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Aviano Scorpions participate in 14-nation deployment

US Air Forces Europe News

Release Date: 8/28/2003

By 1st Lt. Kristin Haley 31st Fighter Wing Public Affairs

AVIANO AIR BASE, Italy (USAFENS) -- The 603rd Air Control Squadron here is preparing to deploy to the 2003 NATO Air Meet at Kzresiny Air Base, near Poznan, Poland.

The recurring live-flying exercise, which takes place Sept. 5-19, involves more than 80 combat and support aircraft and personnel from 14 nations. Other participating air forces will come from Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Turkey and England.

The NATO Air Meet is one of the few remaining large-force employment exercises left on the European continent. In fact, the Polish airspace for the exercise will encompass nearly the entire country; however daily exercises will only utilize portions of it.

The squadron will get excellent training and experience from NAM, but getting everything ready for the deployment may prove to be one of the more challenging parts as well, said Lt. Col. Kristen Dolan, 603rd ACS commander.

"Mobility is also a very important aspect of our mission," she said. "This exercise is a great opportunity for us to pack our equipment, move it to our deployed location, set it up and assess our ability to become operational within a specified time period."

Getting people and equipment ready for any deployment is a huge job. It requires a great deal of planning and coordination. However this isn't the first time the Scorpions have packed up all their equipment and loaded it onto a train. For the past three years, the squadron has loaded equipment onto trains for rail deployments in preparation for exercises such as CLEAN HUNTER in Germany, and TACTICAL FIGHTER WEAPONRY in Denmark.

"After watching the train being loaded last year, I walked away impressed with the men and women of the squadron, and also gained an appreciation for the hard work involved in executing a rail deployment," said Dolan.

However despite all the hard work in preparing for NAM, it is just the beginning. The 603rd will play a critical role during the exercise and is getting the chance to integrate into a C2 structure and to pass air picture information to other C2 units via various types of links, said Dolan.

"In addition to controlling a variety of aircraft from these other countries, we will have the chance to work with two other ground-based command and control units, one from Norway and one from Poland," she said. "Training like this is the key to interoperability."