attacks against the defenses would be followed up with smokescreens. At 10:22am the C-47's began to drop their paratroopers over their target zones. Each C-47 dropped its men in less than 10 seconds and the whole regiment was unloaded in 4 and a half minutes. The whole of the Nadzab area was landed upon and taken uncontested. Watching it unfold Kenney was impressed going on the record to say “the operation really was a magnificent spectacle. I truly don't believe that another air force in the world could have put this over as perfectly as the 5th Air Force did.” By 2pm, the 2/2nd Pioneer battalion crossed Markham arriving at Nadzab during the night. The 2/2nd Pioneer battalion began hacking and burning kunai grass off the airstrip to clear it up before successfully extending it from 1500 feet to 3300 feet. This would allow the 871st airborne engineer battalion to land so they could construct two additional airstrips. On September 7th, Vasey's 7th division began to land at Nadzab, only facing some challenging weather. C Company of the 24th battalion led by Captain Arthur Duell departed Deep creek on the 4th to attack Markham point acting as a diversion. Lt Fred Child's 14th platoon performed the initial attack from the southwest followed up by Lt Maurie Yong's 13th platoon who advanced down a ridge near the river. Two other platoons covered them as they all blasted mortars over the Japanese camp and unleashed 2 vickers guns on Labu island. 100 men of the 6th company, 238th regiment were taken by surprise. They had dug in behind some barbed wire for several months astride a razorback ridge along the Markham river. Their surprise wore off quickly as they unleashed heavy fire killing 12 men and wounding 6. The allies were forced to pull back after killing 18 Japanese. Further to the south, General Nakano was facing some pressure from General Milford's 5th division. During late August the Japanese had been fighting tooth and nail to hold their last defensive line in front of Salamaua. The Japanese forward positions had been hit by heavy artillery for a long time, but their defenders were hunkering down. Brigadier Monaghan elected to send a company to cross the western slopes of Charlie Hill and occupy a position on its northern portion, thus isolating the Japanese. This was the same strategy that had been employed against Mount Tambu. However Milford instead elected to toss a frontal assault, believing his artillery support would win the day. Zero hour for the assault was to be 3:20pm, from 11:30am until then artillery smashed the Japanese positions with 2000 shells, 450 mortar bombs and 6000 rounds of machine gun fire. When zero hour hit, D company of the 42nd battalion began their climb. Lt Garland's 17th platoon led the way, immediately receiving enemy first after the first 100 yards. Two other platoons crossed around to the left and right only getting a few yards further. The approach to Charlie Hill from the west was a very steep thickly clad razorback. Garland's men had not even seen the enemy and 5 of them were hit. Two hours after the attack had begun, platoon leaders signaled down the slope that no progress could be made, it was simply too steep. Up above there were 4 well camouflaged machine gun nests unleashing havoc. The assault was canceled and the men withdrew. Over to the west, the 47th battalion launched two attacks against the Kunai spur. Captain Aubrey McWatter's A company began their attack at dusk on august 28th. Sergeant George Pitt's 9th platoon took the left as Barnett's 7th platoon to the right. The assault fell into hand to hand combat quickly, Barnett was twice wounded and his men were forced back. Pitt's platoon ran into heavy machine gun fire from a well dug in log bunker and were forced back having two deaths and two wounded. On the 30th, Major Idris Leach's C company made their attack but were forced back by heavy fire. Major Idris Leach and Sergeant Bill Eisenmenger lost their lives in that attack. On that same day, there was a request to increase artillery fire. 200 shells were lobbed upon the enemy the next day, then on september 1st after 5 hours of shelling, two platoons attacked again. They were supported by vickers guns as men scrambled to climb the ridge to its crest. The artillery softened up the enemy somewhat. Platoon leader Lt Ernest Anzac Walters died leading his men in the bloody carnage. They achieved the objective by the late afternoon sending many Japanese fleeing from their positions. Owen guns and grenades broke them. Around 60 dead Japanese were found on the Kunai spur, around 40 of them had been killed by artillery fire, some pillboxes took direct hits. The Kunai Spur was renamed Lewis Knoll after Captain Eric Lewis of B Company. To the east, after seizing Lokanu ridge, Milford ordered Lt Colonel Jack Amies 15th battalion to head right of the Americans and penetrate the Japanese defensive line at all cost without delay. At first light on the 31st, Lt Doug Matthew's 18th platoon of D company, reached a junction between Lokanu ridge and a razorback. The Japanese hit Matthew's men with mortar and machine gun fire. Despite the heavy fire, Matthew and his men crept up 75 yards, but at 12:50pm were met with a shower of grenades from enemies on a crest above them. Matthew decided to wait for reinforcements and artillery support before attacking up Scout ridge. Lt George Matthew's, brother Lt doug Matthews arrived with the 14th platoon after 1pm and organized a company attack, despite still not having artillery support nor mortars. Lt Doug led the 18th platoon forward, leading to 11 men becoming wounded, Doug likewise received a shot to the leg. George helped his brother get down the ridge and Doug told him before being carried off for care “About six weeks, I think”. George would later recall “I didn't worry too much about it. I thought on of the family has got out of it”. Lt Doug Matthew died the next day. The 15th battalion forces kept up the pressure sending C company, but they were repulsed likewise. On September 1st, Colonel Davidson sent B company around the west side of Charlie Hill intending to cut off the Japanese supply lines. Captain Frank Greer's B Company crossed a creek during the night and advanced 300 meters from the crest of Charlie Hill. They set up an ambush position, unknowingly 30 yards below the enemy perimeter on Charlie Hill. The Japanese tossed multiple counterattacks while A Company managed to establish their own ambush position nearby in some thick undergrowth on the eastern side of Charlie Hill. On September 4th, A Company joined up with B Company to the west, completely sealing off the enemy position. Meanwhile Captain Yates C company was advancing northwards from Lewis Knoll. Their patrols ran into Japanese losing many men in the process. At 7:15am the next morning they came across a razorback running towards a strongly held enemy position on Twin Smiths. Captain Yates led an attack upon the Twin Smiths, but the enemy fire was too much, forcing him to withdrew.  After the defeat at Arnold's Crest, Brigadier Hammer had resorted to harassing actions against the enemy. The 2/7th were hitting Arnold's Crest while Major Warfe's 58/59th and 2/3rd independent company were hitting rough hill. Hammer sent Lt Garland's men from C Platoon to infiltrate the Japanese rear and to carry out a diversionary ambush. On September 3rd, Lt Garland ordered Arnold's Crest to be shelled, so that the noise would cover his men as they began their infiltration. They departed at 9am, moving along the Buiris Creek between the Japanese positions. They ambushed a supply track at 11am, just when the shelling stopped. Garland recalled ‘My men made their way forward through the jungle canopy like deadly green ghosts. I never heard a sound as they moved forward and adopted their ambush positions.' Garland positioned his men on the southern side of the track with around ten meters between them, covering more than a thousand meters of track, watching while hiding; a difficult balance. Garland noted ‘You soon learn to look through the jungle, by slightly moving your head from side to side, whilst preserving your concealment.' After two hours of waiting, Garland's men killed 8 Japanese in an ambush, after this they pulled out. Finally, Scout Ridge was devastated with artillery and mortar bombardment, allowing Lt George Matthews men to gain its crest where his brother had died. On September 3rd, detachments of the 5th Sasebo and 2nd Maizuru SNLF marines counterattacked and forced the australians off. While this was occurring, Lt Tom Cavenagh's A company of the 15th battalion seized the unoccupied Lokanu knoll. They crept up the knoll under artillery support to find freshly dug trenches, weapon-pits and foxholes all recently abandoned. By nightfall the SNLF marines attempted to reoccupy the positions but were forced to dig in on the northern side of Lokanu Knoll. On the night of september 4th, General Adachi learnt of the Lae landings and immediately ordered General Nakano to withdrew from Salamaua and to assemble at Lae by september 20th. Japanese forces were going to withdrew towards Kaiapit or Sio through Salawaket. Adachi sent the main body of the 20th division to defend Finschhafen, resulting in the suspension of the construction of the Madang-Lae road. The Nakai detachment of Major General Nakai Masutaro currently at Bogadjim was ordered to defend Kaiapit and hold back the allied advance to help Nakano's withdrawal. Nakano ordered the 5th Sasebo and 2nd Maizuru SNLF to cover the movement by barge of the 3rd battalion 102nd regiment towards Law, departing on september 6th. Meanwhile the 51st division prepared a fighting withdrawal and at Lae, General Shoge and Major Mukai just arrived to grab command of the IJA forces. Shoge's attitude was considered to be the ideal representative of a commander. He often went a day or two without opening his mouth, he was a fighting man who did not display signs of joy or sorrow, nor pleasure or pain. Holding the enemy back to the east and west, even within close range, he remained cool. He never lost his composure and he was a large influence upon his officers and men. Shoge concentrated the whole strength of the Lae garrison to block the superior allied forces while Mukai personally led platoons and companies to direct the fighting at the frontlines. Meanwhile on september 6th, Wootten's men continued their advance. The 2/13th battalion reached the Buhem river and captured the overgrown Hopoi airfield. The 2/23rd battalion moved past the 2/17th arriving to the left bank of the Buiem river. From there they pushed back some Japanese to the Singaua plantation. By the late afternoon the Japanese were being hit from the east and north, forcing them to retreat. Ever since D-day, the Japanese had been tossing air raids against Red Beach, the Aluki track and the amphibian craft plying between the beaches, but they were unable to hinder the movement of men and supplies. At midnight on the 6th, 5 LCV's and 3 LCMS landed supplies from Red Beach to Apo village alleviating the severe ration and ammunition shortage for the forward troops and shortening supply lines. New plans were formed. On September 7th, the 24th brigade would takeover the costal advance while Whiteheads 26th brigade would advance further inland up the Burep River. The climax for the Lae-Salamaua campaign was nearly at hand. I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. Operation Postern finally kicked off and the amphibious invasion seems to be a resounding success. The Japanese were completely bamboozled and now frantically tried to get men in the Salamaua area over to defend Lae, but would they lose both as a result of it? 

Last time we spoke about the major planning leading to a thrust into the central pacific and General Kenney's neutralization efforts of the Lae area. Admiral Nimitz and Douglas MacArthur had been battling it out for a long time leading finally to some concrete plans for twin campaigns, one in the Central Pacific and one in the South and Southwest Pacific.  Countless meetings, deals and minds were put to work trying to figure out how to prepare the gradual advance towards the Japanese home islands. To finally make some waves into the central pacific it was to be the Ellice Islands, Gilbert Islands and Nauru as first objectives. Meanwhile in New Guinea the advance upon Salamaua and Lae raged on, but to really break them first air supremacy was required. Kenney unleashed a massive campaign with some innovative new toys completely desolating Wewakes airpower. This episode is Mopping up in New Georgia Welcome to the Pacific War Podcast Week by Week, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about world war two? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on world war two and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel you can find a few videos all the way from the Opium Wars of the 1800's until the end of the Pacific War in 1945.  New Georgia was falling apart for the Japanese. When Munda was seized it spelled doom. General Sasaki ordered his forces to withdraw to places like Baanga Islands after fighting a series of desperate holding operations against the forces of General Griswold. Again, the seizure of Munda was a colossal undertaking. The Americans had tossed 30,000 troops to overcome 5000 Japanese. The Americans lost 1136 of said troops and the Japanese 1500. The Japanese managed this type of bulwark defenses by building up a network of entrenchment systems around Munda Point. The US air supremacy over New Georgia gave them little advantage because the island was simply too dense in vegetation to properly spot enemy positions. Rear Admiral Turner likewise learnt a valuable lesson, that no matter how many transport boats were tossed into an invasion plan, more would always be needed. These lesson led to some radical rethinking of strategy going forward for future operations, like in the Central pacific. Admiral Ota used his fleet of barges to move 5 to 8 in a group, every night. Colonel Tomonari's 13th regiment and Sasaki's HQ were moved to Vila in an effort to reinforce  what would be the new main Japanese outpost in the Central Pacific. Further north the Americans successfully invaded Vella Lavella, completely bypassing Kolombangara and thus cutting off the enemy's supply line. In response to this Admiral Samejima established a barge staging base at Horaniu. Samejima then advised Sasaki to simply proceed with the course of action he thought best. Sasaki decided to do what he had been arguing for sometime now, to concentrate all his forces at Kolombangara. However with Zieta in the hands of the Americans, he would have to figure out a clever way to carry out the logistics of such a plan. Thus he split his forces in two, taking up positions at Bairoko and Baanga. Ota was given the task of evacuating the northern forces at Bairoko using his barge fleet, but the men to the south in Baanga were going to perform a fighting withdrawal of both Baanga and Arundel. Luckily for the Japanese, the 27th regiment had bypassed the Yano battalion in Baanga, to advance upon Piru Plantation and Sunday inlet. The forces at Baanga would be facing against the landings of 3 battalions; the 2nd and 3rd battalions, 169th regiment and the 3rd battalion, 172nd regiment led by General Barker. While Barker was getting his men to assembly positions, the Yokosuka 7th's 12cm guns and two mountains began to fire upon Munda Field. This caused only slight damage with some casualties, but it was a nuisance nonetheless. On August 16th, Barkers 136th field artillery battalion positions at Munda began counter firing against the Yokosuka guns. This was followed up by aerial attacks by 13 Avengers and 17 Dauntless who performed carpet bombing. For those who don't know this is the practice of bombing over a large area simultaneously. Imagine hitting a km area of vegetation by spreading your aircraft and timing everything just right, it produces what would look like a carpet of bombs hitting. So when you take a carpet and toss it over your floor, that was kind of the mental image received by this maneuver. The results were devastating. The Yokosuka 7th guns would not fire again.  Meanwhile the recently landed 2nd battalion, 169th regiment faced the strongest pocket of Japanese as they attempted pushing the defenders further west. The 3rd battalion, 172nd regiment would eventually join in on this attack. When the 2nd battalion was showing signs of slow progress, Barker decided to toss the 172nd in on August 18th. But the fiercest fighting would be seen between the 3rd battalion, 23rd regiment who continued to resist against Barkers 4 battalions as Sasaki's men were crossing over to Baanga and Arundel island. On August 19th, the 1st battalion finally managed to break through to the southwestern coast, where they came across the now abandoned 12cm guns of the enemy. During that night the 3rd battalion, 23rd regiment had slipped through a swamp making their way north to join their fleeing comrades over to Arundel. By nightfall of the next day all had successfully gone over. The cost of mopping up Baanga as recorded by the 169th was 44 dead, 74 wounded and 300 non-battle casualties, the ever present dangers of tropical island warfare. For the 172nd records, it was 8 dead, 36 wounded and nearly 200 men requiring evacuation from tropical diseases. For the Japanese there was no estimation or rough counts for casualties. Such dire numbers would see General Wing replace Barker as commander of the 43rd division effective August 20th. Now Admiral Halsey also wanted to see Arundel seized as it had become an important position, but the allies did not realize the amount of forces that had been snuck onto the small island. Meanwhile the 25th division continued their advance north through painfully rough swamp terrain, pursuing a rather elusive enemy. As the regiments advanced, bulldozers of the 65th engineer battalion tried to build jeep trails behind them. However the rain was so bad they became a nasty type of tropical mud and the bulldozers were struggling. Thus the supplies would have to be carried onwards to the front by hand, typically on the men's backs, or occasionally via air drops. By mid August the 161st regiment would finally reach the rendezvous point at Mount Bao where General Collins planned to have them turn west to secure an artillery position at Mount Tirokiambo. Once the artillery was set up, it could support an assault of Bairoko. Bairoko would be hit from the west by the 3rd battalion, 145th regiment of Colonel Dalton and from the east by the 1st battalion, 27th regiment of COlonel Liversedge. But mother nature is a cruel mistress and she places some impassable swamps, preventing the 140th field artillery battalion from reaching Mount Tirokiambo. On August 21st, the marine defense battalion tractors had to pull the 155mm's of the 136th Field artillery battalion over the soft road to get onto a position on Zieta Hill. However this took too long and while it was occurring the Japanese had successfully evacuated Bairoko. Admiral Ota's fleet of barges had been running to Bairoko every night under the cover of darkness and the cover of some guns placed on Kolombangara that fired upon US PT boats trying to harass the barges. American intelligence believed all of this activity was actually reinforcing Bairoko, thus they planned for a daylight raid to hit the barges in their bases. Rendova launched some PT boats, the 15th corps lent some demolition teams of the 117th engineer battalion and the NGAF provided fighter cover. The raid failed and the boats were forced to retreat.  On August 23rd, Dalton and Liversedge's men entered Bairoko to find a completely deserted base. On that same day, the 27th regiment arrived to the Piru Plantation after slogging through swamps prompting Collins to remark “Crossing that swamp was the toughest physical test I underwent during the war.” On August 23rd, Samejima sent new orders to Sasaki, instructing him to hold the Gizo-Kolombangara-Arundel line and to wait until a proper evacuation date was set. Sasaki sent the 1st company of Major Kinoshita Seishu to occupy some high ground on the western part of Arundel and the 4th company of 1st lt Ito Saburo at the base of the Stima Peninsula on its northeast coast. On August 25th Ota's barges were continuing to run nightly runs to Arundel bringing the 6 and 7th companies of Major Yamada Tadaichi over to Vila. By late August most of the other units arrived to Vila, with the Kure 6th SNLF taking the task of defending Kolombangara's western coast and the 229th regiment were deployed at Mbambare Harbor to protect its eastern coast. In addition, Captain Miyazuki Toshio departed Rabaul with 3 destroyers, the Hamakaze, Shigure and Isokaze to evacuate men at Rekata Bay back on August 22nd. However they were harassed by a PBY around Bougainville and realizing the Americans might toss a naval mission against them, they were forced to abort.  Another evacuation run was attempted 3 days later, seeing Admiral Ijuin leading light cruiser Sendai and 2 destroyers to escort Captain Toshio's group. The diversion was discover by Australian coastwatchers and soon Toshio was intercepted by 10 PBY's in the Bougainville strait. The Hamakaze's forecastle was hit by a bomb that caused 36 casualties again they had to abort. Two days after this light cruiser Sendai the destroyer Sazanami finally broke through to Rakata Bay and managed to grab most of the troops there. To grab the rest of the troops, 6 flying boats and a submarine were sent. Detachments of the Kure 7th SNLF would be landed at Sumbe Head and Sambe Head over on Choisuel, who would work to establish new staging bases for the rest of the troops being brought back to Buin. Over at Horaniu, the Japanese were constructing a new barge deport. Admiral Wilkinsons 3rd echelon led by Captain Grayson Carter consisting of 2 LSTs and the destroyers Philip and Waller were sent over to Barakoma on August 20th. They were intercepted by enemy planes in the Gizo strait which saw Philip collide into Waller providing some slight damage. The last convoys of the month would manage to unload at Barakoma under excellent weather and good air cover. Altogether Wilkinsons landed 6505 men, 1097 tons of rations, 843 tons of petroleum, 2247 tons of ammunition and 2528 tons of vehicles, By September 27th the field would be fully operational. The Americans also managed to construct an airfield at Ondonga, giving General Wing further support to mop up Arundel. On August the 29th, the 2nd battalion of the 172nd regiment were moving to the east coast while the 1st battalion moved west. Both had to advance over mangroves and hardcoral shorelines, because the interior was far too dense with underbrush.  Meanwhile over on Vella Lavella, Wilkinsons turned command over to General Griswold on September 3rd. The americans expected no resistance as they planned to occupy the entire island. Admiral Halsey gave the task to Major General Harold Barrowcloughts 3rd New Zealand division who were scheduled to arrive in mid september. But in the meantime, Griswold landed the 1st battalion, 145th regiment at Brakoma to allow Major Delbert Munsons 1st battalion, 35th regiment to advance up the east coast to secure the Kokolope Bay area, where the American wanted to set up a new radar site. Munson's men made good progress as the reached Lambu Lambu cove by September 4th. From there they dispatched Companies A and C with some Fijian commandos to patrol. The patrols got to the Boko Mission where A company ran suddenly into a strong Japanese patrol. A firefight broke out taking the lives of 12 Japanese. The men examined the bodies and their equipment and sent word back that they were facing recently landed enemy forces. The next morning, the 4th company of the Mikami battalion assaulted A company who were dug in at the Boko Mission. A company managed to fight them off, but had 2 deaths and 2 wounded in the process. Because of the attacks, General McClure sent forward his 3rd battalion followed up by units of the 64th field artillery battalion. The artillery men took up a position at Ruravai to support the advance. At the same time Munsons men cleared up the Boko Mission area, allowing for supplies to come up to it by boat. Munson then directed his forces to hit the main Japanese defenses at Baka Baka. As the men advanced they faced a steep ridge holding Japanese machine gun nests which greatly hindered their progress. Meanwhile on September 5th, the 2nd battalion, 172nd regiment discover the main enemy positions on Arundel while the 1st battalion was landing at Bustling Point trying to secure a forward artillery position. The 1st battalion would then occupy the tip of Bomboe Peninsula. The Japanese units meanwhile were reporting great success in their efforts and also requested they be allowed to assault the enemy artillery at Piru Plantation. On the last day of August, the 9th defense battalions 155mm's at Piru Plantation had begun opening fire on Kolombangara. They also dropped some leaflets upon the Japanese at Vila describing the agonizing death their artillery would provide them, cheeky. The leaflets read “ask the survivors from the 229th what it was like on Bakudan Hill”. The next morning Takabayashi told the 3rd battalion  “enemy shelling and firing will be intensified in the future, any rambling activity must be avoided and everyone must always be on the alert.” All of this prompted Sasaki to order a counterattack.  At around midnight on September 9th, Takabayashi's 3rd battalion, 13th regiment aided by a platoon of the 6th engineers snuck across the Blackett strait using barges to Sagekarasa island, their orders were to drive the enemy out of northern Arundel. Just a few hours later, Griswold ordered Colonel Sugg's 27th regiment to Bomboe Village to attack from the west. Sugg's men began their advance on September 12th, and his 3rd battalion forded the Bomboe Lagoon to seize Sagekarasa Island, effectively cutting off the 13th regiment. The Japanese were taken by surprise and began counterattacking with Takabayashi from the west and Ito from the east, but the Americans held on. Further south, Sugg's 2nd battalion ran into the Japanese main position, meeting heavy gun fire. Additionally the 1st battalion, 169th regiment began an occupation of the Fringe Island and the 82nd chemical battalion began deploying their 4.2 inch mortars at Bomboe to prepare a killing field for the Japanese at Safekarasa. From their positions on Fringe Island, the Americans were able to observe and track the Japanese barges with moonlight seeing them depart Vila and approach the landing area. This provided Sugg's the perfect amount of information to launch a deadly accurate mortar bombardment. The proceeding bombardement took countless lives including the 3rd battalion commander Takabayashi. On the night of September the 15th, Colonel Tomonari brought his HQ across and ten minutes later while he was sitting on a log listening to a company commanders report, he was killed instantly by a mortar shell that landed at his feet. Kinoshita took temporary command of the 13th regiment, 3 days later Colonel Muta Toyoji would become the new 13th regiment commander. On that same day the Americans attacked the main Japanese position, but were beaten back. Griswold  responded by bringing forward the 1st battalion, 27th regiment from Enogai with 5 marine tanks of the 11th defense battalion the following afternoon. On September the 17th the tanks charged forward with 3 rifle companies lined abreast behind them. Artillery and mortar concentrated upon Kinoshita's position, shocking the Japanese and forcing them to pull back. However the following day, the Japanese had quickly learnt their lesson and came back with anti-tank guns. They knocked out two tanks before pulling back to the Stima Peninsula. After two more days, the Japanese began evacuating Arundel. During the night, the 3rd battalion evacuated under some heavy mortar and artillery fire while the Yokosuka 7th guns covered them. The following night barges grabbed the 1st battalion troops, bringing the battle of Arundel to a close. For Colonel Muta Toyoji's 13th regiment, the fight for Arundel was a costly endeavor, they suffered 243 killed, 363 wounded, including many officers. For the Americans it was 31 dead and 225 wounded. Back on September 10th, McClure's batteries began to arrive at Lambu Lambu and as soon as they were put into position they began firing against the Japanese. You see during one of the fights between the Japanese and Munson's forces, a dead Japanese officer was found to be carrying a sketch map of the Japanese positions at Horaniu. Captain Jorn Burden translated the Japanese sketch onto their maps and added details from other patrol reports. This gave A and C batteries an incredibly accurate firing grid that proved to be deadly. The concentration of fire was so accurate the Japanese were forced to abandon their positions almost immediately. When troops later came to the area they found the dugouts had suffered direct shell hits with corpses still holding picks and shovels in their hands. The Japanese realized the American gunners knew exactly where they were located so they made a panicked withdrawal to the northwest coast. On September 14th Munson finally unleashed an attack upon Horaniu only to find the dugouts empty. Fijian commandos were sent to pursue the fleeing Japanese as the 1st battalion moved back to Lambu Lambu and the 3rd battalion occupied Horaniu. The New Zealanders would take over the fight for Vella Lavella, but now we need to venture back over to Green Hell. With the loss of Mubo and Lababia ridge, General Nakano was forced to establish a rough arc of defensive positions in the heavily timbered ground from Bobdubi on the south bank of the Francisco river through Komiatum village to the Tambu Peninsula on the coast. Nakano had risen to the bait of General Blamey who had hoped he would and poured more men into this area in order to defense Salamaua from what he believed to be the actual allied goal. Naknao reinforced the area with the 3rd battalion, 238th regiment and the 3rd battalion, 21st regiment who had been stationed at Lae. The new key position in the Japanese line was Charlie Hill. The new Japanese defensive line ran east along the Yamada Yama known to the allies as Scout ridge to the coast at Lokanu and north over the Francisco river along the ridges of Rough Hill, Arnold's Crest, Kidney Hill and the coast near Malolo. Charlie Hill held 4 perimeters. Below ground the Japanese constructed an intricate tunnel system to protect them and their supplies from bombardments. The entrance shafts had vine covered ladders that went down 6 meters. Galleries branched off the main tunnel like catacombs with benches cut into the sides for sleeping. Near Charlie Ridge was Davidson Ridge where Nakano deployed some new reinforcements from the 115th regiment. On August 24th, Nakano told his men “If this line cannot be maintained, the division is to be honorably annihilated.” Meanwhile, Colonel MacKechnie was tossing patrols past Roosevelt ridge. On August 16th I Company, down 2/3rds of its strength, basically down to a single platoon level, crept forward to toss grenades at some Japanese around Scout ridge while Sergeant Warren unleashed mortar cover. The Japanese sought revenge that night and performed a dusk to dawn attack, but grenades and mortars held them back. It was to be the start of two bitter weeks of such small skirmishes, and the Japanese hunkered down in their foxholes guarded Scout Ridge with their lives. On August 18th, K company performed a frontal assault along the ridge, but Japanese barricades and machine gun fire kept them back. 3 Americans were killed, 7 wounded for their efforts, including a courageous medic who ran into the fray. The Japanese positions on Scout ridge were very strong, with lines in depth going back all the way towards Salamaua. Scout ridge provided the defenders with countless defensive positions along its crest with four intersecting ridges behind Roosevelt ridge. On August 20th, Colonel Davidson ordered his men of the 42nd battalion to capture what he thought were only two knolls to the north of the battalion's positions on Davidson ridge. The smaller knoll was occupied without opposition and the other knoll only had slight opposition. However the next morning, scouts reported there was another feature, they called Bamboo Knoll about 600 yards farther north. Davidson then ordered it captured and it was with little opposition. Crouching in some kunai grass atop that knoll, the scouts could see Salamaua and allied artillery hitting it. They could not see the airstrip because another hill was in the way, that hill was Charlie Hill. Davidson's intelligence told him they had already seized Charlie hill because their maps were not quite accurate. This caused a lot of headaches for historians going through diaries, trying to piece together the movement of troops. Thought I would try to add some frustrating information on their part.  Now to intercept the enemy fleeing from Mount Tambu into the area between Komiatum and Davidson ridge, Brigadier Monaghan's 29th brigade were assembled east of Mount Tambu. Meanwhile Major Warfe was performing an offensive against the junction of Bobdubi, Komiatum and the Bench Cut Track. Warfs A Platoon led by Lt John Lewin had cut off a point at a junction between Bobdubi and Stevens track on August 14th. Warfe planned to toss A and B Platoons against the enemy while the 2/7th battalion's D company took up a further point on the track. At the same time the 58/59th battalion were going to launch a diversionary attack against Erskine Creek. On August 17ths, Warfes commandos advanced south under artillery and mortar support attacking the enemy along Buirali creek and Salamaua track. However the enemy proved too intense to overcome, leading the commando platoons to pull back somewhat. Then the 2/7th company came to the right of A platoons position filling a gap in the center of the enemy line. They exploited the gap and advanced towards the western edge of the main Japanese camp. Lewin's A company kept prodding the enemy lines until 6:30pm when the Japanese made a vicious counterattack causing 5 deaths including Lt Barry and 11 wounded. By dusk the Australian attacking force was thrust like a wedge into the enemy positions with Lewin and A platoon on the left, the 2/7th company in the middle and B company on the right. The following day the Japanese were forced to pull back to the line of the Komiatum track By August 19th, the Japanese were being hit hard. On their northern lines they had 23 deaths, the commander of the 80th battalion, Major Jinno was dead. The Komiatum track was cut by the 17th brigade at Laver's knoll. They were withdrawing across the front, most were now taking up positions further east at Charlie Hill and Kunai Spur. Brigadier Hammer's 58/59th were able to occupy Erskine Creek and C company of the 2/7th seized Orodubi. The following day the 2/7th battalion occupied the junction of Bobdubi and the salamaua track. They captured quite a few forward pill boxes, found the enemy was still holding some in the back so they began raining mortar upon them. At dawn on August 21st patrols found the Komiatum track abandoned, now they could push further on. On august 21st as a result of the enemy giving so much ground, Hammer ordered the mento ford the Francisco river to put more pressure on Salamaua. Lt Henry Mallett's 11th platoon of the 2/7th battalion forded the Francisco river near its south end at Bobdubi ridge. They advanced over a razorback spit towards Rough Hill where they ran into Japanese machine gun fire. They were quickly bolstered by another platoon and by 3pm took the position, to gain fire support to allow others to cross the river. During the afternoon a composite platoon led by Lt Owen Edwards advanced further to occupy a dominant hill, which was named Arnold's Crest after captain Ted Arnold the commander of C company. Like I said if you wanted a mountain, ridge, or hill named after you it seems New Guinea was the place. By August 22nd Hammer's men were occupying Arnolds Crest giving covering fire to allow more forces to cross the river. Once enough men had crossed they began expanding the perimeter. Then on August 27th 420 Japanese from companies from the 115th and 80th regiments counterattacked Arnold's Crest, successfully cutting off the allied line of communications to the south. The Australians did not give it up without a fight however, the counter attacked trying to seize the nearby Fisher's knoll. The Japanese were forced to give up Fishers Knoll but repelled the allied attacks upon the crest itself. Despite still holding Arnold's Crest the following morning saw the Japanese withdrawing westwards. Now it seems Hammer got too excited when he ordered his forces to occupy so many forward positons. Hammer signaled his new divisional commander, General Milford “unreliability of 58/59th battalion troops has forced me to withdraw to hold a tighter line Buiris Creek”. Basically he believed he had overextended the 58/59th who were currently surrounded by a company or so of Japanese. The 58/59th were down to less than 30 or so men, carrying many wounded back and sending reports they were running low on ammunition. However on the ground, John Bethune's B company were holding strong, keeping the situation together. Another company commander named Newman went on the record stating “Hammer had weak companies flung out into the blue where they could not be reinforced or supplies” After all was said and done, upon reflecting on the situation, Hammer would sign off on a recommendation to award John Bethune a military Cross, writing “‘Displaying grit and determination Lt Bethune tenaciously held the area until shortage of amn [ammunition] and supplies forced him to withdraw.' The situation forced Hammer to tone down the aggression somewhat lest a catastrophe were to occur. He ordered the men to form a defensive line from Rough Hill to Arnold's Crest, while more forces came to prepare for another offensive. On August 21st, the Taylor Force had rejoined its regimental force, allowing MacKechnie to launch a new attack in force. On August 27th, A company advanced along a trail going up George Ridge successfully cutting the Japanese supply line. The men dug in, expecting a lot of angry Japanese counter attacks. Captain George of A company wrote this of the experience “‘We began to feel chill in the stomach. Every rush meant firing a few more clips, throwing a few more grenades. As the dark suddenly quietened, our hands counted blindly the few clips left in our belts, the last grenade or two on the parapet – like a thirsty man in the desert checking his last water. For when ammo ran out, they would overwhelm us – waves of many Japs with long bayonets. Home was a long way off indeed, over dark waters to Oregon.'” The fighting fell into hand to hand combat, from foxhole to foxhole. Men fought and died around George who knew the position could not be held. The next day George heard 4 rifle shots signaling permission for his battered unit to withdraw. They fought off 10 consecutive counter attacks before tossing in the towel.  Not all was lost on the action for George's men however, so many Japanese were employed for the counter attacks, they had to give up a position they held known as Bald Hill. Other companies of Taylor force seized the hill as the Japanese retreated to positions on Berger hill and Egg knoll. Over to the west, Brigadier Moten's battered 17th brigade were relieved by Monaghan's men who took up positions north of Mount Tambu. Davidson's 42nd battalion occupied Bamboo Knoll after tossing back a ton of Japanese counterattacks. Davidson then tossed some patrols towards Charlie Hill, which would receive its name after Davidson's given name. The Japanese presence on Charlie Hill was far to strong for smaller units to prod it, so more forces would be brought up.  Back over to the north, Warfe's commando's attempted to overrun the Kunai Spur, a dominant position blocking the way along the Francisco river to Salamaua. On the morning of August 22nd, B Company of the 58/59th crossed the Buirali creek and one of their patrols advanced north to Kunai spit. Three simultaneous attacks were directed on Kunai Spur the following day by Captain Cramps 2/7th company from the north, Sergeant Tom Pot's 58/59th platoon from the west and Lt Russell Matthews 58/59th platoon from the east. It was a very steep climb, when Matthews men finally go atop the spit they were face to face with a machine gun nest that nearly took them out. On August 25th the 2/7th platoon managed to outflank the enemy position near Buirali Creek which caused them to counter attack. They failed to take the Kunai SPur and were relieved by Lt colonel Ken Montgomery's 47th battalion on the 26th. At this point Monaghan took command, and his first order of business was going to be an assault against Nakano's last line in front of Salamaua. I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. The allies were cleaning up on New George while continuing their deceptive assault on Salamaua on New Guinea. General Nakano's men were beginning to feel the wall behind their backs as the allies closed in on Salamaua, but still they did not realize Lae was the actual target. 

Last time we spoke about the Komiatum Offensive in New Guinea. The drive to Lae and Salamaua was raging on New Guinea. Mount Tambu was assaulted and the allies received hellish casualties trying to take it. The legendary Bull Allen saved countless lives during this action, but Mount Tambu simply couldn't be captured. The allies chose to isolate and surround mount Tambu instead. The allies secured took the sugarcane knoll, the timbered knoll and then found a path heading to Komiatum. Nakano ordered his men to hold Komiatum ridge, but their situation became more and more desperate. Allied artillery and aerial bombardment alongside the enveloping maneuvers were taking a toll, the Japanese had suffered 900 casualties since July 23rd. With more men dying minute by minute, Nakano ordered a withdrawal from Komiatum still believing the primary target of the allies was Salamaua. This episode is the Fall of Kiska & Battle of Vella Lavella  Welcome to the Pacific War Podcast Week by Week, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about world war two? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on world war two and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel you can find a few videos all the way from the Opium Wars of the 1800's until the end of the Pacific War in 1945.  So before venturing back to the frigid northern aleutians, we have a lot of action to talk about in the south Pacific. On August 3rd, General Sasaki was forced to order a withdrawal from Munda. General Griswold sent a message over to Admiral Hasley declaring “Our ground forces today wrested Munda from the Japs and present it to you as sole owner”. Halsey in his typical fashion replied “keep ‘em dying”. Despite the blood, sweat and tears taking Munda, as a whole, operation cartwheel had fallen a month behind schedule. As Griswold noted “the months fighting had not been the Americans' finest hour in the Solomon islands campaign”. Halsey would add to it “the smoke of charred reputations still makes me cough”. Now just because Munda had fallen did not mean the work was all done, there was to be cleanup operations of course. General Sasaki ordered his forces to retreat northwards, most were enroute to the Kure 6th farm; the 13th regiment and Sasaki's HQ were going to Bairoko; the 3rd battalion, 23rd regiment and Yokosuka 7th guns were heading to Baanga island. The Americans would be in hot pursuit. General Griswold divided the cleanup operations, giving the 25th division the task of advancing across New Georgia to seize Bairoko Harbor and the Piru Plantation. General Hodge 's 43rd division was given the task of seizing the islands of Arundel and Baanga. General Collins would deploy the 1st battalion, 27th regiment and Colonel Dalton's 161st regiment to advance up the Bairoko trail; the rest of Colonel Douglas Sugg's 27th would advance along the Zieta Trail towards the Piru plantation. General Sasaki learnt on August 6th, the American navy had scored a small but conclusive victory when 6 US destroyers sunk 3 IJN destroyers, the Arashi, Kawakaze and Hagikaze during the Naval battle of Vella Gulf. This of course meant the Japanese reinforcement convoy had failed, thus Sasaki wasted no time ordered a general withdrawal to Kolombangara by the way of Baanga Island. Sasaki needed to give the men more time, so he reinforced the Yano battalion with the 12th company of the 3rd battalion, 23rd regiment who were left to defend the Kure 6th farm. Major Yano Keiji, a veteran of Guadalcanal, selected a rough terrain east and south of Zieta village and the Kure 6th farm to dig in. The Americans would later refer to it as “Zieta Garden”. The garden was to be Yano's first line of defense across the Zieta river. There was a bit of high ground due north of Zieta Village which would have been easier to defend, but he needed his men to protect the trail running to Lulu Channel and Baanga, his only line of communications. The 3rd battalion, 23rd regiment in the meantime were securing Baanga. General Sasaki radioed his plans to the 8th Fleet, but to his surprise was told to hold onto New Georgia until late September for “future operations”. Sasaki was bewildered by this, but understood Admiral Samejima then commanding the 8th fleet was trying to direct a land battle, and obviously he was not experienced in such things. What Sasaki did not know at the time was Samejima was being instructed by General headquarters to do this. On August 7th, the Army and Navy had agreed to pull out of the Central Solomons and would cooperate to bolster Bougainville's defenses. A revisión later on August 13th would instruct Koga, Kusaka and Imamura to hold onto as much of New Georgia as possible while Bougainville was being reinforced. Full evacuation of New Georgia was set for late September to early October, but the actual dates were dependent on the Bougainville progress. On August 8th Sugg's 2nd battalion advanced through a deep ravine going roughly 2 miles up the trail when his men were met with heavy machine gun fire. The Yano battalion was defending the barge supply route through the Lulu channel as their comrades and supplies made their way to Baanga. On August 9th, the 27th began their assault upon the Kure 6th Farm, employing a envelopment maneuver. The Yano battalion was holding them at bay, but gradually the allied forces were confining the Japanese into a smaller and smaller pocket. Meanwhile the 1st battalion was advancing north along the Munda-Bairoko trail where they joined Colonel Liversedge's men. On the 10th, Hodge ordered the 169th regiment to hit Baanga and on the 11th patrols from their 3rd battalion had located the Japanese strongpoint on its southwest tip. By nightfall, the American assault of the Kure 6th Farm forced Colonel Yano to withdraw back across the Zieta River to form a new defensive perimeter. His men performed a fighting withdrawal throughout the night seeing many Japanese scream and throw rocks at the Americans. The usual night time activities that kept the allied forces miserable.  On the 12th the Americans unleashed an artillery bombardment upon the Kure 6th Farm positions not realizing they had already been abandoned. The 89th had fired 2700 rounds, the heaviest concentration of the operation on completely empty positions. The Americans advanced over Yano's old positions, crossed the river and fell upon Yano's new defensive perimeter. On that day General Barker assumed command of the 43rd division as General Hodge returned to his command of the Americal Division. Barker began by sending L Company of the 169th regiment to occupy Baanga. L Company were met with unexpectedly heavy Japanese fire suffering 28 casualties before they were forced to pull back.    Meanwhile on August 13th, Sugg's 3rd battalion with E company managed to launch their main assault against the Yano battalion. They were attempting a envelopment maneuver against Yano's flanks, but heavy resistance saw Yano's right flank repel the attack. On the left there was a marshy plain that hindered the American advance forcing them to go too far left and thus failing to apply enough pressure. Although the assault failed, the unexpected left advance saw some gain. A patrol from H company stumbled across a heavily used trail leading to the Lulu channel. They established a roadblock that night allowing ambush efforts to hit the trail. The roadblock convinced Yano he was soon to be cut off, so he immediately prepared a withdrawal to Baanga.    In the meantime, Barker decided to use Vela Cela island as a launching point for an assault against Maanga. On August the 14th, the 3rd battalion, 169th regiment began occupying the small island before using it as a springboard to land at Baanga. However the Americans quickly found themselves surrounded by a mangrove swamp and the Japanese began tossing counter attacks until night fell.  Yano's forces repelled numerous American attacks from the 3rd battalion throughout the day, afternoon and night. The Japanese threw back one attack led by four marine tanks, which had crossed the river on a bridge engineers built. While doing this his men also began their retreat westwards. H Company met a brief exchange with Yano's men, but Yano decided not to seriously clash with them and withdrew his battalion to Baanga by the 15th.  The 27th occupied Zieta village, making contact with Schultz 3rd battalion, 148th infantry over on Zieta Hill to the north. After this the 27th would advance upon Piru plantation and Sunday Inlet, too which they also ran into mangrove swamps greatly hindering them. The fight for the Zieta area had cost them 168 casualties, the americans were seeing a continuous flow of fierce counterattacks at Baanga, prompting Barker to decided he would reinforce the beachhead with the 2nd battalion 169th regiment and the 1st and 3rd battalions of the 172nd regiment.   At this point General Griswold and Admirals Halsey and Wilkinson were trying to figure out what to do next. Halsey's original plan after the taking of Munda was to attack Kolombangara, but the recent performance of the Japanese defenders made the Americans quite skittish about performing an amphibious invasion. The battle for Munda point was one of the fiercest defenses the Japanese had put up. More than 30,000 troops had been brought over to face 5000 Japanese defenders within their network of entrenchments. As pointed out by the commander in chief of the US Navy planning memorandum “If we are going to require such overwhelming superiority at every point where we attack the Japanese, it is time for radical change in the estimate of the forces that will be required to defeat the Japanese now in the Southwest and Central Pacific.” Munda Point airfield would become a landmark victory because of the 6000 foot runway it would soon provide, alongside taxiways and its capacity as a base of operations. Halsey would later declare its airfield “to be the finest in the south pacific” and the Seabees would be awarded with a citation for their great efforts. Commander Doane would receive a special mention “by virtue of his planning, leadership, industry, and working ‘round the clock' to make serviceable the Munda Airfield on August 14th, 1943, a good four days ahead of the original schedule.” The seabees work was a testament not only to their morale and organization, but also the fact they held superior equipment. Admiral Nimitz would go on the record to state “one of the outstanding features of the war in both the North and South Pacific areas has been the ability of US forces to build and use airfields, on a terrain and with a speed which would have been considered fantastically impossible in our pre-war days.” Overall the Georgia campaign would go on the be an essential component in the strangulation of Rabaul, as pointed out by historian Eliot Morison “The Central Solomons ranks with Guadalcanal and Buna-Gona for intensity of human tribulation. We had Munda and we needed it for the next move, toward Rabaul; but we certainly took it the hard way. The strategy and tactics of the New Georgia campaign were among the least successful of any allied campaign in the Pacific”.   Allied intelligence indicated Kolombangara had roughly 10,000 Japanese defenders, thus Halsey was inclined to seek an alternative method rather than slugging it out. He thought perhaps they could bypass Kolombangara completely and instead land on Vella Lavella. If they managed to pull that off, it would cut off the Japanese supply line to Kolombangara which was basically surviving on fishing boats and barges based out of Buin. Halsey noted “Kolombangara was 35 miles nearer the Shortlands and Kahili. According to coast-watchers, its garrison numbered not more than 250, and its shoreline would offer at least one airstrip.” A reconnaissance carried out back on July 22nd reported very few enemy troops on the island and that it held a feasible airfield site at Barakoma which also had beaches capable for LST's to land at. Thus Halsey approved the plan and Griswold formed the Northern Landing Force, placed under the command of Brigadier General Robert McClure. The force consisted of the recently arrived 35th regiment of the 25th division attached to the 25th cavalry reconnaissance troops, all led by Colonel Everett Brown; the 4th defense battalion, the 58th naval construction battalion and the Naval base group.  To hit Vella Lavella they would require air supremacy and artillery planted upon Piru Plantation and the Enogai-Bairoko area. General Twinnings AirSols had 161 fighters back on July 31st, but by August 18th they would have 129 functioning. Twining had sufficient strength in bombers as the number of light and medium bombers had dropped by less than a dozen, at around 129. For heavy bombers his increased from 48 to 61. It was critical Munda airfields be fully operational by mid august, sothe Seabees of the 73rd and 24th naval construction battalions went to work. Admiral Fitch's plan for Munda airfield called for a 6000 long foot runway with a minimum 8 inch coral surface and taxiways and revetments ready for over 200 fighters by September 25th. Eventually this would also include 48 heavy bombers. The immediate job was the fighter strip as always, you prepare your defenses against air attacks before you bring in the heavy bombers. He had a week to make the field operational. Commander Doane of the 73rd Seabees had two critical assets. The first was Munda was by far the best airfield site in the Solomons. Beneath one to 3 feet of topsoil was solid coral and there was a plentiful supply of live coral which hardened like concrete, great for the surfacing. Second the 73rd was the best equipped battalion yet to arrive to the solomons with D-7 and D-8 bulldozers, ¾ yard power shovels, 8 yard carryalls and 7 ton rollers. Weather was good and the moon was bright for the week permitting night time work without lights. The immediate threat would have been a 12cm of the Yokosuka 7th SNLF at Baanga, but they never fired upon them. Again, wars are won by logistics and it can't be expressed enough what a colossal amount the Seabees did for the Pacific War. By August 14th, Mulcahy flew over to set up his HQ and the VMF-123 and VMF-124 flew into the base with a R4D carrying their gear and personnel. For the incoming invasion P-40s would be coming from Segi while Corsairs would be launched from Munda.  Admiral Kusaka had reformed his 1st Base air force thanks to the arrival of his long-sought reinforcements. In mid July reinforcements arrived to the Solomons in the form of the 201st Kokutai Aerial Bomb group and carrier Division 2's naval bombers from Ryujo. The overall strength of the 1st base air force was now at around 230 aircraft of various types. The land-based bombers would go to Rear Admiral Ueno Keizo's 25th air flotilla over in Rabaul. They were tasked with night bombing raids against Guadalcanal and New Georgia now. Naval fights and bombers would be merged into the 1st combined air attack force, later reformed into the 26th air flotilla led by Rear Admiral Sakamaki Munetake. There job was to destroy any enemy shipping in New Georgia and to conduct interceptions over the Munda-Buin areas. It was understood the Americans held numerical superiority, but the Japanese were willing to take them on hoping their fighting spirit would prevail. Meanwhile, back on the night of August 12th, Admiral Wilkinson deployed an advance party of 14 men led by Captain George Kriner to perform a reconnaissance of Vella Lavella. They would be reinforced by Companies E and G of the 103rd regiment when the scouts found 40 Japanese around Biloa and another 100 5 miles north of Barakoma. They had reached the island secretly using 4 PT boats, though Japanese floatplanes would made to bomb one of them. After the successful arrival of the advance party at Barakoma, F Company of the 103rd landed on August 14th to reinforce the beachhead.  The main invasión force designated Task Force 31 led by Admiral Wilkinson  would consist of 10 destroyers, 5 destroyer transports, 12 LCI's, 3 LST's and two subchasers. At 3:05am  the 1st transport group of the force departed consisting of the destroyer transports with 6 escort destroyers were carrying the 1st and 2nd battalions of the 35th regiment. Captain Ryan led the group aboard Nicholas while Wilkinson was aboard Cony. The second transport group made up of the smaller vessels carried the Seabees and support personally following an hour behind with 4 destroyer escorts led by Captain William Cooke. After the force departed Guadalcanal they were to approach the Gizo Strait around midnight, before beginning to unload in the early hours of august 15th, under the cover of fighters.  However Wilkinson would not be aware his force was spotted by a G3M Betty bomber which reported back to Admiral Samaki who immediately launched a strike force. By 8am, the 1st and 2nd battalions of the 35th regiment had landed. While the 3rd battalion began their unloading process enemy aircraft appeared. 48 Zeros and 6 Vals were intercepted by American fighters. By 9:15 all the troops were landed, now the equipment began to be unloaded. The Japanese launched two waves from Buin, the first appeared at 12:30, made up of 48 Zero's and 11 Vals. They were intercepted leading to no damage being done to the landing forces. 7 Zeros came in low to strafe the beach but were turned away by fire from 65 automatic weapons aboard the LST's. LST's in the past lacked adequate anti aircraft protection, thus 20 20mm guns were borrowed from Guadalcanal and set to use. At 5:30 32 Zero's and 8 Vals showed up but they too were intercepted. By 6pm the LSTs were beginning to retract. The strikes had amounted to 12 men killed on the beach and 40 wounded, it could have been much worse. The Japanese reported losing 9 Zeros and 8 Vals for the day while the Americans would claim to have lost a total of 5 fighters. Without any real land battle the amphibious invasion of Vella Lavella was a resounding success. After darkness settled in, Admiral Ueno's 5th air attack force over in Rabaul launched their final attempt against the American convoys. At 5:30pm, 3 Betty's that had launched out of Vunakanau were spotting the convoy and reporting their movements. They came across the LCI's southeast of Gatukai and the LSTs as they were approaching the Gizo strait. 23 Bettys in 3 Chutai's, one armed with torpedoes the other two with bombs approached. The torpedo armed Betty's attacked the LCI's while the bombers went for the LST's. The American destroyers tossed up a lot of anti aircraft fire as the torpedoes and bombs failed to hit targets. 4 Betty's would be damaged badly for their efforts. The Japanese reaction to the terrible results was to form an unrealistic plan to wipe out the American invasion by sending a single battalion to the island. When the landings became known, officers of the 8th fleet and 17th army formed a conference. They estimated, with accuracy surprisingly, that the landing force was around a brigade in strength. One officer proposed the idea to send a battalion to counterland. General Imamura's HQ calmly pointed out that sending a single battalion against a brigade would be like “pouring water on a hot stone”. The men were desperately more needed for the defense of Bougainville. The Japanese knew they were vastly outnumbered in the Solomons and that the fight for the central solomons was pretty much lost. They believed their only chance to successfully defend the rest of the solomons was to carry out a slow retreat in order to build up forces in Bougainville and Rabaul.  It was decided that two rifle companies of the Miktami battalion and a platoon from the Yokosuka 7th SNLF would be sent to Horaniu on the northeast corner of Vella Lavella. These forces would establish a barge staging base between Kolombangara and the Shortlands. Alongside this Rekata bay would be evacuated and its 7th Kure SNLF would set up a relay base at Choiseul. Imamura nad Kusaka planned to hold Horaniu for as long as possible, trying to establish a new supply route along the west coast of Choiseul.  For the Horaniu operation, Admiral Ijuins destroyer squadron of Sazanami, Shigure, Hamakaze and Isokaze were going to escort 22 barges, supported by 3 torpedo boats and two subchasers. The small armada departed Rabaul on August 17th, but Ijuin's destroyers were spotted quickly by an allied search plane 100 miles out of Rabaul. In fact, Wilkinson was anticipating the Japanese heading for Kolombangara or perhaps Barakoma. He sent 4 destroyers, the Nicholas, O'Bannon, Taylor and Chevalier under Captain Thomas Ryan. Ryan had been an ensign in Yokohama during the 1923 Great Kanto earthquake, where he saved the love of one Mrs. Slack from the burning Grand Hotel. This earned him the medal of honor making him 1 of 18 men to receive the medal of honor during the interwar period of 1920-1940. Ryans force departed Tulagi while the other American convoy, the 2nd echelon led by Cooke were landing equipment at Barakoma. By nightfall Ryans squadron were coming up the slot while the enemy convoy was being harassed by 4 Avengers. The Avengers failed to score hits, but the anti aircraft gunfire alerted Ryan, as the Japanese were reversing course heading in his direction. At 12:29am on August 18th O'Bannon made radar contact and a few minutes later the Americans could see the Japanese ships. At 12:32 the Japanese spotted Ryans force, prompting Ijuin to order a 45 degree turn northwest to try and lure the enemy away from the convoy. As his ruse succeeded there would be a pretty ineffective long range gun and torpedo duel seeing Hamakaze and Isokaze taking slight damage. Meanwhile the Japanese barges were racing to the coast. Ryan believed he had foiled the reinforcement when he engaged the destroyers . But because Chevalier was facing some mechanical failures and could not keep up speed to chase the Japanese destroyers, Ryan decided to turn back to engage the already landed reinforcements at Horaniu. However they managed to escape north too quickly, thus the Horaniu operation was quite a bit of success, with a lot of luck at play. Now we are shifting over to the frigid north waters of the Aleutians. The fall of Attu and Munda were pivotal moments of the Pacific war that completely changed the course of their respective campaigns. When Munda was taken, the Japanese realized the central solomons were a lost cause and began to move all resources and men they could to Bougainville. When Attu was taken, the Japanese realized the Aleutian islands campaign was a lost cause and decided to evacuate the forces on Kiska. The battle of the pips and miraculous evacuation of Kiska was completed by the end of July. Kiska was pummeled on July 26th and 27th under clear sunny weather. 104 tons of bombs hit Kiska's installation on the 26th in a large attack consisting of 32 B-24's, 24 P-38 lightnings and 38 P-40's. On the 27th it was hit with 22 tons of bombs. On August 1st Lt Bernard O'Donnel conducted the first reconnaissance sweep since the July 27th bombing and observed no Japanese fights, no anti aircraft fire and no ships at harbor. Meanwhile the blockade was being performed by Giffen and Griffen's task force who bombarded Kiska. Intelligence crews working on aerial photographs of the island and its installations noted a number of odd features. Practically all the buildings around 23 in all appeared destroyed, but with rubble patterns suggesting demolition rather than bombing. The Japanese also appeared to have done no repair work on the craters in the north head runway, which was very odd, it was around the clock kind of work for them. All the garrisons trucks seemed to be parked on the beach in clusters and it seemed they were not moving day to day. Some pilots reported a bit of activity, like narrowly missing flak and some vehicles and ships seen moving below, but Kinkaids HQ noted all these reports were coming from green pilots. Experienced fliers were not reporting such things. Radio traffic had vanished, some wondering if the bombing was so tremendous it destroyed all the radios. Generals Butler and DeWitt believed the Green pilots, but Generals Buckner and Holland Smith were very suspicious, pointing out that the Japanese had already carried out a secret massive evacuation at Guadalcanal. In fact Buckner and Smith kept asking Kinkaid to toss some Alaskan scouts ashore in rubber boats at night prior to an invasion to report if the island was abandoned or not. But Kinkaid had the last say in the matter and declined to do so. Kinkaid's decision was to go ahead with a full scale invasion of the island. In his words “if the enemy had evacuated the island, the troop landings would be a good training exercises, a super dress rehearsal, excellent for training purposes”.  On August 12th, Captain George Ruddel, leading a squadron of 4 fighters circled low over the anti aircraft gun positions on Kiska, received no flak so he landed on her North head runway dodging nearly 30 craters. The 3 other fighters followed suit and the pilots performed a tiny expedition for some time. They found no sign of people, just destroyed buildings and abandoned equipment. Nonetheless Ruddels report would not stop Kinkaid, only some scolding for doing something so dangerous. The invasion of Kiska, codenamed operation cottage, was set for August 15th. The invasion force was 30,000 Americans and 5300 Canadians under the overall command of Major General Charles Harrison Corlet. It consisted of Brigadier General Archibald Arnolds 7th division; Buckner's 4th regiment; Colonel Roy Victor Rickards 87th mountain infantry regiment, the 13th Canadian Brigade known as the Greenlight Force which consisted of the Canadian Fusiliers regiment, the 1st Battalion of Winnipeg Grenadiers, the Rocky Mountain Rangers regiment and Le Regiment de Hull led by Major General George Pearkers; there was also Colonel Robert Fredericks 1st Special Service force consisting of 2500 paratroops of elite American-Canadian commandos. Kiska marked the first time Canadian conscripts were sent to a combat zone in WW2. The men were equipped in Arctic gear, trained mostly at Adak, practicing amphibious landings using LCI's and LCT's. The naval forces were commanded by Admiral Rockwell were more than 100 warships strong, with Admiral Baker leading a group to bombard Kiska with over 60 tons on August 14th. The journey to the abandoned island was pretty uneventful. On August 15th, Admiral Rockwell dispatched the transports to gather off Kiska during a period of light fog. Major General Corlett's plan was to stage a diversionary landing using a detachment of Alaskan Scout led by Colonel Verbeck to hit Gertrude Cove which was assumed to be heavily fortified. While this occurred an advance force of the 1st, 2nd and provisional battalions of the 1st regiment, 1st special service force would secure the western side of the island, known as Quisling cove. The main force would land at a beach on the north near the Kiska volcano. Colonel Verbecks scouts and Colonel Robert Fredericks commands were the first to come ashore. They were met by empty machine gun nests as they climbed Lard Hill, Larry Hill and Lawson Hill, interesting names. They investigated caves and ravines only to find destroyed equipment. But perhaps the enemy was simply further up in the hills saving their ammunition to ambush them. During the morning the main force landed on Kiskas northern side whereupon they immediately began climbing some cliffs to reach objectives. In the process each battalion of the 87th mountain regiment captured Robber Hill, Riot Hill and Rose Hill. US Army Lt George Earle recalled this of the unique landscapes of Kiska “At one end was a perfectly shaped steaming volcano, cloudcushioned, well- wrapped […] all around were cliff-walled shores and, when visible, a bright green matting of waist-high tundra scrub and deep lush mosses – a great green sponge of slopes rising to a rocky knife-edge crest nearly eight hundred feet above the shore up in the fog, and zigzagging its ridge-line backbone toward the […] four-thousand foot cone of the volcano”. Lt Earle also noted the incessant rain and fog, Kiska saw roughly 250 days of rain per year on average and held a ton of clouds blotting out sunshine. On the day the allied force landed the island was blanketed with a thick fog. As the allied forces advanced they ran into a variety of booby traps the Japanese had taken a lot of time to leave behind, these included; typical land mines, improvised 155m shells with trigger wires, M-93 mine's laid upside down wired to blocks of TNT, timed bombs, candle bombs, and the classic grenades with trip wire. There was to be several casualties from booby traps. In the fog as timed bombs or other traps went off, allied forces opened fire towards noises believing the enemy was upon them. There was some friendly fire incidents amongst the Americans and Canadians, but not as much that has been perpetuated by quite a few videos on Youtube mind you. Its actually a myth thats been perpetuated in many books, in fact the main source I have been using for the Aleutian islands campaign is guilty of it sad to say. The friendly fire incidents on Kiska was not a large skirmish between American and Canadian forces that resulted in many deaths or wounded, no that was pretty much summed up to booby traps, a lot of them. If you want to know more about this, I did a podcast interview on my youtube channel, the Pacific War channel with Brad St.Croix, a historian focused on Canadian military history. The episode is titled the Canadian experience during the Pacific War, and Brad had a lot of, going to admit, vented anger about debunking this myth haha. Please go check it out, I have to admit of all my podcast episodes it has not received many views and I am sad at this because there's a lot of interesting stuff, like how Canada was going to be part of Operation Downfall. Anyways. The Americans and Canadians suspected the Japanese might be retreating into the interior or hiding in fight pits, so they were tense the entire time, after the stories from Attu who could blame them. The crack of a single rifle fire, would be met with more, but it always died down quickly. Corlett's forces continued to climb uphill towards Link Hill and Ranger Hill in the direction of the main enemy camp at Kiska harbor. They found all the fortifications they came across abandoned. The second wave of the main force were brought over consisted of the 1st regiment, 1st special service force who landed at Little Kiska Island unopposed. By August 18th Corlett was confident the enemy was not on Kiska, but he continued the search nonetheless, into the caves and ravine, until August 22nd. To quote Ian Toll's 2nd book of his pacific war trilogy  “Considering the expenditure of naval ordnance and aerial bombs on an island that had been vacated by the enemy, and the tremendous investment of shipping and troops in a bloodless invasion, the Kiska operation had been slightly farcical. In Pearl Harbor, the news was received in good humor. Nimitz liked to tell visitors how advance elements of the huge invasion force, creeping inland with weapons at the ready, were warmly greeted by a single affable dog that trotted out to beg for food” Indeed the capture of Kiska which ushered the end to the Aleutians campaign, was kind of a enormous blunder when you consider the amount of resources allocated to it. You always have to consider these resources could have been brought to the south pacific, but hindsight is hindsight. After the battle of Attu, the allies expected an absolute bloodbath on Kiska. For Corlett's men, the americans suffered 18 deaths, 170 wounded, the Canadians 4 killed and 4 wounded, 130 men also got trench foot. The destroyer Abner Read struck a Japanese mine on August 18th, suffering 70 dead and 47 wounded to bring the total casualties to 313. Generals Buckner and DeWitt sought an invasion of Paramushiro, but the joint chiefs of staff would gradually reject the idea because it was simply seen to be easier to drive through the central or south pacific to Japan. But I would like to point out, if the south and central pacific campaigns did not go well, the idea of hitting the Japanese home islands from the Aleutians could have been a very real thing. Kinkaid, Butler, Eareckson amongst many others would leave the north pacific to deploy in other theaters. It was only really Buckner who remained, DeWitt returned to the west coast, as did the majority of forces. Wanted a feel good end to this one. So the allied forces on Kiska found more than just booby traps, turns out the Japanese had abandoned a number of dogs on the island, so the allied troops adopted many of them and turned them into unit mascots and pets. Surviving photos of the soldiers and the dogs are abundant and cute. I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. The amphibious assault of Vella Lavella was a huge success, though now the battle for the small island was on. The farcical battle of Kiska had ushered in the end of the Aleutian islands campaign, birthing a long persisting myth to this very day of an incredible friendly fire battle. 

We love a good haunted castle, but actually, what castle ISN'T haunted? In this episode, we discuss the history and some spooky ghost stories of some of our favorite haunted castles around the world including Bran in Romania, Leap in Ireland, Himeji in Japan, Burg Eltz in Germany, Arundel in England, and Voergaard in Denmark. Tune in now to plan your next haunted vacation!

Last time we spoke about the drive to Lae and Salamaua on New Guinea and the mysterious battle of the Pips. The boys on Green Hell were having a hell of a time trying to capture Mount Tambu. The Japanese had made a pillbox nightmare around Mount Tambu and reclaimed Ambush Knoll. Ambush Knoll was once again taken by the allies, by Warfe's commandos to be exact, but Mount Tambu was proving to be a much tougher nut to crack. Then in the frigid northern waters of the Aluetians, the allies had just successfully retaken Attu, but at a horrifying cost. The heavy cost convinced the allies, Kiska would be a similar bloody affair so they sought some Canadian help for its invasion. Yet before the invasion would occur one of the strangest battle of WW2 happened, the mysterious battle of the pips. The Americans found themselves firing at ghosts. But today we are venturing over to New Georgia. This episode is the Fall of Munda Welcome to the Pacific War Podcast Week by Week, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about world war two? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on world war two and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel you can find a few videos all the way from the Opium Wars of the 1800's until the end of the Pacific War in 1945.  The New Georgia campaign in many ways was akin to Guadalcanal. The Americans had suddenly invaded the island, landing numerous troops before the Japanese could coordinate a way to thwart them. Once the troops were landed, then the Japanese decided to react, and by react I mean tossing troops of their own on the island to dislodge the Americans. But just like with the Guadalcanal campaign, the war of transportation was not one the IJN could seemingly win against the Americans. By 2nd of July US forces led by the US 43rd Division, held an overwhelming advantage of 15,000 troops compared to 9,000 Japanese, who had landed at Zannana with a view to attacking westwards towards Munda Point. It was a battle that took far longer than the Allies had envisaged. Stubborn Japanese resistance and their ability to infiltrate US lines and cut supplies meant an advance at a snail's pace, despite their control of the air and sea. Yet while the Americans were chipping away, bit by bit at the outskirts of New Georgia, the real defensive position was of course, Munda. Up until this point Major General Minoru Sasaki had done a great job of delaying the Americans while pulling his forces back to make a stand at Munda. Indeed the Americans had a terrible time fighting the Japanese and mother nature, as Sergeant Antony Coulis described one advance thus “We alternatively crawled up and down greasy ridges. We forded numerous jungle streams and swam three of them. The repeated torture of plunging into icy streams; the chopping away of endless underbrush and foliage; the continuous drizzle of rain; the days without hot food or drink; the mosquitoes tormenting us at night. It was sheer physical torture …” Sasaki had constructed a barrage of defensive entrenchments around the airport around Munda to halt the US advance. As Admiral Halsey recalled “Rugged as jungle fighting is by now we should have been within reach of our objective, the airfield. Something was wrong.” The now deceased Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto's plan to turn the Solomons into a killing machine in order to force the United States to parley for a negotiated peace, seemed to be working. With the battle turning into a stalemate, on 15 July Halsey sent the famously tough Major-General Oscar Griswold, of the 14th Army Corps to New Georgia. Major-General John Hester, who had turned down help from the Marines, was relieved from command of the 43rd Division and replaced by Guadalcanal veteran Major-General John Hodge. A Landing Craft Tank Captain named Jack Johnson  described the operation as a “screw-up. General Hester was army. I had him aboard one time. He was a little fart. He wore these high lace-up boots and carried a riding crop.” However, a lot of the blame would be placed on Rear-Admiral Turner, the commander of the amphibious forces who had insisted that Hester should retain divisional command as well as overall command of the landing operations.It also did not help that the 43rd “National Guard Division” were untested in battle. Griswold would find them in a state of near psychological collapse, prompting him to request reinforcements from the 37th division. The 37th division was led by General Beightler who was manning Reincke Ridge while to the south near the beach were the 43rd division under General Hester's command until the 29th and the 25th division of General Lawton Collins. Additionally Marine tanks of the 10th defense battalion from Rendova were arriving to replace recent losses and they would be critically needed to face the nightmarish Japanese pillboxes the Americans would be facing. In front of the Americans was a complex of camouflaged and mutually supporting pillboxes and fortifications amidst thick jungle. These defenses dominated several high features including Shimizu Hill, Horseshoe Hill, Kelley Hill and Reincke Ridge. They were made out of crushed coral and coconut logs dug several feet into the ground, with just a small portion poking out for their machine gunners and riflemen. It was these types of defenses that had plagued Hesters assaults. Across a frontage of around 3200 yards, Sasaki had established a series of these defenses along a northwestern axis going from the beach to Ilangana. Before the offensive could be kicked off, 161st regiment led by Colonel James Dalton discovered the Japanese held the Bartley ridge due east of Horseshoe hill. Their reconnaissance indicated double-logged pillboxes. Bartley ridge would be the most forward of the defensive positions and thus needed to be seized first.  To meet the enemy Sasaki ordered Colonel Tomonari's forces to launch a second counterattack against whatever allied forces showed up on the northern flank and he also requested the recently landed Yano battalion to reinforce the northern flank. However Tomonari's men had suffered tremendous casualties and he was still trying to rally the scattered men along the rugged highlands. Meanwhile Colonel Yano was only able to send his 7th company to take up a position northwest of the 3rd battalion holding Sankaku hill, because his other men were needed to defend Vila. Because of this Sasaki ordered the depleted 1st battalion, 229th regiment to reinforce the Ilangana line. Colonel Hirata placed the 1st battalion along the line between Sato's 2nd battalion and Kojima's 3rd, which would turn out to be a key position. The offensive kicked off at first light on July 25th. Commander Arleigh Burke took 7 destroyers through the Blanche Channel and bombarded the Lambete plantation for 43 minutes firing more than 4000 5 inch shells. Nearly at the same time, the new commander of AriSols, Brigadier General Than Twining sent 171 bombers and 100 fighters to hit Munda, the largest air strike thus far in the area. As Burke's destroyers were firing 5 inch shells, B-24's and B-17's led the air attack, followed by B-25's, Dauntless and Avengers. It was described by many eyewitnesses as “the greatest show on earth”. The Japanese were only able to toss back 57 Zeros at 9:40am who were intercepted quickly by a Rendova patrol of 29 fighters who shot down 6 zeros and lost 4 of their own. But from 6:30-7am, the 254 aircraft managed to drop 500,800 lbs of fragmentation and high explosive bombs over the target area, a roughly 1500 by 250 yard strip. The result was enormous clouds of smoke hanging all over Munda, but Japanese casualties were considerably light. As the bombardment was quieting down, Griswold unleashed the ground forces supported by the 43rd divisions artillery who were firing more than 2150 105mm howitzer shells and 1182 155mm howitzer shells. Colonel Brown's 103rd regiment advanced upon Ilangana point while the 172nd tried to envelop Shimizu Hill, supported by 5 tanks. The 172nd tossed their 2nd and 3rd battalions around the left and right of Shimizu hill, but by 10am, even with the 5 tanks the Japanese pillboxes had halted them in their tracks. 3 of the tanks were disabled because of vapor lock and a ton of time was wasted by infantry trying to extricate them. THe 3rd battalion on the lefthand side, tried to fight through machine gun and mortar fire, but found it impossible. The men tried to move around the pillboxes but found themselves fired upon by other machine gun positions. The 2nd battalion, 103rd regiment attacked in the center of the 43rd divisions zone and managed to progress 300 yards against lighter opposition. bY 10:40am Company E managed to advance 500 yards and by noon reached a beach near Terere. As Company E tried hastily to create a defendable position, the Japanese moved behind them cutting their telephone lines back to the battalion HQ. Seeing the opening, General Hester tossed in some of his reserves in the form of Ramsey's 3rd battalion, 169th regiment. They were ordered to charge through the same gap made by 3 Company. But as they marched towards the gap they were met with enfilade fire from the southern part of Shimizu hill and from some pillboxes to the south. The 169th were unable to exploit the gap and now E company was forced to pull back lest they be encircled and annihilated. To the north, Beightler kept his 145th and 148th regiments in reserve until Bartley ridge was neutralized. Dalton sent I Company to contain the Japanese pocket by attacking it frontally while the 1st battalion and rest of the 3rd battalion performed a double envelopment. The 1st battalion went around the left while the 3rd took the right, seeing both driving southward and northward for 200 yards. The 1st battalion led by Lt Colonel Slaftcho Katsarky advanced 700 yards with only light opposition, but over on the other side the 3rd battalion of Lt Colonel David Buchanan were halted at the offset by heavy machine gun fire. By the 2nd of the day the 3rd battalion would establish itself in a containing position north,south and east of Bartley ridge. E Company had to be taken out of reserve and sent into the line on some high ground due north of Bartley ridge to secure the right flank of the 161st zone. The 1st battalion advanced a further 400 yards west of Bartley and took up a position on a small rise northeast of Horseshoe hill. With the southern advance stalling somewhat, Colonel Stuart Baxter of the 148th was ordered to help the 161st's efforts at reducing the pocket on Bartley ridge. He performed a limited advance and his 2nd battalion led by Lt Colonel Herbert Radcliffe gained 600 yards without meeting Japanese resistance. Meeting no resistance, the 1st battalion led by Lt Colonel Vernor Hydaker took up the 2nd battalions position as they advanced further, allowing engineers of the 117th engineer battalion to construct a supply trail behind them.  Despite all of this Griswold was frustrated by the failure of his 43rd division performance. Ultimately Griswold blamed General Hester who he wrote about in his diary that night  “I am afraid Hester is too nice for a battle soldier. He is sick and all done in. Tonight I am requesting his relief from the division.” The next day he ordered the exhausted 172nd to hold their position while the 10rd would advance 800 yards from Ilangana for Terere. To support them the artillery bombarded for over an hour, allowed the 103rd to advance with some tanks in the vanguard. A crucial component of their advance would be the 118th engineer battalion led by 2nd Lt James Olds an acting corps chemical officer, whose men were equipped with flamethrowers who went to work spilling fire over enemy pillboxes. This led to the vegetation over and around them being incarcerated in a matter of seconds and many pillboxes were simply wiped out.  As I had said a few times in this series, the flamethrower would be one of the most devastating weapons in island hopping warfare. The flamethrower was gradually employed by both assault and mop up operations. However useful as it was, it did hold some disadvantages. The equipment as you can imagine was quite large and heavy, required the operator to get very close to the enemy positions and thus extremely vulnerable. For flamethrower personnel to be able to close the distance required rifle team protection. But what if you could alleviate these vulnerabilities by slapping a big flamethrower to a tank? Generals like Griswold and Harmon at this point began mounting flamethrowers to tanks and although it would not see the limelight at Munda, the Firetank as they would become known would become the most devastating weapon against Japanese defenses. By the midafternoon, Browns 10rd regiment managed to reduce around 74 pillboxes along a 600 yard front, successfully occupying Ilangana and continuing the coastal advance until Kia. While it was a great victory for Hester, it failed to change Griswolds mind about relieving him. Back over in the north, Beightler ordered another assault of Bartley's ridge. 6 light marine tanks of the 10th defense battalion led the charge at 9am. Companies L and K advanced in columns behind the tanks, tossing heavy fire from .30 caliber Browning automatic rifles (known as BAR's for my Call of Duty world at war veterans) and 2 flamethrowers. Unfortunately for the two guys carrying the flamethrowers, they were not properly protected by their rifle teams and were killed quickly. Very much like the learning of how to perform amphibious landings, it would take time to learn how to effectively use flamethrower units. The man managed to overrun a dozen or so pillboxes, but the terrain soon forced Dalton to frantically order men to extricate stuck tanks. During the morning hours a Japanese soldier burst out of the brush and planted a magnetic mine to one of the stuck tanks disabling it. A second tank was hit in its fuel line by gunfire while the remaining tanks managed to pull back and reorganize by 11am. After 5 hours of combat, Buchanan's 3rd battalion had lost 29 men and only progressed 200 yards and thus was forced to pull back again.  On the 27th, Beightler committed his 2nd battalion, 145th regiment to reduce the defenders on Horseshoe hill. They managed to occupy a knoll connecting Horseshoe hill called Wing Hill, but heavy fire from Horseshoe hill eventually dislodges them. Meanwhile Colonel Tomonari finally managed to rally his men together for an attack against the 148th northern flank, while Sasaki sent a machine gun detachment, which was actually some anti-aircraft gunners to ambush the 148th engineers causing Colonel Baxter to order Companies A and D to rush over to protect them. Further south, General Hester began tossing some more aggressive actions in combination with artillery and mortar bombardments, gradually pushing the Japanese off high grounds. The 43rd division was slowly advancing yard by yard on the right flank, now reaching within 500 yards of the coast, but the 8 tanks of the 9th defense battalion were demolished in the attacks. On the 29th, the 1st battalion, 169th regiment had to be brought over from Rendova to take up a position between the 103rd and 172nd regiments. Alongside 4 tanks from the 10th defense battalion and some engineers wielding flamethrowers, Hester now had enough hardened forces to push the Japanese. Because of the continuous fighting, all the American regiments were becoming veterans. Pockets of Japanese that would have once held back an entire american battalion, possibly even a regiment were not being reducing quickly and efficiently. The technique for reducing pillboxes, whether it be from isolating them or overwhelming them was becoming mastered. Broken down this process began with a complete non-combative reconnaissance of the Japanese defenses. This was followed up by a reconnaissance in force, usually by a platoon with extra units who would uncover a portion of the Japanese positions. The assault consisted of  parts: preparing an artillery bombardment usually consisting of mortars, firing off the bombardment, then storming in. The bombardments usually got rid of the brush and foliage improving visibility so the enemy could be targeted and damaged. If done efficiently, the Japanese would flee their pillboxes to take refuge. Flamethrowers and tanks made the process a lot easier for the finishing touch part. Soon the Japanese were being pushed to the crest of Shimizu hill. However while Hester was definitely picking things up better with the 43rd division, Griswold was determined to relieve him of command, feeling the man had exhausted himself. Now Major General John Hodge would take over the 43rd. Meanwhile to the north, the Beightlers 161st regiment infiltrated abandoned pillboxes on Bartley ridge near its crest. Over on Horseshoe Hill the Japanese were being hit with heavy bombardments while the 2nd battalion reoccupied Wing Hill and Companies G and F crept their way up the crest of the hill. However once near the crest they began to be pinned down by machine gun fire. The 1st battalion was hitting the hill from the southeast meeting heavy fire as well and they managed to reach 15 yards on top of the crest before being halted. By 5:30pm, the 2nd battalion was forced to withdraw to the foot of the hill, but two companies from the 1st battalion dug in on the crest. The americans lost 24 men died with 40 wounded. On the other side, during the night, Tomonari's main forces of 400 men arrived ready to attack at dawn. They attempted to move behind the rear of the 148th as Baxter's troops were advancing to Bibilo Hill. Baxter's force was spread out quite thinly across 1500 or so yards and they happened to be around 800 yards west of their main regimental ration and ammunition dump. The Japanese from a high ground position began firing down upon them with machine guns, rifles and grenades as forward units stormed the rations and ammunition dump. A ragtag group of service company soldiers rush over to defend the dumb returning fire upon the Japanese. Major Frank Hipp of the 148th took command of the force managing to hold back the Japanese. However as a result of this near catastrophe, Beightler ordered Baxter to withdraw on the 29th. Beightler believed the enemy was coming through a gap between the 148th and 161st greatly worrying him.  Back over at Horseshoe hill, Companies G and F reached the crest while E company was hitting its northern side, supported by machine gun crews from H company. The fighting for the north side resulted in hand to hand combat seeing E company make some progress. But by nightfall the 2nd battalion again was again withdrawing down the hill. The actions ended disastrously, as the men were hit hard as they withdrew down the hill taking enormous casualties and gaining nothing in the process. On the 30th, Bartley Ridge and Shimizu Hill remained in Japanese hands as Beightler and Hodge were reorganizing their exhausted forces. That morning, Baxter finally began his withdrawal, miserably under heavy rain, with Tomonari's troops harassing them with ambushes. The ambushes caused Baxter to order the men to dig in around the supply dump and that night saw numerous soldiers dying for water begin to use their helmets as rain catchers. The next day the 148th attempted another break through, but Tomonari's machine gun crews hammered them back towards the supply dump for another night. At this point Sasaki received new orders instructing him to keep the supply lines to Kolombanagara secure. He elected to prepare his men to withdraw to a new defensive line that would be anchored at Kokenggolo Hill to the right, running east of Bibilo hill towards the Munda-Bairoko trail, then it would pass north to Hachiman Hill. Yano and his battalion were ordered to come over from Kolombangara to take up a position at Sankaku hill; Hirata's 229th regiment would hold Kokenggolo Hill and Tomonari would take up a position at Hachiman Hill. These orders came after the Japanese defenders had suffered tremendous losses over days of fighting. In truth the Japanese defensive line was formidable facing the American 14th corps, and indeed the Americans had been held back for a long time. But the Americans brought terrible power, their naval, artillery and aerial bombing was constant and hammered the Japanese. By late July most of the Japanese emplacements near Munda were in shambles. Rifle companies that were typically 170 men strong had shrunken significantly, some down as low as 20 men. The 229th regiment numbered only 1245 effective men. The hospitals could not hope to care for all the sick and wounded as constant shelling rained hell from above. Aside from the sick and wounded, as a major result of the shelling, many men were suffering nervous disorders, to use the old term shell shock, but today we'd call it  Combat Stress Reaction “CSR”. To compensate for the losses, Colonel Hirata simply ordered his men of the 229th to kill 10 americans for every Japanese and to do so to the death. That's the kind of, I guess what the Japanese at the time would call fighting spirit, something that made the Japanese armed forces during WW2 unique, perhaps rather tragically.  General Imamura decided to reinforce Vila with the 3rd battalion, 23rd regiment and six companies to buff up the 1th and 229th regiments. This freed up the Yano battalion to take up their new position on the new defensive line. Yet still in the meantime, Japanese were still defending Shimizu and Horseshoe Hill to give the rest of the forces time to withdraw. On the 31st Major Francis Carberry's 2nd Battalion, 161st charged up Bartley ridge finding no resistance. Then at 4:45pm the 15th field artillery began firing on Horseshoe Hill while the American forces near its crest tried to dislodge the Japanese. Again they were unsuccessful. By the afternoon Japanese were withdrawing from the Ilagana line, covered by fire from Horseshoe hill. During the night Tomonari led his men to withdraw, but a Avenger spotted his force fleeing through a valley overheard and called in an artillery strike. One of the shells hit Tomonari's HQ killing a lot of his staff and nearly him. Tomonari's force had to abandon a lot of equipment, but by dawn of August 1st they had managed to assemble at Kokenggolo and Bibilo Hills. His 2nd battalion alongside Hara's quick fire battalion went into the tunnels of Kokenggolo Hill while the rest of the 1st and 3rd battalions dug in on Bibilo Hill.  Baxter received a message over radio on the 1st of August from General Beightler “time is precious, you must move, get going haste is essential”. The order was to get every man Baxter had and take Shimizu hill. Baxter rallied Companies A, E, B and G into a skirmish line with bayonets fixed and charged at 850am. By 9:30am the exhausted Americans reached Katsarsky's position where they handed the weary men fresh water and some hot food. Shimizu hill was theres. Meanwhile the 103rd regiment began their own attack. Hodge sent Companies E, F and G to march upon Lambeti which they did, finding no opposition. The rest of the 43rd found no opposition as they marched across Shimizu Hill, by 3pm they advanced 700 yards. Beightlers men captured Horseshoe Hill without firing a shot and as darkness fell on the 1st of august, Griswold ordered a general advance for the next day. Admiral Wilkinson brought a convoy bearing fresh troops of the 27th regiment to aid Beightlers right flank, but it took them until August the 3rd to get into combat assembly. In the meantime August the 1st would bring with it a significant increase in artillery bombardment. The 43rd divisions artillery commander, Brigadier General Harold Barker fired 2000 rounds on the 1st, followed by 2000 more on the 2nd, an incredible 7300 rounds on the 3rd and 3600 on the 4th. The Munda area was turned into an inferno. Yano lost the commander and all platoon leaders of the 8th company; 5 officers died atop Bibilo hill; Hara Masao was killed leaving his 1st battalion to be commanded by Sato on August 2nd; the tunnels of Kokenggolo Hill were one of the few safe planes, but a direct hit collapses an entrance to Sato's tunnel, burying him along with 60 men, requiring an entire day to dig them out. The Japanese were forced to take refuge wherever they could, preventing Sasaki from stabilizing his new defensive line. Captain Sugiura Kaju brought reinforcements from the 7th and 8th combined SNLF to Erventa where he loaded up the 3rd battalion, 23rd regiment to head for the Vella Gulf under the escort of Admiral Nishimuras cruisers Susuya, Chokai, Kumano, Sendai and destroyer Amagiri. However the naval force was intercepted by PT boats near the Blackett strait. The PT boats fired torpedoes at the Japanese destroyers, but none hit a target. Sugiura was able to land the reinforcements around Webster Cove, but the Amagiri rammed PT 109 just forward of her starboard torpedo tube ripping away the starboard aft side of the boat. Two men were killed, and one John F Kennedy, yes the future president was tossed around the cockpit of PT 109. Kennedy got the rest of the men to abandon ship around 11 in all. A few of them had serious burns and they were forced to swim for an islet 3.5 miles away known as Plum Pudding Island. Kennedy was the first to reach the island and he proceeded to help tow others to the island. The island was unoccupied, but a company of Sasebo 6th SNLF were nearby on another islet called Gizo. Seeing Japanese barges moving around, the Americans would make their way east to an island near Ferguson passage called Leorava island. It would not be until the night of August 7th when the coastwatch Lt Reginald Evans found them and helped them reach PT 157. For his courage and leadership Kennedy received the Navy and Marine Corps Medal alongside a purple heart for injuries he suffered. However the medals would pale in comparisons to the story written about the event by John Hersey for the New Yorker and Reader's digest which would give Kennedy a strong foundation politically.  Back to the battle, on August 2nd, Griswold's forces advanced across the entire front and by the late afternoon the 103rd regiment had already reached the outer taxiways of Munda airfield; the 169th were approaching Bibilo Hill; and the 37th division were 700 yards ahead of Horseshoe hill. By the end of the day, the Japanese defensive line was basically Kokenggolo to Bibilo Hill and the Americans were closing in on both. The 103rd and 169th had units around the eastern end of the airfield, many men using wrecked Japanese aircraft as defendable positions. The 145th and 161st were on the eastern ridges of Bibilo hill and the 148th were about to cut the Munda-Bairoko trail. The Yano battalion's position was taken so quickly, the Americans had failed to notice they had overrun it. Thus Yano withdrew northwards. On August 3rd, the general advance continued and with more open terrain present, mortars became a lot more effective speeding it up. The 169th were advancing up the eastern end of Kokenggolo Hill; to the north, the 145th were advancing up the eastern ridges of Bibilo Hill the 161st were breaking through on the right and the 148th were now along the Munda-Bairoko trail. The situation was desperate that night so Sasaki was forced to order the men to withdraw yet again, now towards Zieta. Hirata's 229th regiment was to hold their position until sundown to give everyone time, then act as a rearguard until they could withdraw to Kongo Hill. Sasaki likewise moved his HQ to the Kure 6th Farm at Zieta. The next morning brought further misery upon the Japanese in the form of an airstrike. At 7:20am 25 Dauntless, 24 Avengers and 24 B-25's bombed Gurasai-Kindu Point, which is just due west of Munda airfield were the Japanese had constructed fortifications and emplaced many anti aircraft guns. Griswold did not let up seeing perhaps the final push against Munda before him. Hodge's 43rd division with marine tanks leading the way attacked Kokenggolo Hill. Beightler's 25th division were striking against the Japanese northern flank, freeing up the 148th and 161st to advance west towards the beach. The defenders at Kokenggolo Hill offered strong resistance as they withdrew towards Kong Hill before the 161st managed to break through to the sea. The fiercest fighting would be found on Bibilo hill, where the 145th were fighting against the dug in 229th regiment. By the end of the day, both the 148th and 161st broke through to the sea north of Kokenggolo hill and the 145th nearly cleared Bibilo hill as the Japanese fled along a trail going to the Kure 6th farm. With Bibilo Hill reduced, the Japanese began abandoning Kong Hill to continue retreating northwards.  Griswold's 43rd division tossed mortars, infantry and tanks across Kokenggolo Hill driving away the last of the Japanese from tunnels, bunkers and pillboxes. Their forces soon crossed the western part of the Munda airfield. General Wing grabbed a military telephone and called General Hodge from Bibilo Hill stating “Munda is yours at 2:10 today”. Inturn Griswold radioed the good news over to Admiral Halsey "...Our ground forces today wrested Munda from the Japs and present it to you… as the sole owner…" Halsey then replied with "a custody receipt for Munda… Keep 'em dying." Munda had fallen at long last. The Americans had suffered  4994 casualties since July 2nd, the Japanese had 4683 death with a untold amount of wounded. With Munda captured, Tomonari was ordered to withdraw to Kolombangara to take command of the Vila defenses while Sasaki would move his HQ to Bairoko then move by barge to Vila as well. The 3rd battalion, 23rd regiment was deployed at Baanga island to cover the Japanese withdrawal using mountain guns. Admiral Ota's SNLF marines were to defend Arundel island. While these forces made their retreat, Admiral Samejima elected to carry out another reinforcement run. He would transport the Mikami battalion and on August the 6th with Admiral Ijuin carrying two other companies of replacements to Buin, Sugiura was once again sailing for Kolombangara. Sugiura had the destroyers Hagikaze, Kawakaze and Arashi while Ijuin had the destroyer Shigure. Meanwhile Admiral Wilkinson received reports from a PBY that sighted Sugiura's ships passing by the Buka Passage, so he ordered Commander Frederick Moosbrugger to depart Tulagi and sweep the Vella Gulf. Moosbrugger had the destroyers Stack, Sterret, Lang, Dunlap, Craven and Maury. He sailed south of Rendova to enter the Vella Gulf. He took his time going 15 knots to create as little wake as possible so Japanese floatplanes would not spot him and he was northwest of the coast of Kolombanaga by 11:25pm. Moosbrugger's plan  was to divide his force into two formations; a torpedo division consisting of Dunlap, Craven and Maury, and a Gun division consisting of Lang Sterett and Stack. The torpedo group would attack first once rader contact was made while the Gun group would cut across the bows of the enemy and open fire as the torpedo's were expected to hit. This was to be the first time in the Solomons campaign that the US navy planned to use torpedo's as its primary weapon. All 6 of Moosbruggers destroyers held SG radar, but much more importantly at this time an advancement had been made to fix the idiotic mark 14 torpedoes. The defective magnetic exploder was fixed and the settings that made them run too deep was fixed. Admiral King was responsible for the first fix while Moosebrugger on his own accord ordered the torpedoes to be set at a minimum running depth of 5 feet. Sugiura knew fell well he most likely did not hold the element of surprise, but he was prepared to fight as he entered the Vella Gulf with his destroyer Hagikaze in the lead. Moosebruggers force was passing through the Gizo strait before turning southeast towards Blackett strait. Then the Americans turned north up the gulf with the torpedo group leading the way during the dark hours when at 11:33 Dunlaps radar made a contact, bearing 19700 yards away. Moosbrugger immediately changed course to close in and began to line-up his torpedo attacks. For once the Japanese lookouts failed to spot the Americans, most likely due to a lack of moonlight. At 11:41 at a range of around 4500 yards Moosebrugger fired 22 torpedoes and at 11:46 turned his ships 90 degrees as the Gun group made a course to cross Sugiuras T. aT At 11:42 Sugiura's lookouts spotted the American ships silhouettes and torpedo wakes, but it was too late. At 11:45 7 out of the 22 torpedoes found targets. Two torpedoes hit Hagikaze, 3 hit Arashia and 2 hit Kawakaze. Hagikaze was hit aft her engine room bringing her to a stop; Arashia's machinery spaces were destroyed and Kawakaze was hit under her bridge detonating her forward magazine sending her ablaze. Shigure would be found later to have been hit by a torpedo which failed to explode. The 3 destroyers were disabled and burning wrecks. The Japanese fired 8 torpedoes in return, none finding a target as they frantically tried to turn northwards to escape. The Gun group opened fire sinking the 3 crippling destroyers in the course of an hour killing 820 of the 940 troops on board. The Japanese would later send 4 large barges to try and rescue survivors with around 310 out of 1520 Japanese sailors and soldiers being rescued including Sugiura. The IJN received a night action defeat which also killed and prevented reinforcements for New Georgia. The American torpedoes would soon strike fear into the IJN. I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. Munda has fallen at last, though it came at a terrible price. Now with the airfield in American hands, the battle for New Georgia would come to a swifter end. The US Navy finally got the chance to deliver a torpedo blow to the IJN and a devastating one it was.

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The Sicilian Mafia is one of the most murderously amoral organisations on the planet – yet babyishly sentimental when it comes to Italian peasant Catholicism. And, like other branches of Italian organised crime, questions exist over whether they have allies in the Vatican, some of whose senior officials are as keen on money-laundering as the Mafia, only not so good at covering their traces.  The relationship between the hitmen and the hierarchy casts an exotic shadow over a new series of thrillers by Alexander Lucie-Smith, the first of which, The Chemist of Catania, has just been published. To quote A.N. Wilson, Lucie-Smith's plots are fast and his characters unforgettable. 'Menace, suspense, lust, love and fear all enliven his narrative. I can see him becoming a real cult author.'  Some scenes describe acts of stomach-churning depravity. Others display a surprising degree of theological literacy – surprising, that is, if you don't know that the author is a Catholic moral theologian and hard-working parish priest of Arundel and Brighton. I hope you enjoy our conversation and buy Father's book. But be warned: page 95 is not for the faint-hearted. 

Welcome the Driven Female Entrepreneurs Podcast! The weekly show that helps you dream bigger and achieve more in your business, by learning what works from successful female entrepreneurs.   In this episode In this episode of the Driven Female Entrepreneur Podcast, I speak with Rikki Arundel, a Storytelling Expert and Gender Inclusion Speaker. Rikki developed a passion for public speaking at a young age, but ended up in the insurance industry. However, they pursued qualifications and training, attending conferences and discovering a love for personal development speakers, which were not yet popular in the UK.  After speaking at several events, Rikki was encouraged to join the National Speaker Association. They took the leap and joined the association. Attending a NSA conference in the US in 1995 proved to be a life-changing experience (can you imagine sitting next to Zig Ziglar?!). After their transformative experience, Rikki felt compelled to create a community for like-minded speakers back home. Drawing on inspiration from their own journey and the encouragement of friends, they founded the Professional Speaking Association. Now, through their expertise, they assist business leaders and professional speakers in utilising storytelling to enhance the impact of their presentations and motivate their audience to take action. Leveraging their personal stories and experiences as a non-binary trans individual, they also aid business leaders in promoting greater LGBTQ+ inclusivity within their organisations, leading to increased profitability. Don't miss Rikki's episode as they share their tips for captivating audiences with inspiring storytelling and creating a LGBTQ-inclusive business that makes all clients feel welcome and encourages authentic self-expression.   “To create a business that's more welcoming and inclusive to everyone, I would recommend you start engaging with people from different cultures and backgrounds.” - Rikki Arundel   Highlights In this value-packed episode you'll learn: How to handle or approach people and cultures you don't understand. A helpful way to make your business truly inclusive. The difference between women and men's storytelling. Tips for tapping into and utilising both your feminine and masculine attributes. The importance of learning how to speak up without feeling the fear of judgement.   "Being able to say what you think, what needs to be done, and expressing your own view comes from a certain level of confidence that you have to develop." - Rikki Arundel   About Rikki Rikki Arundel is an award winning speaker and was the founder of the UK Professional Speaking Association. However in 2002 their speaking career almost ended when they made the difficult decision to transition and begin living as a woman. Faced with considerable discrimination they changed direction, completing a masters degree in gender research and establishing themselves as a Gender expert. Today they will be sharing some of the lessons they have learned from living and working both as a woman and now as a non binary person.    Connect with Rikki Website           Linkedin          Facebook        Instagram           Twitter                        Access your Free Training (as mentioned in the show) The number one question I'm asked is: How can I get more clients?  To help you market your business and attract more of your ideal clients, don't miss this masterclass: Access your Free Training and Attract your Next Dream Client Here                                      Join the Driven Female Entrepreneur Community Come and join like-minded women in the FREE online community for Driven Female Entrepreneurs.  You can expect many more tips, tools and insights to support you as you build and grow your business to 6 figures and beyond!   > The Driven Female Entrepreneurs Club   About Your Host, Melitta Campbell Since 1997, Melitta has been using her ability to spot gaps between a company's goals and its strategy and positioning to help businesses become profitable and achieve growth - in as little as three months. By combining the insights gained from working directly with senior leaders for more than 20 years, her unique blend of art-school and business-school training, and her restless curiosity, Melitta has helped her clients identify new opportunities and develop creative solutions that add value in profitable and purposeful ways, that are straight-forward to implement and result in a clear competitive edge. After witnessing too many talented and passionate women fall short of their vision to make a profit and a difference, more recently, Melitta has brought her business, leadership and marketing expertise together with her personal experiences, to become a trusted advisor and coach for female-led businesses. Book your Free Business Clarity Call: www.melittacampbell.com

Welcome to this bonus episode of The Travel Diaries podcast, where we are going to be talking about some of the most beautiful and awe-inspiring national parks here in the UK. We're joined by friend of the podcast, former guest on Season 3, Juliet Kinsman, who is the Sustainability Editor of Conde Nast Traveller magazine, the author of The Green Edit: Easy Tips for the Eco-Friendly Traveller and an aficionado of the national parks of the UK. Today's episode is brought to you in partnership with BMW and National Park UK's Recharge in Nature Project, an initiative to support nature restoration, biodiversity, wellbeing as well as access - the project is enhancing the electric vehicle charging infrastructure around our national parks to make it that bit easier to use an electric car when exploring. Often they are so vast, so remote and so rural that if you're driving an electric car you might be anxious about when you'd next able to charge it. From the soaring mountains and serene lakes of the Lake District National Park to the rugged moorlands and rolling hills of the Cairngorms National Park and the wild horses of the New Forest, by uncovering Juliet's national parks travel diaries we'll not only take a closer look at what makes these parks so special, we'll also explore how we can ensure their protection for generations to come.So grab your your binoculars, your walking boots, and your sense of adventure, and let's get started as we delve into the National Parks of the UK! Destination Recap: Lake District National Park, EnglandSnowdonia National Park, WalesNew Forest National Park, EnglandThe Pig Hotel, Hampshire, EnglandLimewood, Hampshire, EnglandChewton Glen, Hampshire, EnglandCairngorms National Park, ScotlandSaorsa 1875 Hotel, ScotlandSouth Downs National Park, West SussexPetworth, West SussexArundel, West Sussex,Swanbourne Lake, Arundel, west SussexWildhive, Callow Hall, DerbyshireLoch Lomond National Park, Scotland To discover more about the Recharge in Nature Project, visit bmw.co.uk/NationalParks Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the latest Guides Gone Wild special release! Today we're hyping A Flying Flock, the intrepid all women team who'll be layering up in their bright pink and yellow snowsuits this weekend (February 4-5, 2023) to compete in the U.S. National Toboggan Championship taking place at the Camden Snow Bowl in Camden, Maine.The flamingos and ducks that make up this fabulous flock include five Mainers - Maile Buker, a marketing junkie from Portland; Tricia Tobey, an interior designer from Kittery Point; Marianne Naess, an aquaculturist from Cape Elizabeth; Helene Dicesare, a nurse from Arundel; and Deanna Smith, a lobster woman from Tenants Harbor - and a lone New Hampshire-ite, Lisa Teague, an interior designer from Portsmouth. Maile, Lisa, and eventually Deanna joined me  for an impromptu chat to talk about the history of the toboggan championship; their fundraising recipients, Trekkers; and why a handful of women 'of a certain age' would decide to impersonate a pink puff pastry with yellow cream filling and take their lives into their hands hurtling down a 400' long ice chute onto a partially frozen, rockpile strewn lake.It's freaking nuts, and I absolutely love it.Whether you're on Team Flamingo or Team Duck, you're going to enjoy these ladies' meteoric flight pattern.  So layer up, grab a balaclava and those cowbells, and head over to Camden Snow Bowl this weekend - the teams will be running all day on Saturday and Sunday morning in the hopes of making the finals.Check out the schedule and get information about parking, shuttles, the bands, the fun, all the things over at camdensnowbowl.com. And I hope you'll consider supporting Trekkers in honor of these brave ladies, you can go to @a_flying_flock on Instagram and use the link in bio to donate.**P.S. Maile wasn't kidding, apparently there was a flamingo-duck. And Chute Master Stuart Young has his own inspiring story!

Brendan Parkhurst, superintendent at Cape Arundel Golf Club in Kennebunkport, Maine, joins Andy as the latest guest in our Superintendent Series. Brendan has been at Cape Arundel for over 20 years and has helped guide the Walter Travis-designed course through its restoration. The special care needed for Cape Arundel's dramatic greens, how a tidal river flood impacts the grass, and the pros and cons of taking care of a 5,800-yard course are all discussed. Brendan also shares some tips for how to handle the security detail and motorcade when the President of the United States is a frequent visitor.