{"id":192335,"date":"2015-02-23T04:00:03","date_gmt":"2015-02-22T18:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=192335"},"modified":"2015-02-23T04:00:03","modified_gmt":"2015-02-22T18:00:03","slug":"6-nations-partner-accomplish-cope-north","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/6-nations-partner-accomplish-cope-north\/","title":{"rendered":"6 nations partner to accomplish Cope North"},"content":{"rendered":"

ANDERSEN AIR FORCE BASE, Guam\u2014More than 300 military members from six different countries joined together to conduct the humanitarian assistance and disaster relief portion of Exercise Cope North 15 here and throughout the region of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands on Feb. 15-18.<\/p>\n

\"Aeromedical<\/a>
Aeromedical personnel from the U.S. Air Force and Royal Australian Air Force transfer a simulated downed pilot from a U.S. Navy MH-60S Knighthawk during a multinational search and rescue exercise at Cope North 15, Feb. 18, 2015, at Anderson Air Force Base, Guam. (U.S. AIR FORCE\/TECH. SGT. JASON ROBERTSON)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"U.S.<\/a>
U.S. Navy Naval Aircrewman (AWS) (Helicopter) 3rd Class Ryan Fujii, Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 25, is hoisted into an MH-60S Knighthawk with a simulated downed pilot during a multinational search and rescue exercise at Cope North 15, Feb. 18, 2015, off the coast of Guam. (U.S. AIR FORCE\/TECH. SGT. JASON ROBERTSON)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"U.S.<\/a>
U.S. Air Force, Japan Air Self-Defense Force and Royal Australian Air Force aircraft fly in formation during a photo exercise at Cope North 15, Feb. 17, 2015, off the coast of Guam. (U.S. AIR FORCE\/TECH. SGT. JASON ROBERTSON)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"A<\/a>
A U.S. Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcon from the 14th Fighter Squadron flies along the coastline of Guam before joining on an aircraft formation for a photo exercise at Cope North 15, Feb. 17, 2015. (U.S. AIR FORCE\/TECH. SGT. JASON ROBERTSON)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Simulated<\/a>
Simulated downed pilots shield themselves from the rotor wash of a U.S. Navy MH-60S Knighthawk during a multinational search and rescue exercise at Cope North 15, Feb. 18, 2015, off the coast of Guam. (U.S. AIR FORCE\/TECH. SGT. JASON ROBERTSON)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThe Pacific theater and Pacific Command cover an enormous span of area, and every day we\u2019re encountering new issues,\u201d said U.S. Air Force Capt. Mark Nexon, CN15 HA\/DR mission commander. \u201cNatural disasters are very common\u2014there\u2019s a lot of volcanic activity, there\u2019s earthquakes, and tsunamis, and typhoons that remain a threat throughout the region, so practicing our capabilities and improving our capacities, and not just the United States, but all our partners in the region…working together, we can cover more area together.<\/p>\n

The U.S. Air Force, Navy and Coast Guard partnered with the Japan Air Self-Defense Force, Royal Australian Air Force, Republic of Korea Air Force, Royal New Zealand Air Force, and the Philippine Air Force to accomplish the training exercise. This marked the first time the RNZAF and PAF participated in Cope North to assist with the aeromedical evacuation portion of the HA\/DR exercise. Members from the Singapore and Vietnam air forces also observed this portion for the first time.<\/p>\n

The scenarios of the event varied to meet seven main objectives: Airfield assessment team insertion, deployment of contingency response airmen, expeditionary medical support, multinational aeromedical evacuations, substandard airfield operations, humanitarian assistance airdrops, search and rescue, and redeployment of the contingency response airmen.<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s Cope North also marked a first where airmen deployed off Guam to the nearby islands of Tinian and Rota for the HA\/DR exercise, versus the method of deploying troops to the local Northwest Field in Guam in the past. Rota was used as the hub location to support and provide relief to the spoke location of Tinian, which was fictitiously impacted by an earthquake and tsunami for the training scenario.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe interoperability during this exercise was amazing,\u201d said Sharon Rohde, CN15 HA\/DR lead planner. \u201cEveryone was very well integrated, and this was a positive reflection of our ability to coordinate with other agencies who have been very accommodating and extremely helpful in supporting us, especially the local civilian airports in [the] CNMI.\u201d<\/p>\n

To start off the exercise, members of the 36th Contingency Response Group from Andersen AFB and RAAF contingency response airmen deployed to Rota and also opened the airfield and accomplished substandard airfield operations on Tinian. There was also EMEDS established at Rota to aid exercise victims who were hypothetically transported from Tinian for medical care. When necessary, EMEDS members arranged some patients for aeromedical evacuation by multinational AE crews to be transported to a higher echelon of care.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe observed how the U.S. and Australian aeromedical evacuation teams manage patients and set up the hospital,\u201d said Philippines Air Force Tech. Sgt. Wilfredo Uiado, aeromedical technician. \u201cWe learned a lot and it was great to be part of Cope North and to establish relationships with the other countries.\u201d<\/p>\n

The four-day HA\/DR scenario on Rota and Tinian mirrored the team\u2019s real-world capabilities of being able to maintain operations for five days in the event of a disaster until civilian agencies would be able to support the impacted area. During that time frame, the air forces demonstrated these capabilities by treating 70 patients, moving more than 216 passengers, transporting approximately 700,000 pounds of cargo, and conducting approximately 25 airdrops before concluding and redeploying back to Guam.<\/p>\n

The exercise culminated with a joint, multinational search and rescue event off the coast of Guam on Feb. 18.<\/p>\n

This year marks the 86th iteration of the Cope North multilateral training exercise which is a long-standing, multinational event designed to increase interoperability, improve combat readiness, and develop a synergistic disaster response capability between the countries involved. The second half of Cope North will shift the focus to air combat training which will include air-to-air and air-to-ground combat and a large force employment exercise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ANDERSEN AIR FORCE BASE, Guam\u2014More than 300 military members from six different countries joined together…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":192336,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[2240,2241,51,2242],"class_list":["post-192335","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","tag-emeds","tag-exercise-cope-north","tag-guam","tag-sgt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192335","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=192335"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192335\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/192336"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=192335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=192335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=192335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}