  Current studies of the peculiar velocity flow field in the Local Universe are
limited by the lack of detection of galaxies behind the Milky Way. The
contribution of the largely unknown mass distribution in this "Zone of
Avoidance" (ZoA) to the dynamics of the Local group remains contraversial. We
have undertaken a near infrared (NIR) survey of HI detected galaxies in the
ZoA. The photomety derived here will be used in the NIR Tully-Fisher (TF)
relation to derive the peculiar velocities of this sample of galaxies in the
ZoA.
