"Well engineers really did have two roles. You know the first, the reason that we went to Vietnam which was probably three months later than the first Australian troops went over which was the battalion was because they didn't have support when they went out into the field and when they went out into the field they would come across things like booby traps or unexploded bombs, ordnance that Australians had never ever dealt with before.

"And the other role for engineers was back in base camp and when we were back in base camp we would take part of the perimeter so that we'd act as our own sentries, our own work within the perimeter and of course here we were doing things like building everything from latrines through to showers. You know these sorts of things. So we had a construction type role back in base camp as well as operating things like the rubbish tip you know these sorts of things."

CAPTAIN SANDY MACGREGOR