CAP conducts search-rescue training

Dick Benoit

Thursday, Sept. 14, 2000 | 10:13 a.m.

Fifteen pilots and 30 observers took to the Nevada skies Saturday, and another eight pilots and 16 observers participated Sunday as part of a search and rescue exercise conducted by the southern region of the Civil Air Patrol's Nevada Wing.

The exercise was conducted from the Civil Air Patrol operations building at 2890 Rancho Drive next to the Metro Police Aero Bureau.

The purpose of the exercise, according to Civil Air Patrol spokesman Maj. Charles McCarty, is to train new mission pilots and observers in search and rescue techniques and provide refresher training for experienced search and rescue volunteers.

Mission coordinator for Saturday's activities was Maj. Sam Sotosanti. Maj. Jim Forney coordinated the Sunday portion of the exercise. Seven CAP youth cadets also supported the exercise.

Coincidentally, a small aircraft with a pilot and one passenger made an emergency landing on Rome Boulevard in the northwest part of the valley on Sunday.

In the scenario for the search and rescue exercise, a pilot was reported overdue and possibly down in a more remote and unknown area. The aircraft, with two people aboard, was on a planned flight from Beatty to Las Vegas, then to Mesquite, and the pilot supposedly could have diverted to Boulder City.

The scenario also assumed the pilot did not file a flight plan and that information was provided by family members when the pilot did not return home.

"That is often the case when pilots become familiar with a particular route," McCarty said.

Civil Air Patrol is a civilian volunteer auxiliary of the Air Force. The CAP conducts 85 percent of inland search and rescue missions dispatched by the Air Force Search and Rescue Coordination Center.

Air Force experiment

Nellis Air Force Base is hosting the "live-fly" portion of the Joint Expeditionary Force 2000 exercise this week. The flying for the exercise began Monday and was to wrap up today, according to Nellis spokesman Sgt. Rich Covington.

Nellis often hosts air combat exercises with visiting units from U.S. and allied air forces from around the world practicing proven combat techniques. This exercise, however, was intended to prepare Air Force people to explore new technologies and processes.

One concept being tried out during the exercise, Covington said, is "time critical targeting," which enables targets to be found, identified and destroyed on the same day, possibly within hours. This contrasts with past practices of targets being identified and then assigned in air tasking orders, a process that can take up to 72 hours before a target is destroyed.

Much of the flying for the experiment will be over the 3.1 million-acre Nevada Test and Training Range in Nye County. The range incorporates the Nellis Air Combat Training System.