$re = '/^(?:[^ \n]* +){5}(?P<extension>[^ ]+)[^-\n]*-\s+(?P<location>\w+)/m';
$str = 'Mar 7 14:24:29 10.52.176.215 Mar 7 12:24:29 963568 - Melbourne details-cable-issue - vdvfvfv
Mar 20 09:52:55 10.52.176.215 Mar 20 07:52:55 963569 - Brisbane cable-issue';
preg_match_all($re, $str, $matches, PREG_SET_ORDER, 0);
// Print the entire match result
var_dump($matches);
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php