Vietnamese refugees reunited with Navy personnel for first time since South China Sea rescue

By John Hanscombe
Updated June 18 2021 - 2:44pm, first published 2:00pm
Jim Broomhill, left, and John Tregonning bring an exhausted refugee to safety aboard HMAS Melbourne. Photo: Australian War Memorial
Jim Broomhill, left, and John Tregonning bring an exhausted refugee to safety aboard HMAS Melbourne. Photo: Australian War Memorial

Forty years ago, on a dark and stormy evening, a Royal Australian Navy Tracker aircraft spotted a small vessel in distress in the South China Sea. On board were 99 people fleeing Vietnam. On June 20 - World Refugee Day - rescuers and rescued will get together again for the first time.

In the lounge room of his home in North Nowra on the NSW South Coast, Vince Di Pietro thumbs through his pilot's log book, searching for entries on June 21, 1981. The 62-year-old retired Royal Australian Navy commodore is recalling his role in the dramatic rescue of 99 Vietnamese refugees, whose overloaded vessel had broken down and was adrift in a stormy South China Sea.

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