NT: Veteran thanks sore feet for bomb blast reprieve

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NT: Veteran thanks sore feet for bomb blast reprieve

By Rod McGuirk

DARWIN, Feb 18 AAP - Joe McDonald thanks foot soreness for saving him from the firstbomb that landed on the Darwin waterfront.

The army veteran from Penshurst, Sydney, has made his first return to Darwin in a decadeto commemorate the 60th anniversary of the first Japanese air raid tomorrow.

The former Darwin Infantry Battalion soldier, who turned 81 last Saturday, remembershe was resting his scrub-shredded soles at camp on February 19, 1942, when he was supposedto be on guard duty at Stokes Wharf.

He had returned from the Tiwi Islands, north of Darwin, only two days earlier with40 children evacuated from an orphanage on Melville Island.

His feet suffered after his boots became wet as he unloaded a boat at a beach on the island.

"I tried to dry them and they went hard in front of the fire, my socks caught fireso consequently I walked bare-footed all over the islands," he said.

"My CO (commanding officer) thought we'd had a holiday out there and he thought weshould go on guard duty at the post office as well as the wharf."

But his sore feet excused him and he remained at camp at Parap on the outskirts ofDarwin's CBD when the wharf was cut in two by the first bomb dropped in the raid.

The explosion killed 22 wharfies.

The post office was destroyed by a direct hit which killed 10 civilians in the bombshelter below it.

Mr McDonald's injured feet eventually proved to be a five-month reprieve rather than his saviour.

He survived 25 air raids before he was struck in the back by shrapnel during a raidon Darwin's RAAF base on July 30, 1942.

He spent 10 days in hospital before returning to duties.

"It didn't put me out of the war; they just gave me an easier job than foot slogging," he said.

AAP rmg/ph/bwlD

KEYWORD: BOMBING MCDONALD