NATO exercise at the 36 ° Stormo

18/12/14

From 8 to December 12, the Ramstein Guard exercise 11 (RG 11) was held at the 36 ° Stormo of Gioia del Colle (BA), an electronic warfare activity planned for the "Annual NATO Electronic Warfare Force Integration Program "(NEWFIP), aimed at training NATO assets to conduct air operations in a realistic electronic war scenario (GE), with the aim of verifying and consolidating the" performance "of combat units in accordance with operational guidelines of Armed Forces.

The operation was divided into three phases: planning of the flight activity, deployment of the Falcon DA20 aircraft belonging to the "COBHAM Aviation" company which carried out missions on input from the CAOC of Torrejon (SPA), a real and specific exercise. deployment of the assets involved.

In addition to the flight crews, the support personnel of the 36 ° Stormo and the DA20 aircraft, the exercise also involved the 4th and 37th Stormo with Eurofighter aircraft, the 6th Stormo with Tornado IDS aircraft, the 50th Stormo with Tornado ECR, the 14 ° Stormo with KC767A aircraft to ensure Air to Air Refueling (AAR - refueling in flight), the 22 ° Gr.RAM of Licola and the Mobile Command and Control Department of Bari Palese, which provided the its support with the ITA-D-ARS component (Deployable Air Control Center, Rap Production Center, Sensor Fusion Post), allowing you to verify its operational capabilities. Specifically, the operational staff operated the control of the interceptors in conditions of radar and communication disturbance, successfully applying the Air Defense procedures.

The commander of the 36 ° Stormo, Colonel Andrea Fazi, noted at the end of the exercise how the participation of the structures in the prepared operations had a high training return for all the departments involved, providing the possibility of training in very complex electronic warfare environments .