Wallaby Airlines

Twelve months flying the Caribou in Vietnam

Australian Air Campaign Series 6

By Jeff Pedrina

Published by Big Sky Publishing
RRP $19.99 in paperback | ISBN 9781922896247

No 35 Squadron was formed in 1942 in WA, performing vital transport missions across northern and eastern Australia but its exploits during the Vietnam War, operating the Caribou aircraft, remain the high point in the minds of many.

In Jeff Pedrina’s book we have a very personal account of his twelve month’s service in Vietnam with No 35 Squadron – dubbed ‘Wallaby Airlines’.

While the story is primarily about the people, and the personalities, he encountered during his tour of duty in Vietnam, it is also the story of a remarkable aircraft, the de Havilland Canada DHC-4 Caribou – the first mass-produced short take-off and landing (STOL) aircraft of its size. For seven and a half years it was the backbone of the airlift effort in the highlands of Vietnam. It was operated by the Royal Australian Air Force until November 2009, forty-five years after it first entered RAAF service.

First into the theatre in 1964 and last out in 1972, the Caribou aircraft and its air and ground crews were the RAAF’s quiet achievers in Vietnam. In the course of seven and a half years, Wallaby Airlines achieved an excellent operational record and reputation as a tactical transport squadron. This book, in its original format was first published in 2006.

This new edition is intended to bring the experiences of Jeff Pedrina, and the exploits of the Wallaby Airlines and its venerable Caribou aircraft to life for a new generation of reader.

As a footnote to the story, Pedrina describes the help he gave a Vietnamese refugee family via his local parish church. Was this, in some way, personal atonement for being involved in a war that many came to question?