The Royal Canadian Navy’s Joint Task Force Pacific is currently in the City of Prince Rupert to host an event known as Exercise CLEARWATER.
This is a joint exercise that also involves the Army, Air Force and the Coast Guard and is mainly meant to show that Canada is dedicated to protecting it’s West Coast by land, sea and air.
And according to Joint Task Force Pacific’s commander, David Patchell, this exercise is not a development that was thought of recently;
“It’s actually been in the works for a while and this about increasing our ability to operate collectively in the Maritimes. It’s not a Navy task, it really is a land, air, sea, Special Forces and Coast Guard responsibility to ensure our littorals are safe and secure. So we’ve been planning this for quite a while.”
The officer in charge of the exercise, Major Mike Hughes, also went onto explain in more detail what would be happening throughout the near week long endeavour;
“We started the tactical activities on the 11th and will culminate them on the 16th with tear down happening a couple days afterwards and we’ll be departing here on the 17th and 18th. The focus is on exercising surveillance of presence activities in a joint and interagency environment. We have elements of the Royal Canadian Air Force, we have cyclone helicopters flying and doing surveillance missions. We have elements of the Royal Canadian Navy here as well. We have some small boats doing patrols, establishing observation posts in remote areas. We also have members of the Canadian Rangers here as well and they’ll be doing land based observation in the Maritime environment on some remote locations.”
Patchell then said that while this might be the first time an exercise like this has been done in Prince Rupert, it won’t be the last and he then provided the reason why Prince Rupert was chosen to host the exercise;
“Prince Rupert is the third busiest port in Canada, which is absolutely important for this economy and it’s growing. Up to 200 percent growth is expected in the next 15 to 16 years. So it’s really important for Canada’s economy to make sure we can safely and freely conduct all of the operations here in Prince Rupert.”
This exercise was also noted to be a good opportunity for all these collective parts of Canada’s armed forces to come together and further establish their working relationships, lines of communication and maximize their preparedness to handle any threats that come their way.