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From Active Shooters To Drones, NAS Pensacola Completes Anti-terrorism Exercises
February 18, 2023
An annual anti-terrorism force protection exercise wrapped up Friday at area Navy bases.
Exercise Citadel Shield-Solid Curtain 2023 is an annual, two-part force protection exercise.
“(The exercise) is an important exercise designed to ensure our people and security forces are at peak readiness to deter and respond to potential security threats,” said NAS Pensacola Installation Training Officer Trent Hathaway. “We use realistic scenarios to ensure U.S. Navy security forces maintain a high level of readiness to respond to changing and dynamic threats.”
According to Hathaway, scenarios during Citadel Shield – the first week of the exercise – included an unmanned aerial surveillance exercise, a hostage situation and an active shooter drill, each of which members of the NAS Pensacola Anti-Terrorism Training Team used to gauge readiness from responding NAS Pensacola NSF personnel. Hathaway added that training serves to coordinate individual, departmental and installation responses to these drills.
“Exercising our personnel in response to varying realistic threats enhances our personal and force-wide readiness,” he said. “The exercise tests information dissemination, individual response plans, security force response, and our ability to coordinate with local emergency responders and the community.”
Hathaway also stressed that the annual exercise was unrelated to any current threat, but was designed and executed to increase readiness and to deter or respond to potential security threats.
“These exercises essentially enhance the training and readiness of NAS Pensacola security personnel and better prepare them for potential force protection situations,” he said. “We should train the way we fight, so ensuring a learning environment for security personnel to exercise functional plans and operational capabilities was one of the chief goals of this exercise at a local level.”
Hathaway said the second week of the annual Navy-wide exercise – Solid Curtain – centered around NAS Pensacola’s capability of exercising Navy Command and Control capabilities and evaluating the readiness and effectiveness of fleet and installation force protection programs.
“Coordination with area commands to ensure our force protection efforts are accurate and capable is something we test annually,” Hathaway said. “Communication during any event is critical in ensuring the safety of our most valuable assets – the men and women here – is critical to our ongoing mission of training the best aviators and aviation maintenance personnel in the world.”
by Bruce Cummins, NAS Pensacola
Pictured top: A NAS Pensacola Navy Security Forces sailor participates in an active shooter scenario during Exercise Citadel Shield – Solid Curtain. Pictured below: NAS Pensacola U.S. Navy Security Forces’ K-9 Handler Master-at-Arms 2nd Class Dylan Pilkington participates in a drone training scenario during Exercise Citadel Shield-Solid Curtain 2023. Photos by Bruce Cummins/NAS Pensacola for NorthEscambia.com, click to enlarge.
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