Tim The Yowie Man tracks down the Cathcart tank traps

The Canberra Times

Lining the forest outside Cathcart stands hundreds of timber posts driven into the ground during the Second World War by the Voluntary Defence Corp. The posts were designed to slow the advancement of an enemy tank attack.

Transcript

00:00 [Music]

00:16 So we found them. It's not a myth after all.

00:19 The tank traps of the South East Forest are a real thing.

00:23 Just walked up from a track deep in the South East Forest here,

00:26 extending about 100 or even more metres into the bush on either side,

00:30 are these poles, these timber poles that would have been driven in

00:34 by the Volunteer Defence Corps back in the 1940s, 1942, '43,

00:39 in anticipation of a Japanese attack from the coast,

00:44 coming up to the escarpment of the South Coast.

00:48 And these tank traps would hopefully have stopped any tanks

00:51 right in their tracks.

00:54 It's amazing that 80 or so years on that some of these are still standing.

00:59 We've counted on either side of the track, there's probably a good 80 or so

01:03 on either side of the track still in place.

01:06 But what you've got to be careful about, there's also many that aren't here.

01:10 They've been removed for whatever reason, or they've decayed,

01:13 and there's big holes in the ground that you don't want to put your feet in.

01:16 I think they're more of a hazard these days than any tank coming through here.

01:22 [Music plays]

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