Peninsula News Review
May 03 2006

TWO-WEEK FURY

By Christine van Reeuwyk

Watch your six next week, the jet jockeys are coming to town

The Russians aren't coming. But just about every other country will be here.
The military presence will be a little more obvious, and noisy on the Peninsula this week.

Exercise Trident Fury is a two-week joint, coalition-based exercise hosted by Joint Task Force headquarters and executed by the Pacific Fleet Commander. The exercise runs from May 8 to 19 and includes six Canadian and US Navy ships, 60 aircraft, including US, UK, NATO military aircraft and commercial training support aircraft, small Canadian and US Army elements - more than 2,000 personnel utilizing space in Esquimalt, Saanich Peninsula, Comox and Tofino. It will include all services of the military.

The goal is to provide challenging training to prepare Canadian Forces [CF] to operate with allies in a realistic threat environment. Terry Stewart, manager, marketing and development at Victoria Airport Authority, explained the role of the local airport to North Saanich and Sidney councils last week.

Victoria airport will play host to one-third of participating aircraft including F-15 (Eagle) and F-16 (Falcon) fighters, E2 Hawkeyes from the US and an AWACS from the UK. Takeoffs are tentatively slated for around 9 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. with landings near 11:30 a.m. and 4 p.m. daily. In an attempt to reduce noise disruptions, they hope to have little or no exercise flying at night or on the weekend.

They will utilize both Department of National Defense/CF and civilian facilities.
"These guys will fly friendly when they visit," Stewart said. "As friendly as warbirds can fly."

However, Lieutenant Commander Jonathan Myers, exercise planner, cautioned that these are 'war games', and scenarios can change without warning. "We need to approximate real-time scenarios," he said.

Another 20 aircraft will operate out of 19 Wing Comox including Cf-18 Hornets, CP-140 Auroras and NATO AWACS. Due to space constraints the base couldn't accommodate all the participating aircraft and so another 20 will return to their American home base at the end of each mission. Civilian aircraft including executive jets and alpha jets will also participate as civilian support. One runway will be closed during the exercise.

Aircraft will begin arriving May 4 at Victoria International Airport.
The public is welcome to watch the landing and takeoffs from three main public viewing areas at Mills Road, off of Willingdon Road and at the end of Canora Road.

Lt. Commander Myers ran through a presentation to both municipal councils, explaining the role of the Peninsula. He said all three branches of the Canadian military will be involved, with small army participation at Tofino. Also, a half-dozen navy ships will participate in the exercise, but none of those will be in the waters surrounding the Peninsula. Navy vessels may be present here as per usual routine.

Canadian Navy ships HMCS Algonquin, Winnipeg, Vancouver and Yellowknife, along with auxiliaries HMCS Oriole and Fleet Diving Unit vessels and two US naval vessels will participate. Operations will include live surface-to-air missile firings and the employment of air-to-surface Precision Guided Munitions.

There will be no increased risk to residents of the area due to the heightened amount of military aircraft in the air Commodore Bruce Donaldson, Commander of Canadian Fleet Pacific explained.

"These are very safe aircraft," said Donaldson. "They fly these [exercises] all the time."

The greatest risk he noted was the risk of curiosity bringing civilians too close to the aircraft. There will be security in place to ward off the over-enthusiastic citizen and secure the military assets.

Stewart said there would be three professional firefighters onsite, plus the military will have firefighters on duty. He noted that the situation isn't similar to an airshow, where pilots are performing manoeuvres overland and for crowds of onlookers. The aircraft will simply take off and land at the airport performing any difficult tasks off the West Coast of Vancouver Island, added Cmdr. Donaldson. He told Sidney council that most of the exercises will take place about 40 miles off-shore.

The Joint Task Force Pacific expects that the exercise will result in more than $2 million being spent on Vancouver Island throughout the two weeks. There will be more than 2,000 participants, 1,000 of which will be in the Greater Victoria area and more than 300 are expected on the Peninsula.