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Vigilant Shield: Robins Combat Comm squadrons participate in NORAD Exercise

  • Published
  • By Jenny Gordon
  • Robins Public Affairs
ROBINS AIR FORCE BASE, Ga. --  Their squadrons are usually the first in, last out; able to deploy anywhere in the world within 72 hours.

This time a team of 22 members from the 51st and 52nd Combat Communications Squadrons from Robins flew a few hours north to participate in NORAD's Vigilant Shield 15 exercise. 

They're part of the 5th Combat Communications Group, the Air Force's only remaining active duty combat communications group.

NORAD, or the North American Aerospace Defense Command, is a bi-national U.S. and Canadian organization that provides aerospace warning and control for North America. 

The latest training was conducted at the Royal Canadian Air Force's 5 Wing Goose Bay, in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador on the northeast coast of the country.

The Canadian NORAD region at Goose Bay hosted the flying portion of the exercise. It involved 550 personnel, to include members of the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Air National Guard and Canadian armed forces.

Providing communications capabilities, the Robins team shipped some 20 short tons of equipment such as phones, radios, generators, computers and wiring onboard a FedEx aircraft for the nearly three-week exercise. 

"We basically took our equipment, transferred it up to Goose Bay, and provided support with secure and unsecure communications," said Capt. Tyronza Snowden, 51st CBCS Combat Plans and Programs Flight commander. "We were charged with providing global communications, so we were able to see everything from the ground up, to see how our air piece integrated with our cyber piece, how our cyber piece integrated with our logistics, personnel, and more."

"It was an interesting experience to see how our bilateral partners worked together," he said. "We don't normally get to do something like this on a day-to-day mission. You usually just see a piece of your own pie, but there we were able to see everything come together." 

According to the RCAF, the exercise provided American and Canadian forces an opportunity to "realistically train and practice aerospace defense missions in a simulated training environment." 

The squadrons, in turn, train hard at Robins so that when the call comes to deploy, everyone is prepared for what needs to be done.  

As part of the exercise, 52nd CBCS members were charged with providing communications capabilities into a hangar- installing some 7,000 feet of cable throughout. It's a massive undertaking for less than two dozen people to put up satellite dishes, program switches and routers, generators and other equipment.

Staff Sgt. Nicholas Mattox, an electrical power production professional, helped set up generators, giving power to phones and computers for Internet service.

"You train and train to deploy, so it was nice to experience what it would be like in the real-world and up close," said Capt. Diane Perez, 52nd CBCS Special Missions Flight commander. "Overall things went very well."